U.S. Withheld Data Showing Risks of Distracted Driving

[Jake Stillow]

Source: New York Times

June 21, 2009

In 2003, researchers at a federal agency proposed a long-term study of 10,000 drivers to assess the safety risk posed by cellphone use behind the wheel.

They sought the study based on evidence that such multitasking was a serious and growing threat on America’s roadways.

But such an ambitious study never happened. And the researchers’ agency, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, decided not to make public hundreds of pages of research and warnings about the use of phones by drivers — in part, officials say, because of concerns about angering Congress.

On Tuesday, the full body of research is being made public for the first time by two consumer advocacy groups, which filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit for the documents. The Center for Auto Safety and Public Citizen provided a copy to The New York Times, which is publishing the documents on its Web site.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/technology/21distracted.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=print

---

And no, people; using hands-free devices has not been proved any safer than using a cell phone in one's hand.
http://documents.nytimes.com/documents-from-the-u-s-department-of-transportation-s-national-highway-traffic-safety-administration#p=3

[Mythsaje]

1. Right, because a cellphone conversation (hands free)

is somehow worse than talking to passengers. Bullshit.

On edit: Welcome to DU.

Believe me, this isn't a new argument here.

[NashVegas]

3. You Must Be One of Those Lucky People

Who have no perceivable differences in trying to concentrate on a cellphone call and drive, and carrying on a conversation with a passenger 2 feet away from you, in the flesh. I envy you.

[FREEWILL56]

25. To me there is no difference between the 2.

Both are dangerous distractions and most people can't walk and chew gum at the same time and go figure that they are trying to drive and talk at the same time. It's hard to make laws like this to protect people, be it to protect the victims or the drivers, because most people are incompetent assholes. I've seen drivers reading papers, putting on makeup, fixing their hair, shaving, picking their nose, texting, and even watching tv. Maybe they should change the driving test to reflect their ability to handle multitasking? At least that way the ones that aren't good at it won't pass to be on the road, legally.

[Odin2005]

32. And I should believe your anecdotal evidence over science WHY?

[kath]

4. Not bullshit - there is scientific evidence to back it up.

My daughter read some of these papers for a Psychology class last fall. And a recent article posted here at DU in the past few days backs this up as well.

Different parts of your brain are activated when carrying out a phone conversation vs. talking to someone you are with. Plus, a passenger is aware of traffic, weather and other dangers the driver is facing and will shut up accordingly, or even warn the driver.

[Mythsaje]

10. Yeah, because having your passenger yell "LOOK OUT" isn't a distraction

especially when it's something you already knew about. I don't know who's offering this nonsense p.o.v. about what passengers are and are not aware of, but it doesn't fit with my 25 plus years of accident free driving worth a damn. Passengers generally don't pay any attention to the road unless you're scaring them to begin with. THEN they find a reason to pay attention. Otherwise they're yammering away, talking on THEIR phones, sleeping, playing with the radio, talking to the people in the back, etc...

And anyone who doesn't think passengers are more than likely a bigger distraction than a disembodied voice has never cried out "Hey, if you don't settle down in the backseat and stop touching your brother, I'm going to turn this car around RIGHT NOW!"

I still call bullshit.

[chascarrillo]

11. How about you read the research before drawing assumptions?

[lindisfarne]

24. The person you replied to writes fantasy books - and apparently, lives in his own fantasy world as

well. Science apparently has no place in it.

[kath]

16. For those who believe in science, rather than just their own close-minded opinions:

http://www.apa.org/journals/releases/xap144-drews.pdf Passenger and Cell Phone Conversations in Simulated Driving

http://www.psych.utah.edu/AppliedCognitionLab/cdir.pdf Cell-Phone–Induced Driver Distraction

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2684625 Telephone Conversation Impairs Sustained Visual Attention Via A Central Bottleneck

http://www.webbikeworld.com/Motorcycle-Safety/cell-phone-crash.htm Cell Phone Crash Study ---- This article reports on an Australian study. Note this quote:
"The study was conducted in the Western Australian city of Perth. The Institute first tried to conduct this research in the United States, but U.S. phone companies were unwilling to make customers' billing records available, even with permission from the drivers. Phone records could be obtained in Australia, and the researchers got a high rate of cooperation among drivers who had been in crashes."

http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/Drivingissues/20060830105036.html Cell Phone Use as Dangerous as Drunken Driving

[Name removed]

20. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[lindisfarne]

23. Thanks for those links. As you implied, some on DU are just hostile to the scientific method (& many

know little about how science is done) but others of us do appreciate your effort!

[Touchdown]

15. Wow. Can I touch you? I wish I was as important to the world as you.

I mean the absolute GALL of anyone to expect you not to bless your entourage with a phone audience just because you're behind the wheel of a well scented limo.

It must be true. People will surely die of loneliness if you don't accept their genuflecting whenever they petition for your audience, including your royal Lincoln chariot.

[provis99]

17. talking on a cellphone is as dangerous as driving drunk.

and even more annoying.

[babylonsister]

2. Holy crap! More...

Critics say that rationale and the failure of the Transportation Department, which oversees the highway agency, to more vigorously pursue distracted driving has cost lives and allowed to blossom a culture of behind-the-wheel multitasking.

“We’re looking at a problem that could be as bad as drunk driving, and the government has covered it up,” said Clarence Ditlow, director of the Center for Auto Safety.

The group petitioned for the information after The Los Angeles Times wrote about the research last year. Mother Jones later published additional details.

The highway safety researchers estimated that cellphone use by drivers caused around 955 fatalities and 240,000 accidents over all in 2002.


So how many more since 2002? :nuke:

[obliviously]

5. I post on DU with my blackberry while I'm driving!

but only in traffic jams and at long stop lights.
Unless I'm in a rural area with no traffic I don't answer my phone period. I let it go to voicemail and wait till I stop to check them.

[TheCowsCameHome]

6. Driving really interferes with my texting, cellphone talking, and newspaper reading.

It's sooooooo inconvenient to be watching the road.

[tblue37]

7. It doesn't even make sense for Congress to want to

protect cell phone use while driving. Who benefits from that who might be of any use to them at all?

[change_notfinetuning]

18. It's not who'd benefit, but solving another problem would be a

distraction to what they see as their real job - raising money for their reelection.

[harmonicon]

27. money!! yay!!

How much stupid shit do people buy for their phones for this reason? Crap "hands free" things like the borg-inspired bluetooth "I'm a jackass" earpieces, etc. Sale of these things in turn leads to more use of cell phones operated by the telcoms who in turn give shit loads of money to politicians to influence policy. That's what I would assume right off the bat at least. A more simple explanation could be to look at the knee-jerk reactions of some people here; a representative wouldn't want to piss off people who hate science (can you think of any other issue where that's been an important voting block?!) when doing something because of scientific evidence results in a law/policy/change which interrupts the lives of their science-hating constituents.

[chill_wind]

8. K & R

[Wednesdays]

9. Kicked and Rec'd

Too many times have I nearly been broadsided by cretins with their ears glued to their phones.

[KT2000]

12. I am so sick of

drivers crossing the center line into on-coming traffic (ME!) and it turns out they are talking on a cell phone.
Our state has a law that it is illegal to talk on a cell phone (hands-free OK) but there must be another reason for the stop. A totally useless law.

It is just plain selfish to use a cell phone while driving and the consequences can be serious injury or death. People shouild be forced to publicize their all-important conversations when they get into accidents while using a cell phone - including hands-free.

[FlyingSquirrel]

13. Oh, by the way

Reaching down to grab something that has fallen on the floor is not a good idea either. Or trying to eat a tv dinner. Or trying to put your contact back in. Or trying to catch back up with the two college coeds who just passed you in a convertible. Or checking to see how your armpit smells and fixing your hair at the same time. Or brushing your teeth in the mirror. Or changing your radio station, or putting a new cd in. Or playing Risk on your cell phone. Especially that one.

[WatchWhatISay]

14. Or texting while driving

I suspect my daughter is guilty of this, since she almost always logs in excess of 3000 calls per month.

[harmonicon]

28. give me liberty or give me death: don't fuck with my risk!!!

Really there shouldn't have to be a law, because common-fucking-sense should dictate one's behaviour when driving a car, but as your many examples (except for the risk one!) illustrate, that is often not the case. Perhaps the real problem is creating a society where driving on a daily basis is a necessity for life, which in turn means making obtaining a driver's license painfully easy.

[TommyPaine]

19. In the past 5 years I've had many close calls (no pun intended)...

...with lousy drivers. Over half the time the other driver was on a cell phone.

I live downtown and walk around a lot. I see motorists on their cell phones, in their cloistered little worlds, paying insufficient attention to goings-on around them. Talk about accidents waiting to happen. It’s especially frightening and dangerous for vulnerable pedestrians and cyclists.

We're isolated enough in our daily lives, even more so behind the wheel, in 2-ton deathtraps of steel and glass. Today’s automobiles further that sense of isolation, make us feel more disconnected from the road, from other drivers, from pedestrians. Driving should be a fully interactive experience.

It’s time for all states to ban handheld device use by drivers while on the road.

[kath]

21. WRT cellphones, it makes no difference whether it is handheld or hands-free

(in terms of deleterious effects on driving)

[TommyPaine]

26. Yeah, I shoulda said...

...drivers should be banned from using all handheld and hands-free devices while on the road. And what's the deal with people listening to their iPods while driving? That's already illegal in my state, wearing headphones while operating a motor vehicle.

[Mnemosyne]

22. My very pregnant daughter and I almost hit by guy texting. He continued even after

horn blown and swerve by us. Wow. IDIOT.

[kpete]

29. Report: Agency withheld distracted driver research

Source: Salon

Report: Agency withheld distracted driver research

Jul 20th, 2009 | NEW YORK -- The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration gathered hundreds of pages of research and warnings about the hazards of drivers using cell phones, but withheld the information from the public in part out of fear of angering Congress, a newspaper reported Monday.

The former head of the traffic safety agency, Dr. Jeffrey Runge, told The New York Times that he was urged to withhold the findings to avoid antagonizing members of Congress who warned the agency against lobbying states. Runge said transit officials told him he could jeopardize billions of dollars of its financing if Congress thought the agency had crossed the line into lobbying, the Times said.

Critics say that the failure of the Transportation Department to pursue the role of driving distractions in car crashes has resulted in traffic deaths and allowed multitasking while driving to grow.

The research findings were obtained by the Center for Auto Safety and Public Citizen through Freedom of Information requests, the Times said. The newspaper posted the documents on its Web site Monday night.

The findings included:

Read more: http://www.salon.com/wires/ap/2009/07/20/D99IJGS00_us_cell_phone_study/index.html

[Mythsaje]

30. Dupe

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=3978430&mesg_id=3978430

[orleans]

31. k&r n/t

[Stuart G]

33. It was the Bush Administration...why? to sell,, cell phones...nt

[Festivito]

34. Republicans would love for Dems to restrict cell phone use in cars.

I bet some of the people here actually have a hidden agenda.

Holding a cigarette, changing the radio station, talking to a passenger, all take a bit from driving attention.

I also see people who do nothing and seem oblivious for it while driving, and they are dangerous.

This cell-phone banning topic seems too well funded. It makes me wonder.

[DJ13]

35. I bet most of those denying cell phone usage is a hazard use phones in their car

First person to text a reply to this while driving (without wrecking) gets a cookie.

[kath]

37. Yeppers - in one story I read, an OK legislator voted against a bill banning

hand-held cellphones because he so much liked using HIS phone when driving home each night.

Teh stoopid rulez out here - supposedly years back some other dumbshit OK legislator voted against a law requiring infant car seats because such a law would have deprived him of the sight of his daughter riding home from the hospital with his newborn grandbaby in her arms. :banghead: :banghead:

[snooper2]

36. A large chunk of people can't drive period

cellphone or no cellphone...

I don't know how many times I've been beside some idiot ( Male and Female ) on the highway looking to their right in the back seat yelling at a kid ( or something ) and the vehicle vears to the left...