Thursday August 20, 2009, 1:45 AM
When Lebanon Valley College student Nicole Gallo, 19, was hit and killed last week by a car whose driver bent down to pick up her iPod off the floor, it was just the latest distressingly sad story detailing the consequences of driving while distracted.
It also is another stark reminder that our laws, the way we teach people to drive and the emphasis on what we teach -- at home and in driver education programs -- haven't kept pace with the reality of today.
Nearly 80 percent of crashes and 65 percent of near-crashes involve some form of driver inattention within three seconds of the event, according to research from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute. The highway administration also says the biggest source of driver inattention is the use of a wireless device.
That needs to change.
The first step is to pass a ban on sending text or e-mail messages while driving. Clearly one is not looking at the road or thinking about driving when he or she is sending a text or e-mail. Legislation pending in the General Assembly would help address this problem. That is a good first step. But what is really needed is a federal ban. Our state and our country are juggling significant issues now, but this simple step would go a long way to saving lives.
This is not just a problem related to young drivers. It is a problem related to all drivers. Truck drivers who text while driving, for example, are 23 times more likely to be involved in a crash or near-miss than non-texting drivers, an analysis by Virginia Tech's institute showed.
A Nationwide Insurance survey aimed at studying the issue of driving while distracted revealed that more than six out of 10 drivers say they expect to be available by cell phone or other electronic device at all times, even though half of those same drivers say they have been hit or nearly hit by a driver talking on a cell phone.
We have advocated a ban on using hand-held cell phones in a car. There are enough hands-free devices available these days that there is no excuse for needing to hold a phone to your ear while driving.
But driving while distracted doesn't end with cell phones, e-mails and texting. As we all know, and the Nationwide survey showed, even people who believe they are safe drivers admit to changing clothes, shaving, reading, putting on makeup, and all sorts of crazy activities while driving. That is on top of eating, changing the radio, monitoring a GPS system, putting in a new CD, turning around to talk to someone in the backseat or picking up an iPod that fell to the floor.
All this has become acceptable behavior. In this case, the path to preventing the horrible kind of crash that ended up killing Nicole Gallo not only involves changes in the law but changes in the way we think. It needs education as well.
Deep in Pennsylvania's "Content and Performance Expectations for Driver Education" is a section on driver distractions inside and outside the vehicle. It is a small part of the curriculum. That must change. There should be much more emphasis on distractions because there are so many now adays.
Parents must insist on safe behavior when teenagers are behind the wheel, and they need to be role models themselves.
New drivers, in particular, and all drivers in general, should understand the factors associated with driving while distracted and how they play themselves out, often in tragic ways.
It was once the norm for children riding a bike not to wear a helmet. It was once typical to throw the kids in the backseat of the car and drive off without anyone wearing a seat belt. And stopping people from having one for the road was once not a national cause.
The solution to these basic safety issues has come with law changes, parental commitment and a shift in the way we think -- all accomplished through education at every level.
We need to add texting, e-mailing and other functions that get in the way of a driver's concentration to the list of things we once allowed.
It is time to get serious about stopping driver distractions. It will save lives.
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