A phone in the hand should be a primary offense for drivers - Uniontown Herald Standard

Anyone who drives has probably seen a car in front of them swerving on the road at some point.

Thirty years ago, the assumption was that the driver was intoxicated.

While that’s still a reason far more often than it should be, in 2020, there is also a different factor at play that causes erratic driving: a cellphone.

They’ve become appendages, practically Super Glued to our hands.

And heaven forbid you forget your phone at home when you go out! The anxiety that comes with nomophobia (no-mobile-phone-phobia) is all too real for some.

Bet your focus on driving improves, though.

The state House of Representatives wanted to help that focus along, voting 120-74 to ban drivers from using hand-held phones to make phone calls.

It was a great bill.

Unfortunately, an amendment to the bill before it was voted on removed its teeth.

Under the passed legislation, holding the phone to talk on it will be a secondary offense. It also changed texting while driving to a secondary offense.

A “secondary offense” means a police officer could see you violating the law, but could not pull you over unless you’re doing something else, like speeding, to warrant a traffic stop.

As the law stands now, texting while driving is a primary offense, meaning if an officer sees it occurring they can pull you over for that – no other violation needed.

Local police have said keeping up with driving texters is already enough of a struggle. They’ve told us that proving someone is texting while driving (as opposed to holding the phone to make a call) is tough.

Having both texting and holding the phone to talk be primary offenses would’ve made it much simpler, and, we believe, our roads much safer.

It’s hard to understand the objection to enacting a law that holding the phone for any reason (other than making a 911 call, which is an exception in the legislation) is enough of a risk to get pulled over.

Drivers who have a phone in their hands are distracted. Period. Full stop.

Anyone who claims that’s not true for them is sorely mistaken.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration noted that sending or reading a text takes your eyes off the road for 5 seconds.

At 55 mph, the NHTSA stated on its website, that the equivalent of “driving the length of an entire football field with your eyes closed.”

Think about how long it takes you to search for a phone number you want to call. It brings a similar risk.

It’s just common sense to enact legislation that stops that from happening, and acknowledges that holding a phone in your hand while driving is a primary – not secondary – offense.

The bill now heads to the state Senate, where we would urge local Sens. Pat Stefano and Camera Bartolotta to push back on this watered-down proposal. Tell your colleagues you want to put the teeth back in this legislation, and urge them to vote it down if that does not happen.

2020-01-21 07:00:00Z
https://www.heraldstandard.com/opinion/editorials/a-phone-in-the-hand-should-be-a-primary-offense/article_5783acb4-388b-11ea-8f47-1354cd035278.html