re: #94 buzzsawmonkey

Driving while holding a cellphone is stupid; handsfree laws make sense. But the recent rumbles I have heard that it is “just as dangerous” to drive while talking on a handsfree is simply nuts. Will it next become illegal to talk to the other people in the car?

Back when CA first enacted their hands-free law I decided to go and compare accidents rates from 2006 with the early 90’s before cell phones were as prolific as they were now. This was all done using information publically available from the feds, and I think only applied to highway miles. Bottom line was I was unable to find any significant change in the accident rates over those years. The claim was that using a cell phone was as dangerous as driving drunk, and given that at any time many more are using a cell phone than driving drunk (at least I would hope so) if the claims of the studies actually held up in real life there would have been a huge jump in the number of accidents.

My theory for the difference between the controlled studies and real life is that the controlled studies really compare a distracted driver to a non-distracted one, in real life I’ll argue the normal mode for a driver is distracted. Whether they’re distracted talking on a cell phone or singing along to their favorite song on the radio really doesn’t make any difference.