![]() ![]() Frank Ginn (R-Danielsville) tried to legalize using the phone while the car is stopped in traffic. John Carson’s (R-Marietta) amendment to the state’s original law, there have been efforts to add to the rules or bolster the penalties. As Hydrick said, many mistakes factor into the danger we see on today’s streets. Maybe the lack of interest in obeying Georgia’s distracted-driving rules falls in line with the overall decrease in driver IQ and increase in selfish behavior. Drivers illegally park at higher financial risk. The first three offenses are one, two, and three points on a license and fines are, respectively, $50, $100, and $150. And the penalties for offenses were and are still extremely light. There were local and statewide grace periods after July 1st, 2018. The state tried to assuage fears about over-policing and tried to be sympathetic to people adjusting to the change. People seemed to take notice and either worked to get legal or schemed to break the law less obviously. Making radical changes to two things so personal to people - their phones and their vehicles - warranted the barrage. I spent a whole month writing about different angles of the law. In the months leading up to July 1st, 2018, there were numerous local news stories and ad campaigns to educate and warn Georgia drivers about the stricter law. The newer standard - hands-free in almost every instance - made the enforcement much more cut and dry. “So they had a difficult time proving it in court.” Any driver pulled over in Georgia for texting and driving from July 2010 to July 2018 could just tell the officer that they were dialing a number to call someone. “The previous law allowed people to talk on their phone while driving (and holding their phone)],” Hydrick said. Hydrick explained what other lawmakers, activists, and law enforcement have said to me before: The 2010 anti-texting law was extremely difficult to enforce. Hydrick did not name a particular factor for which to explain the decrease. Convictions did decrease to only about 50,000 last year. There were roughly 57,000 convictions in 2021, as Georgia road fatality numbers began to rise again. And that is despite the above-mentioned obstacles. The last two years (20) we’ve had over 50 thousand convictions (per year).” A stark increase. “Before the hands-free law was passed, we averaged about 10 to 11 thousand convictions per year for distracted driving. Did the citizen outcry about policing in the summer of 2020 change the enforcement strategy? Are staffing shortages and the recent rises in violent crime making this law have less priority? His response shocked me. I asked Hydrick how much the state and local agencies enforce the law and had the tactics in doing so changed. This has led me to believe that the newness of the Hands-Free Georgia Act has worn off and, likely, so has the effectiveness. ![]() ![]() My first assumption is that they are deprioritizing piloting a 3,000-pound, combustible metal wedge by choosing to message or scroll. My first judgment about drivers who are weaving and constantly tapping the brakes is no longer that they are under the influence, or unskilled, or tired, or timid. In 2023, this is even more obvious to me than five years ago. Idling at a traffic light phone-in-hand is bad enough, but so many motorists are still unabashedly thumbing and steering. In comparison to five years ago, many drivers seem to just blatantly hold their phones behind the wheel. The statistics show more success for the law than my anecdotal analysis does. If no one changed their behaviors after July 1st, 2018, then logic would state that more crashes would have distracted drivers, because the definition of such became broader. With the 2018 tightening of the original 2010 texting ban, several more actions on mobile devices became illegal for most drivers: holding a phone, watching and shooting videos, touching the mobile device for any reason besides dialing a call or adjusting GPS apps. So while driving has overall become more lethal since 2020, distracted driving has become less of a factor in those wrecks in Georgia. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |