Trucks at Work Blog

“Many states and localities have laws specifically prohibiting activities such as using a cell phone or sending a text message while driving. In addition, several states have laws that hold drivers accountable for distractions that could contribute to an accident.” –Stephanie Rahlfs, an attorney and editor with FindLaw.com

As efforts start ramping up across the country to combat texting and cell phone use while driving motor vehicles, another question is popping up – what constitutes a “distraction” while behind the wheel, anyways?

I mean, heck, I’m always sipping on coffee or some sort of heavily caffeinated beverage while driving me old ugly minivan – it’s the only way for me to survive occasional wee-hour trips I’ve gotta make up to Baltimore Washington International airport. So does drinking coffee count as a “distraction”? And if we start cracking down more generally on “distracted driving,” is this the kind of thing that results in a traffic ticket?

It’s an important question to ask because yet another study shows that drivers readily admit to engaging in all kinds of “distractive activity” behind the wheel – some that I would consider innocuous (such as drinking coffee) while others are downright scary (surfing the Internet while DRIVING? Are you KIDDING me?)

According to a new national survey by FindLaw.com, nine out of ten drivers say they have engaged in what the pollsters considered “distracting and potentially dangerous activities” while driving. The most common of these “activities” are:

Drinking coffee or other beverages - 81%

Eating - 76%

Talking on a cell phone - 66%

Sending or receiving text messages - 29%

Applying makeup - 11% (21% of women drivers)

Sending or receiving email - 8%

Reading a book or newspaper - 7%

Surfing the Internet - 5%

The FindLaw.com survey – conducted using a demographically balanced telephone survey of 1,000 American adults, with a margin of error of plus-or-minus 3% – also found certain distracting activities are particularly prevalent among younger drivers. More than half of drivers between the ages of 18 and 34 say they have sent or received a text message while driving, while one out of ten admitted to having sent or received emails or surfed the Internet while behind the wheel.

And yet … drinking coffee behind the wheel counts as “distractive activity”? I mean, sure, if you drop it or try to mix in cream and sugar while blasting down the asphalt at 70 miles per hour, I can see that as a major distraction. But, heck, if we’re going to ban drinking beverages behind the wheel, is nose picking not far behind? (Not, to paraphrase the great Jerry Seinfeld, that there’s anything wrong with that!)

“What’s clear from surveys, despite some variability in their findings, is that bans on hand-held phoning while driving can have big, long-term effects, but the safety implications still aren’t clear. Many drivers still use their hand-held phones, even where it’s banned, and other drivers simply switch to hands-free phones, which doesn’t help because crash risk is about the same, regardless of phone type.” –Adrian Lund, president, Insurance Institute for Highway Safety

Here’s a conundrum the growing movement to eliminate distracted driving must solve: do laws banning the most frequent forms of driver distraction actually succeed in changing patterns of driver behavior behind the wheel?

The answer, it seems, is decidedly mixed – and not in a good way. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) researchers recently conducted a new round of observations of driver use of hand-held phones in three jurisdictions where the practice is banned. The findings, along with results of previous studies, reveal a critical divergence – in some jurisdictions, such behavior declines and stays down, while in others, it only initially declines, then starts trending back up.

In the District of Columbia, the proportion of drivers using hand-held phones dropped by about half immediately after a ban on hand0held cell phone use while driving took effect in 2004. Nearly five years later, IIHS said, cell phone use while driving has edged up a little, but the decline is largely holding relative to nearby Virginia and Maryland.

That’s not the case, however, in New York – the first U.S. state to prohibit drivers from using hand-held phones in 2001. Connecticut enacted a ban in 2005. Comparing trends in New York with nearby Connecticut – which enacted a similar ban in 2005 – IIHS researcher’s found cell phone use declined an estimated 76% in Connecticut and 47% in New York, but then use began going back up.

To quantify the long-term effects, researchers observed phone use multiple times during 2001-09 in both the study states and nearby communities without phone bans, to estimate the proportion of drivers expected to be using hand-held phones if the laws hadn’t been enacted. By this measure, then, the laws seem to be a success as hand-held phone use was an estimated 65% lower in Connecticut, 24% lower in New York, and 43% lower in the District of Columbia than would have been expected without the laws.

Yet in Connecticut and New York, cell phone use behind the wheel was higher in spring 2009 among women of all ages compared with men and higher among drivers younger than 25 versus 25-59 year-olds. Only 1% of drivers 60 and older were observed using phones, IIHS said.

What’s more worrisome to Adrian Lund, IIHS’ president, is whether drivers are merely trading one distracting habit for another.

“Banning hand-held phones does reduce their use while driving, but it isn’t known whether such bans also reduce crashes,” Lund noted. “Nor is it known how drivers respond when hand-held phones are banned. This has important implications concerning the laws state legislators are considering [for] crash risk is about the same, whether drivers use hand-held or hands-free phones. So if motorists respond to hand-held bans by switching the type of phone they use, they may not be reducing crash risk. What they’re doing, though, is engaging in a practice that’s harder to curb because laws against it are harder to enforce.”

In a 2006 study, the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI) equipped cars with video and sensors to estimate the risk associated with using cell phones while driving. The main finding from that research is an almost 3-fold increase in the odds of crashing or nearly crashing when dialing a hand-held phone. Yet there’s also a 1.3 increase in crash risk merely for talking. However, IIHS noted that this study included only 100 cars and not many crashes occurred during the study period, so the results are inconclusive.

VTTI researchers, however, say the risk associated with text messaging may be much higher, based on a new study of truck drivers. The main finding is a 23-fold increase in the odds of crashing, nearly crashing, or drifting from a travel lane among truckers who texted while they drove. A limitation is that most of the incidents involved lane drift or other driver error, not crashes, and it’s unknown how such incidents relate to actual crashes.

Two other studies that relied on the cell phone records of crash-involved drivers show big increases in crash risk when drivers talk on phones, whether hands-free or hand-held, with the risk of a crash involving injury or property damage is four times as high. Other studies conducted on simulators found that cell phone use while driving not only impairs driving performance, the impairment is similar for hand-held and hands-free phones alike.

“Whether the risk associated with phoning or texting while driving is four-fold or 23-fold or somewhere in between, the fact of the risk is clear: Manual dialing and texting seem especially risky, but talking also involves crash risk – and drivers spend more time talking on phones than dialing,” lund pointed out.

IIHS added that no U.S. state currently bans all drivers from using hands-free phones. Though 21 states and the District of Columbia prohibit beginning drivers from using any type of phone, including hands-free, these laws are hard to enforce, the group noted – pointing to research findings in North Carolina that found teenage drivers didn’t curtail phone use in response to such a ban, in part because they didn’t think the law was being enforced.

That “human behavior” element (and oh how often “human behavior” totally CONFOUNDS all the nice and neat theories scientists and others put forth!) is also complicating efforts to get technology to make a difference.

IIHS said one approach to preventing cell phone use of any sort behind the wheel would be to use “Blocking devices” to prevent phone use in moving vehicles. But one problem is that such devices would block phoning by passengers as well as drivers. To get around this, some systems include a passenger mode, IHHS said, but it’s unclear whether drivers can be prevented from activating it to circumvent the whole purpose of the devices. On top of that, cell phone “blockers” of any sort for vehicles aren’t yet in widespread use, and their effects aren’t known.

All of this lays a big layer of complications atop efforts to reduce distracted driving; not unsolvable ones, mind you, but ones that require above all permanent changes in permanent behavior – behavior that many drivers, everyday motorists as well as truckers, feel is a benefit to them when behind the wheel. That will be a very tough nut to crack.

“We must act now to stop distracted driving from becoming a deadly epidemic on our nation’s roadways. This Summit will give safety leaders from across the nation a forum to identify, target and tackle the fundamental elements of this problem.” –U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood

This week, a two-day government-sponsored summit will gather safety experts, researchers, elected officials, and (of course) a variety of interest groups in our nation’s capital to focus on the growing roadway safety issue of distracted driving.

This summit meeting has been in the works for a while now, and it’s going to feature five panels – on data, research, technology, policy, and outreach – with a range of experts discussing each topic.

And these aren’t lightweights, I stress. For example, to “set the stage” for the summit, as it were, an overview of the problem of distracted driving will be guided by Victor Mendez, administrator for the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), this Wednesday with insight from: Dr. John D. Lee, professor, department of industrial and systems engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison; Bruce Magladry, director, office of highway safety for the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB); Kristin Backstrom, senior manager, AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety; and John Inglish, general manager, Utah Transit Authority.

Rose McMurray (at right), acting deputy administrator for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is leading a panel on determining how risky distracted driving really is, with insight offered by: Dr. Tom Dingus, director of the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute; Dr. William Horrey, with insurance giant Liberty Mutual’s Research Institute for Safety; and Dr. Key Dismukes, chief scientist-human systems integration division with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (that would be NASA – and you though there were no ties between trucking and the space program!)

Dr. David Eby, research associate professor and head of social and behavioral analysis for the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute, along with Rod MacKenzie, chief technology officer and vice president of programs with the Intelligent Transportation Society of America, are two of the luminaries that will discuss the distractions caused by technology, the efforts needed to assess and reduce the negative impact of distractions caused by current and planned devices, plus technologies that can prevent the consequences of distraction.

On Thursday this week, the legislative, regulatory, and law enforcement approaches to address distracted driving get a good going-over. Peter Rogoff, administrator for the Federal Transit Administration, leads a panel comprised of: John D’Amico, representative of the Illinois General Assembly; Bruce Starr, a state senator from Oregon; State representative Steve Farley from Arizona; Major David Salmon, director-traffic services division, New York State Police; and Vernon Betkey, chairman Governors Highway Safety Association and director, Maryland Highway Safety Office.

Probably one of the more interesting panels closes this two-day summit; a panel that not only reviews ongoing initiatives to increase public awareness of safety issues such as distracted driving, but also reviews research regarding the effectiveness of such efforts. Ron Medford, acting deputy administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), will lead this panel discussion, joined by: Chuck Hurley (at left), executive director and CEO of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD); Janet Froetscher, president and CEO of the National Safety Council; and Dr. Adrian Lund, president, Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

They’ll also be joined by two unusual guests: Sandy Spavone, executive director of the National Organizations for Youth Safety and Ann Shoket, (at right) Editor-in-Chief, Seventeen Magazine – yes, THAT Seventeen magazine. No doubt that Shoket will be able to tell the assembled experts whether any of their concerns about distracted driving are making any impact on younger drivers, especially teenagers. It’ll be interesting to hear what she says.

Even as this two-day event gets underway this week, efforts are being ramped up to legislatively attack many of the behaviors that lead to distracted driving.

For example, AAA and its safety advocacy arm AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety are launching a broad national effort to pass laws banning text messaging by drivers in all 50 states by 2013 – something that we’ll hear more about, no doubt, as the groups are participating in this week’s summit.

AAA pointed to a study by one of its state members, the Auto Club of Southern California, that analyzed a texting while driving ban implemented in the Golden State back in January – a ban that appears to be reducing texting by drivers.

Prior to the California texting while driving ban, researchers observed 1.4% of drivers at any point in time in Orange County, CA, were texting while driving, said AAA. Following the law taking effect, just 0.4% of drivers were observed texting—a decline of about 70% overall. This indicates that banning texting while driving can potentially change driving behavior of motorists, reduce dangerous distracted driving, and improve safety, AAA noted.

The problem though, is widespread, according to the AAA Foundation’s research. It shows that approximately one in five U.S. drivers admit to texting while driving at least once in the last 30 days. That is why AAA said it is advocating for laws that make it illegal for drivers of all ages to send, write, or read a text message or e-mail while their vehicle is in motion.

Currently, 18 states and the District of Columbia have laws that address text messaging by all drivers. Two more states have laws that prohibit teens or other new drivers from texting while driving – yet laws differ across the states and some have significant shortcomings, according to Tom Frymark, AAA regional president.

“New technologies that help us multitask in our everyday lives and increasingly popular social media sites present a hard-to-resist challenge to the typically safe driver,” Frymark said. “AAA will lobby nationwide to pass laws in states that lack them and improve existing laws against texting while driving. We’ll also continue our work through public education, driver training, and other safety programs to discourage motorists from engaging in the broad range of other distractions that tempt them while behind the wheel.”

Needless to say, it’ll be interesting to see how all of this comes together at this week’s big summit on distracted driving – and more importantly, how its findings may drive the creation of new laws and regulations across the nation in the months ahead.

“Who better than a national network of professional van operators to say which truck stop, motor oil, or brand of tire is best? These are the things they live with every day, and the King of the Road survey lets them share their knowledge and experience with the rest of us.” –Glen Dunkerson, chairman and CEO, Atlas World Group

The King of the Road survey is one of the few such reports I look forward to reading every year. Now in its sixth year, this survey – compiled from the responses of 340 long haul drivers, most of the owner-operators, employed by Atlas Van Lines, a division of Atlas World Group – provides both a serious and light-hearted glimpse into the lives of some the hardest working professionals you’ll ever meet.

Not only do these folks spend a lot of time criss-crossing the country (31% of them spending 31 to 40 weeks on the road, with 23% out there over 40 weeks out of a year), they also put a lot of miles on the odometers of their rigs (38% traveling 50,000 to 74,999 miles per year, with 25% clocking 75,000 to nearly 100,000 miles annually) yet must also painstakingly load and unload precious household goods with the utmost care – not necessarily a recipe for a fun work day for most people, I think.

Yet it’s a calling for most of these drivers, with over 43% of those surveyed boasting of 10 or more years working as a “super van operator” (as the call themselves) for just Atlas Van Lines – that’s regardless of past moving company experience.

But life on the road isn’t easy, as any long-haul driver – mover, freight hauler, whomever – will tell you. And the big challenge for most of these drivers boils down to one thing nowadays – staying fit and healthy.

Nearly two-thirds of the respondents to Atlas’ survey said maintaining a healthy lifestyle is the biggest challenge of life on the road, with 56% saying eating right and 24% saying getting enough exercise are their greatest hurdles. Yet many of them report they are doing what they can to stay fit by walking/running at truck stops (37%) and choosing water (71%) and fresh fruit (36%) as their No. 1 drink and snack. They’re also choosing Subway as their top “fast-food” restaurant out on the road now, besting runners-up KFC and Wendy’s by a mile.

These drivers, too, are trying to be “green” where they can in their working lives. Nearly all respondents (94%) said they are trying to do more to protect the environment, including recycling whenever possible (38%), drinking from reusable containers (28%), and using biodiesel fuel (12%). A third of respondents use noted they are using systems designed to reduce engine idling time.

One sad note (of sorts) gleaned from this survey is that days of the CB or “Citizen’s Band” radio may be numbered, with only 50% of drivers using them, replaced (not surprisingly) by cell phones. Nearly all (95%) of Atlas’ respondents said cell phones are their preferred method of communication. In another surprising finding, over a third (36%) of Atlas’ long-haul van operators report they have daily access to a computer, and more than half use a computer once a week or more.

Blackberries and other mobile devices are also gaining popularity on the highways, too, with 14% of van operators said they use these devices, up from 7% a year ago.

Then, of course, come the “fun facts” as I like to call them:

Most scenic highway: I-70 through Colorado/Utah/Kansas/Pennsylvania

Most boring highway: I-10 through California/Arizona/New Mexico/Texas/Louisiana/Alabama/Florida

State with the best rest stops: Florida (20%), followed by Ohio (17%) and Texas (16%)

Favorite hotel chain: Super 8 (36%), with the Days Inn a close second (30%)

Best coffee: Dunkin’ Donuts (43%) with McDonald’s (21%) a VERY distant second

Most effective antacid: Tums (31%) with Rolaids (25%) the runner up

Favorite music: Classic rock from the ‘60s, ‘70s, and ‘80s just edges out Country (37% vs. 30%)

Best Class 8 tractor: Kenworth (38%), followed by Freightliner (22%) and Peterbilt (14%)

Favorite motor oil: Shell Rotella (40%), followed by Mobil Delvac (31%) and Chevron Delo (16%)

Best tires: Bridgestone (36%) followed by Michelin (32%) and Goodyear (19%)

Favorite truck stop chain: Petro (44%), with Flying J (24%) a distant second

“The new information in this survey also indicates that many drivers are either in denial about their DWD habits or resistant to changing their behavior. This suggests that legislation may not be enough to eliminate distracted driving and highlights the need for a technological solution that can prevent cell phone usage in moving vehicles while still allowing people to stay connected.” –Bill Windsor, chief safety officer, Nationwide Insurance

Efforts are increasing to stop a wide group of behaviors lumped into the catch-all phrase “driving while distracted,” more broadly known as “DWD,” but according to a recent survey, it’s going to be an uphill struggle at best.

Nationwide Insurance noted that in its most recent On Your Side survey – conducted by Harris Interactive via its National Quorum telephone polling service – that 80% of Americans favor a ban on texting while driving, while two thirds favor a ban on cell phone calls and more than half said they would support a ban on cell phone use altogether behind the wheel.

Ah, but the devil is in the details as the old saying goes. The survey – conducted between Aug. 5 and 9 this year, among a nationwide cross section of 1,008 adults aged 18 and over – discovered that those polled say they are witnessing a growth in distracted driving behavior on the roads, with more than half noting they see more drivers using cell phones while driving than they did 12 months ago and nearly three-quarters pointing out that when they drive, they always or often see other drivers using cell phones.

Yet these same folks may be in serious denial about their own cell phone use behind the wheel. Nationwide said nearly half (49%) of drivers polled in the survey said a law restricting use of cell phones would not change their behavior because they don’t currently use cell phones while driving. “But when you compare this statistic to Nationwide’s 2008 DWD survey, which revealed that more than 80% of drivers admit to talking on their cell phone while driving, it may be the case that some drivers are either in denial or too embarrassed to admit their DWD problem,” noted Bill Windsor, Nationwide’s chief safety officer.

Then there’s resistance to new laws governing DWD behavior, as 18% of the survey’s respondents that admit to using their cell phones while driving say they would continue to do so regardless of a change in law, with Generation Y most likely to resist the change (26%).

Despite that push back, though, Nationwide said it remains firm in its support of the concept of a national ban on texting while driving – primarily because such laws could save lives by reducing DWD related crashes and thus lower insurance costs for consumers.

“DWD impacts all of us in one form or another and Nationwide will continue to raise public awareness about this important issue,” said Windsor. “By working closely with legislators, public safety officials and other key stakeholders we can arrive at real-world solutions to this problem and help make the roads a safer place.”

State governors are also paying much closer attention to this issue, with the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) recently enacting a new policy encouraging every state to ban texting behind the wheel for all drivers.

“The action by the GHSA membership is based on the fact that texting while driving is indisputably a distraction and a serious highway safety problem,” noted GHSA Chairman Vernon F. Betkey Jr. “If every state passes a texting ban, it will send a message to the public that this dangerous practice is unacceptable. We can begin to change the culture that has permitted distracted driving.”

Betkey noted that the recent study from the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute that indicated a driver who is texting increases crash or near-crash risk by 23 times influenced the GHSA membership’s action. However, successfully enforcing text messaging bans remains the tricky part, Betkey stressed, and hoped more information on how to do so successfully may come from a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) DWD enforcement demonstration project later this year.

“In the past, there were challenges enforcing seat belt and drunk driving laws. However, the research and highway safety communities collectively worked together and developed successful enforcement programs like Click It or Ticket,” added GHSA Vice Chairman Lowell Porter. “I am confident that we can do the same thing with texting bans [and] GHSA’s new policy will help move this process along.”

We’ll see how this theory plays out in the months ahead.

“The great secret that all old people share is that you really haven’t changed in seventy or eighty years. Your body changes, but you don’t change at all. And that, of course, causes great confusion.” —Doris Lessing

It’s a touchy subject, let no one be in doubt: getting older, taking more meds for various ailments, and how those two in combination affect one’s performance behind the wheel. And for the record, this issue directly involved me for a time: due to a pinched nerve in my spine, I had to take pain meds for a stretch – meds that definitely affected my judgment behind the wheel. Fortunately, for me at least, a series of spinal injections solved my problem (so far) allowing me to go off the pain meds entirely – so now my driving faculties are back at full power.

[In the interest of full disclosure, going off those pain meds proved to be one of the tougher and more unpleasant episodes of my life, let me tell you – but that story is for another day.]

I bring this up as a new study compiled by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety finds that a large percentage of older drivers – aged 55 and up – take one or medications per day, yet very few realize how those meds affect their driving performance.

The University of Alabama at Birmingham conducted a survey of 630 drivers aged 55 and older (with the average age 70.4) on behalf of AAA. Conducted between September and December 2007, the survey assessed the participants’ knowledge regarding both prescription and over the counter (OTC) medication use and how it might affect their ability to drive. Here’s what the survey uncovered:

• The overwhelming majority of those surveyed – about 92% – said driving was their preferred mode of transportation and 60% said they drove six or seven days per week, with men driving twice as much on average as women.

• About 95% of respondents reported having had one or more medical condition and respondents 75 and older reported the most medical conditions as well as taking the greatest number of potentially driver impairing medications.

• Approximately 78% of respondents currently used one or more medications, with 71.3% using one or more prescription medications, and 68.7% currently used one or more prescription medications that were potentially driver impairing (PDI).

• In addition, 19.1% of respondents currently used five or more medications, 12.1% currently used five or more prescription medications, and 10.2% currently used five or more prescription PDI medications.

• Overall, 27.6% of respondents indicated some awareness of PDI medications; however, awareness decreased with increasing age for both women and men. Few respondents (17.6%) had received a warning about PDI medications from a healthcare professional.

• Among respondents currently taking five or more PDI prescription medications, 21.9% indicated some awareness, and 18.8% reported receiving a warning about PDI. Among respondents 75 years and older, approximately 77% reported no-AEW, even though these subjects had the greatest number of medical conditions and were currently taking the greatest number of prescription PDI medications.

[To read the full AAA report, click here.]

This is the real kicker, I think – that few respondents (18%) received a warning about potentially driver impairing medications (e.g., ACE inhibitors, sedatives, and beta blockers) from a healthcare professional. Further, the study found that such warnings do not increase with increasing numbers of medications or with increasing numbers of medical conditions, noted AAA. In effect, the level of awareness of potentially driver impairing medications decreased with age, while in contrast the number of prescription medications people were taking increased.

Let’s face another fact here as well: a significant portion of the U.S. population (including yours truly) is getting older, and although older drivers are involved in a small proportion of total motor vehicle collisions (MVCs), they have the highest number of MVCs per mile traveled according to AAA. With the number of drivers 65 years of age and older expected to double by 2030 (according to the Federal Interagency Forum on Aging Related Statistics 2008), reducing the risk of MVCs among these drivers will increase in importance. Therefore, the relationship between medication use and MVC risk is likely to grow increasingly important as the older population continues to grow, noted AAA.

And the truck driver population is aging faster than most. According to the Transportation Research Board, by 2004, the percentage of truck drivers over 65 had risen to 3.7%. If this trend continues, more than 5.5% of the truck driver population would be over the age of 65 years old by 2014, TRB noted – a “graying rate” that’s almost twice as fast as the overall workforce.

Healthwise, too, truckers face other problems: according to recent research, 55% of truck drivers overweight and more than 50% smoke, compared to a national overall average of 20.9% and 25%, respectively.

This issue of surrounding aging drivers is only continue to grow unless measures are taken to increase awareness about medications that can impact safe driving, noted Kathleen Marvaso, AAA’s vice president of public affairs. High-risk groups include those with multiple medical conditions and those taking multiple medications or potentially driver impairing medications. “[We] need to be aware of health and wellness issues which can affect their ability to drive safely,” she said.

Indeed, it’s a trend that will bear watching.

“The bottom line is; distracted driving is dangerous driving. If it were up to me, I would ban drivers from texting, but unfortunately, laws aren’t always enough.” –U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood

Suddenly, the issue of “distracted driving,” specifically as it applies to the use of cell phone to either talk or text while operating a motor vehicle, is everything. No less than Ray LaHood, head of the Department of Transportation, held a press conference yesterday to note that a national summit meeting is going to be held in September to figure out ways to combat distracted driving.

“We’ve learned from past safety awareness campaigns that it takes a coordinated strategy combining education and enforcement to get results,” he said at the press event. “That’s why this meeting with experienced officials, experts and law enforcement will be such a crucial first step in our efforts to put an end to distracted driving.”

He noted that a number of deadly accidents involving text messaging behind the controls of not just cars and commercial trucks, but trains as well, highlight the dangers of text-messaging and other distractions.

In 2008, LaHood noted, a commuter train crash in California involving an operator who was texting on a cell phone killed 25 people and injured 135 others. In another incident, a Florida truck driver admitted to texting moments before a collision with a school bus that killed a student. In yet another only a few weeks ago, a 17-year-old high school student from Peoria, Illinois, was killed when she drove off the road while texting with friends.

“The bottom line is; distracted driving is dangerous driving,” LaHood stressed. “Following next month’s summit, I plan to announce a list of concrete steps we will take to make drivers think twice about taking their eyes off the road for any reason.”

There’s a legislative effort in Congress on this issue as well – one supported by trucking’s biggest lobbying group, the American Trucking Associations.

Introduced on July 29 by U.S. Senators Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), Mary Landrieu (D-La.), and Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), the Avoiding Life-Endangering and Reckless Texting (ALERT) by Drivers Act of 2009 would create federal funding penalties for states that fail to make texting while driving illegal.

Text messaging while driving is already illegal in Alaska, California, Connecticut, Minnesota, New Jersey, Tennessee, Utah and the District of Columbia. In these states, police can stop a driver for texting while driving and ticket the driver. Text messaging while driving is also illegal in Maryland, Virginia, Washington and Louisiana but police cannot ticket a driver in these states for the offense unless the driver has been stopped for another traffic offense. Six additional states have legislation in place that will prohibit text messaging while driving by January of 2010.

Congress’ ALERT bill, however, would require all states to within two years of the bill’s passage ban writing, sending or reading text messages using a hand-held mobile telephone or other portable electronic communication device. States that do not comply with the legislation risk losing 25% of their annual federal highway funding, noted ATA – and the group said this fits in with the industry’s safety agenda.

“We recommend that drivers and motor carriers consider policies that would minimize or eliminate driver distraction caused by using electronic devices while operating any type of motor vehicle,” the association noted in a press release. “Electronic communication devices hinder driver performance by taking the driver’s eyes off the road. Drivers may also become so absorbed in their text message that their ability to concentrate on driving is impaired.”

The ATA stressed, however, that it’s important that any legislation does not inadvertently require states to outlaw the use of truck cab fleet management systems that provide limited but necessary cargo-related information to truck drivers – an important distinction that hopefully won’t get lost in the legislative shuffle on Capitol Hill.

Yet the success of these various legislative and regulatory efforts hinges on changing human behavior, and that is no easy task. For at the heart of this issue of “distracted driving” is a cultural phenomenon that is widely encouraged – even prized – called “multi-tasking.” Jerry Osteryoung, professor of finance at with the college of business at Florida State University, notes that multi-tasking is now being routinely listed as a job requirement – and that “Generation Y,” roughly those born after 1980, prides itself on its ability to multi-task.

“How many times have you driven down the highway talking on the phone or even worse, texting? This has always bothered me,” he wrote in one of his columns recently. “I tend to want to want to ‘multi-task’ all the time too, and yes, I have sent text messages while driving. I am not particularly proud of this, but in those moments, it seemed that it saved me time and made me more efficient. [Yet] lately I have noticed that the more I multi-task, the less fulfilled and more stressed I feel.”

An empirical research study on the effects on multi-tasking done by Rubinstein, Evans and Meyer in 2001 compared how long it took to solve various types of problems (e.g., math problems) when participants switched from one task to another, Osteryoung noted. They then compared this to the time that elapsed when participants stayed on one task until completion.

The study found that multi-tasking was just not as efficient as doing one job until completion, said Osteryoung; the reason being that each time they moved from task to task, they had to catch up to where they left off. “Interruptions and multi-tasking have a similar effect in that before you can resume the task, your mind has to return to where you left off, and this takes time,” he explained.

Additionally, the study found that people who multi-task could lose 40% of their time. Although less time was lost when people multi-tasked between familiar things like driving and talking on the phone, the time escalated when they had to multi-task between complex problems.

As a result, Osteryoung said he tried an experiment; for one day, he did not allow himself to multi-task no matter how much he wanted to take a call or check emails while driving. Later in the day, he pulled over and responded to my phone calls and then emails all at once.

“At the beginning of the day, I felt very frustrated as I thought I was falling behind,” he related. “However, as the day went on, I started to feel less stress, and a sense of peace just seemed to envelope me. On top of this, I was able to accomplish all I needed, and it even seemed as if I was able to get more done than I would have while multi-tasking.”

Osteryoung said his little experiment confirmed to him that multi-tasking comes with a high cost both in terms of stress and productivity. “While clearly some degree of multi-tasking is always going to be necessary, the more you reduce it, the better and more productive your life will become,” he noted. “From now on, I am going to minimize how much multi-tasking that I do. I know now that, for me, it is not efficient and it makes me feel like ‘crap.’”

It’ll be interesting to see if engendering a more negative view of “multi-tasking” as a concept can help reduce the problem of distracted driving. We’ll how this view plays out as debate about this issue increases.

“As mobile technology evolves at a breakneck pace, more and more people rightly fear that distracted driving – phone calls, e-mails and texting – is a growing threat on the highways.” –Peter Kissinger, AAA Foundation president and CEO

Over a decade ago, I used to work in downtown Washington D.C. and commuted by what’s known locally as the “slug line” – an informal carpool network whereby people could get a lift downtown for free while allowing the car driver to use the high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes.

Of course, this form of commuting violates one of the big golden rules my parents drilled into me as a young child (‘Don’t take car rides from strangers‘) but the system worked safely and efficiently for the year and a half I used it.

Yet it also provided me with endless coffee table conversation as I met a variety of drivers whose behavior behind the wheel proved, to put it mildly, frightening. Once myself and two others got a ride from a gentleman in a Mercedes sedan; I got the front seat and thought to myself, ‘This will be a comfortable ride for a change.’ That’s until we hit the on ramp to the HOV lanes at 95 mph … and he started talking on his cell phone.

Despite the interior temperature registering 67 F, I literally sweat out a gallon of water on that ride into the city – blasting down the highway at breakneck speed while the Mercedes driver yakked mindlessly away on his cell phone. [We ‘slugs could not say anything to the driver, however – that’s one of the rules of ‘slugging’ as it’s called; the drivers only speak if spoken to. If I’d had an ejection seat, though, I would’ve pulled the cord and bailed out of there.]

This is a long way of getting around to the subject at hand – a recent survey by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety that finds 87% of motorists today rate texting or e-mailing while driving a very serious threat – ranking almost even with drunk driving.

The information comes from the second annual Traffic Safety Culture Index compiled by the AAA Foundation an effort to spark the dialogue about improving our safety culture and working toward the goal of zero deaths on our nation’s highways, says the group’s president, Peter Kissinger.

Distracted driving was top-of-mind for motorists, with 80 percent of motorists rating distracted driving as a very serious threat to their safety, the group reported. Even those who admitted to distracted driving acknowledged they were putting themselves in danger, with more than half of those who admitted to reading or sending text messages or e-mails while driving indicated they were much more likely to have an accident.

Here are some more of the findings from the 2009 Traffic Safety Culture Index survey:

• About 90% of respondents said people driving after drinking alcohol was a very serious threat to their safety; 87% said the same about text messaging or e-mailing while driving;

• Some 80% of motorists rated distracted driving as a very serious threat to their safety, yet many admitted performing distracted behaviors like talking on the cell phone or texting or e-mailing while driving within the last month;

• Over two-thirds admitted to talking on a cell phone and 21% admitted to reading or sending a text message or e-mail while driving in the past month

• Nearly 90% said that texting or e-mailing while driving was a very serious threat to safety, yet 18% of those same people admitted texting in the past month;

• Some 58% said that talking on a cell phone while driving was a very serious threat to their safety, yet 55% of those same people self-reported talking on cell phones while driving in the past month;

• Nine out of 10 people considered running a red light unacceptable, yet 26% of those same people admitted to running a red light;

• Nine out of 10 people considered tailgating unacceptable, yet 24% of those same people admitted to tailgating in the past 30 days;

• Some 63% considered speeding 15 mph or more on the highway unacceptable, yet 28% of those same people admitted doing so in the past month;

• Fully 95% of people rated speeding 15 mph or more over the speed limit on residential streets unacceptable, yet 21% of those same people admitted doing so in the past month.

A previous AAA Foundation survey found two out of three drivers mistakenly believe using a hands-free cell phone is safer than talking on a hand-held device. Yet Kissinger noted that, in this survey, the use of a hands-free cell phone was the only behavior that more than half of all drivers rated as acceptable, yet numerous other studies have shown it is equally as dangerous as talking on a hand-held phone – both quadruple your risk of being in a crash.

“There are many motorists who would never consider drinking and driving, yet they think it’s somehow okay to text or e-mail while driving. We need to stigmatize distracted driving to the same degree as drunk driving in our culture, because both behaviors are deadly,” he said. “This survey shines the light on drivers behaving badly; it also raises some dangerous public misconceptions. We’d like to end the belief that ‘it’s the other guy’s problem’ and end the false sense of security that ‘if I chat on a hands-free cell phone I’m somehow safer.’”

In other words, everyone’s got to do their part out on the roadways in order to make them safe – and that includes focusing all of our attention on driving while we’re behind the wheel.

“This troubling data shows us, for the first time, the scope of drugged driving in America, and reinforces the need to reduce drug abuse. Drugged driving, like drunk driving, is a matter of public safety and health. It puts us all at risk and must be prevented.” –Gil Kerlikowske, director of the office of National Drug Control Policy.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) last week released the results on an interesting survey it conducted back in 2007 concerning the number of folks driving while impaired (DWI) on our roadways.

While this voluntary survey found that the percentage of drunk drivers – those with a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or higher – has declined significantly over the last three decades, new screening techniques discovered that a lot of folks are getting behind the wheel high on a variety of illegal narcotics … especially at night. That data got the attention of safety experts throughout the federal government as it could be a serious and worrisome trend.

Yet this new survey from NHTSA is, in a way, an isolated island in a sea of activity. It represents the first time the agency took samples of “oral fluids” (which I assume to be saliva or “spit” as we all call it) and blood and then used new screening techniques to look for illegal drugs. An ongoing follow-up survey using these new detection efforts is slated to be wrapped up by 2012, so we’ll have to wait a while to see what NHTSA discovers in terms of the rate of drivers found with illegal drugs in their system.

OK, to the numbers. First, the alcohol-impairment findings:

• First, NHTSA recorded a continuing decline in the percentage of legally intoxicated drivers. In 1973, 7.5 percent of drivers had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or higher. By 2007, however, the rate declined to 2.2 percent. NHTSA also noted a BAC of .08 or higher is now above the legal limit in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

• The percentage of male drivers with illegal BAC levels was 42 percent higher than the percentage of alcohol-impaired female drivers.

• Time of day made a big difference in the likelihood of drivers having illegal BACs. Looking just at Friday daytime (9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m.), early nighttime (10:00 p.m. to midnight), and late nighttime (1 a.m. to 3 a.m. Saturday), only 0.2% of drivers had illegal BACs during the daytime, while 1.2% had illegal BACs during the early nighttime and 4.8% had illegal BACs during the late nighttime.

• Overall, drivers were more likely to be illegally drunk during late nighttime hours (1 a.m. to 3 a.m.) than during daytime or early evening hours.

• Motorcycle riders were more than twice as likely as passenger vehicle drivers to be drunk (5.6 percent compared with 2.3 percent). Pickup truck drivers were the next most likely to have illegal BACs (3.3 percent).

Now, the illegal drugs while driving findings:

• NHTSA’s survey found 16.3 percent of nighttime weekend drivers were drug positive.The survey focused on weekend nighttime drivers and found that the drugs used most commonly by drivers were: marijuana (8.6 percent); cocaine (3.9 percent); and over-the-counter and prescription drugs (3.9 percent).

• Based on the oral fluid results, more nighttime drivers (14.4%) were drug-positive then were daytime drivers (11.0%). Based on the blood test results which were administered only at nighttime, 13.8% of the drivers were drug-positive. Using the combined results of either or both oral fluid and blood tests, 16.3% of the nighttime drivers were drug-positive.

An important point to note here: NHTSA stressed that most “psychoactive drugs” like marijuana are chemically complex molecules, whose absorption, action, and elimination from the body are difficult to predict, and considerable differences exist between individuals with regard to the rates with which these processes occur. Thus the result of these factors is that, at the current time, noted NHTSA, specific drug concentration levels cannot be reliably equated with effects on driver performance.

Alcohol, in comparison, is more predictable, said NHTSA, as a a strong relationship between BAC level and impairment has been established, as has the correlation between BAC level and crash risk.

It should also be noted that NHTSA excluded commercial vehicle drivers for logistical reasons from this survey – as a much larger area is needed to safely pull over tractor-trailers – while motorcycle operators were over-sampled, since motorcycle deaths have more than doubled over the last decade and motorcycle crashes have the highest alcohol involvement rate of any vehicle type.

The basic survey procedure involved the use of law enforcement officers to direct traffic at the survey sites, but not otherwise to interact in any way with the survey subjects, noted NHTSA. Trained data collectors solicited participation of the drivers in the survey at 300 collection sites in cities and on rural roads, offering incentives for participation, with that participation being voluntary and anonymous. Note, however, that drivers found to be impaired were not allowed to get back into their vehicles and drive away.

So what does all of this tell us? For starters, the rate of drivers impaired by alcohol operating a motor vehicle dropped significantly in over 30 years …. but it’s still a big problem. “Alcohol still kills 13,000 people a year on our roads,” stressed Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. “So we must continue to be vigilant in our efforts to prevent drunk driving.”

Drug use by drivers is definitely worrisome, but putting NHTSA’s numbers into context is difficult. This is new research and as such is still being digested. We’ll know more as the agency wraps up its follow-on survey in 2012.

One thing is certain: the issue of DWI isn’t going away – and drunk/drugged driving leads to almost four times as many deaths on our highways than truck-car collisions. That is a startling factoid and one that needs to be remembered as we work towards reducing the annual fatalities suffered on our roadways.

“Increasing the efficiency of vehicles already in our fleets here and now is imperative.” –Dan Steere, president and CEO, GreenRoad

I received an interesting opinion piece from Dan Steere the other day in relation to my post on the need to keep funding future research and development efforts to improve commercial vehicle fuel efficiency. Steere – president and CEO of GreenRoad, a company that provides driver training services – is a big believer that much more can be done now, with the trucks currently on the road, to improve fuel efficiency.

Steere (at right) also thinks improving miles per gallon (mpg) doesn’t necessarily require major changes to equipment either, for HOW a truck is driven over the course of the day/week/month can make a big difference in terms of fuel economy.

Of course, GreenRoad has a vested interest in boosting the importance of driver training services – that’s how they make money. But the point Steere makes below about the impact of driver training of fuel efficiency is a good one – and one that can be applied to all manner of fleets, not just over-the-road truckers.

Mr. Steere, the floor is yours:

“As Sean stressed in his June 29 blog post, fuel efficiency is a major concern for everyone in the commercial trucking industry. Fortunately the industry is not alone. The Obama administration and Capitol Hill are taking action. In May, President Obama announced a fuel efficiency policy requiring new passenger vehicles and light trucks to average 35.5 miles per gallon by 2016. Similarly, Congress is reviewing the Surface Transportation Assistance Act proposed by Congressmen James Oberstar (D-MN) and John Mica (R-FL). If it passes, it will invest $450 billion to meet several goals: reducing carbon emissions, road congestion and crashes, as well as funding mass transit and highway construction.

These are, however, long-term fixes. New vehicle mandates will take years to replace the 250+ million passenger vehicles on our roads. And encouraging mass transit will take some cars off the road, but not soon enough to address the traffic congestion depleting your gas tank.

Leave the long-term to Washington. It’s time to focus on what we can do today, cost effectively. The annual fuel spend in the U.S. exceeds $350 billion [according to the U.S. Department of Transportation]. Hybrids and bio-diesel alternatives are available and can generate some relief, but replacing commercial fleets with these vehicles isn’t always practical or cost-efficient. Increasing the efficiency of vehicles already in our fleets here and now is imperative.

It’s well documented that safe driving can lower gas mileage and that safe driving is as critical in determining day-to-day fuel efficiency as engine type and mpg rating. It’s also no surprise that drivers prone to quick starts and stops and long idling times – not to mention speeding and other types of aggressive or inefficient driving – use more gas. Those drivers are also more likely to be involved in a crash than those who exhibit safer, more even driving behavior. The human and cost implications of vehicle crashes are staggering, but avoidable.

[For a whitepaper from GreenRoad that goes into more detail on this subject – ‘Is Safe Driving More Economical? Driver Safety and Fuel Consumption’ – please click here]

Fuel efficiency and driving safety can be more than a hope for the trucking industry. There are many products and services available today to help drivers improve their driving behavior and operate existing vehicles more efficiently. For instance, new and automated driver coaching services, such as GreenRoad’s, have been shown to yield sustained improvement in fuel consumption and cut vehicle crashes by 50 percent. The result is typically a payback in two to three months, not several years. With more efficient driving, the trucking industry could save over $10 billion per year.

The federal government’s efforts at improving fuel efficiency and surface transportation are positive steps toward lowering our nation’s carbon output, fuel usage and traffic congestion. But there are additional, more immediate steps the government and each of us can take. For example, the Government Services Administration is using funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to purchase fuel-efficient vehicles for the Federal fleet.

Why not require the Federal fleet, whose vehicles number in excess of 500,000, to implement a comprehensive initiative to improve driving behavior? With a return on investment of 90 days, this would have a net positive impact on the federal budget. This approach is far cheaper than replacing fleets with hybrids and far faster than waiting years for new mpg standards. Moreover, this is an extraordinary opportunity for Washington to demonstrate leadership to the state and local fleets, numbering 1.4 million vehicles. And the opportunity is even greater for the 20+ million commercial vehicles on America’s roads today.

We have all we need to make an impact today – the political will, the economic need and the innovative technology. Together we can support positive change: the trucking industry needs to continue focusing on current fuel usage and driving safety; and we need to influence Washington to lead by example. Not only can we can generate billions in savings, while reducing emissions and our dependence on foreign oil, but we can save a few thousand lives while we’re at it.”

You may not agree with everything GreenRoad’s Steere says above, but I’ll tell you one thing: his words provide a vital reminder that good skills behind the wheel of a commercial vehicle count for a lot more in terms of fuel efficient and safe operation than we typically think.