Bolstered by text-message-related mass transit crashes and a host of recent studies underscoring the dangers of messaging while driving, a group of U.S. Senators has introduced legislation that would ban mobile messaging from the driver’s seat.
The ALERT Act (Avoiding Life-Endangering and Reckless Texting by Drivers Act), co-sponsored by Senators Charles Schumer of New York, New Jersey’s Robert Menendez, Louisiana’s Mary Landrieu and North Carolina’s Kay Hagan, and introduced July 29, would require individual states to prohibit emailing or “texting” by those operating a car, truck and most vehicles of mass transit.
According to Schumer’s office, local law enforcement would enforce the ban, much like police departments currently enforce driving laws pertaining to cell phone calls and seat belt use. The U.S. Department of Transportation would establish minimum penalties within six months of the bill’s passage.
Additionally, the Secretary of Transportation would determine if a state has adequately implemented the law and states deemed noncompliant would risk losing 25 percent of their federal highway funds for each year the regulation is not enforced.
“We have seen too many lives ruined due to drivers recklessly using their cell phones,” Schumer said in a news release, which cited a catastrophic railroad crash in California in 2008 and various text messaging studies as evidence of the dangers of texting while driving.
The most recent series of studies, released July 27 by the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, found that motor vehicle operators are over 23 times more likely to be involved in a collision or a near-collision when texting than when not texting.
Mendendez noted in the release that “Texting while driving should be illegal on every road, every railway, in every state.”
Fourteen states and Washington, D.C. currently impose bans on texting while driving, while another 11 states have modified bans, such as restrictions regarding minors and messaging on highways.
Schumer’s office said the ALERT Act is likely to hit the Senate floor for a vote in the fall. It has yet to be introduced in the House of Representatives.
