Measure Your Driver Distraction

The New York Times ran an in-depth article on the consequences of distracted driving accompanied by a “game” that gauges how texting impacts your ability to drive. Using a series of virtual tollbooths and a virtual smart phone, users try to answer text messages while navigating the tollbooths. It’s a simple game, but it quickly becomes evident that even a one-word answer increases reaction time.

The average user was registering a reaction time .24 seconds slower than normal when we tested it. While it’s a good tool, something more realistic like noticing brake lights might resonate with more drivers. 

Halloween is a Dangerous Day on Roads

Everybody has heard to beware of the unwrapped candy with poison, but the far more frightening — and real — danger for kids on Halloween is being safe on the road. The chance of a child being killed while walking from 4 to 10 p.m. on Halloween is twice that of any other night of the year, according to Safe Kids USA.

After analyzing data from pedestrian deaths from 2002 to 2006, it concluded that 540 kids, ages 14 and younger, die while walking during those hours on Halloween every year.

Here are a few tips from our pals at MotherProof.com about how to keeping your child safe this year:

97% of Americans Want Ban on Texting While Driving

It appears there’s one thing our heavily divided nation can agree upon: ban texting while driving.

An overwhelming 97% want the practice to be illegal, according to a recent CBS News/New York Times survey. Only 1% said it should be legal.

This opinion cuts across regions, gender, and frequent and infrequent drivers. Of those who said texting while driving should be illegal, 52% said the punishment should be the same as the penalty for drunken driving. People who are 45 and older favor a harsher punishment. The poll was conducted among a random sample of 829 adults nationwide on Oct. 5-8, 2009. Its margin of error is 3 percentage points.

This follows a well-publicized study that found drivers who text are 23 times more likely to be involved in an accident. President Barack Obama recently banned federal employees from texting while driving, and the practice is already illegal in 18 states and the District of Columbia.

Whatever this survey says about Americans’ attitudes, I’d say from an informal survey of watching drivers on the road that a solid chunk of this 97% isn’t practicing what it preaches.

Poll: Texting + Driving Should be Illegal (CBS News)

Winter Brings on 'Peephole' Driving

As winter approaches, there is a safety hazard to be on the lookout for other than the typical sleet, ice and snow: peephole driving.

This term applies to people who scrape just enough ice from the windshield to see the road when driving. Many who live through long, cold winters might have done it.

A dangerous practice, police officers throughout the snow belt are already planning to target peephole drivers this winter using existing "obstructed" driving rules.

New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine signed a law that requires drivers to “make all reasonable efforts” to scrape off ice and snow from the windshield, trunk, hood and roof of a vehicle. Drivers who fail to do so can face fines of $25-$75. That added rule will help officers in New Jersey make a case against peephole driving, as well.

Police and EMTs worry about chunks of ice or snow that fly off of vehicles while in motion. A chunk of ice torn off a moving car can be as heavy as a brick and becomes a dangerous projectile.

Will peephole driving laws catch on? Do you worry about people who try to drive with snow and ice still coating their windshields? Let us know in the comments.

Police Watching for ‘Peephole’ Drivers as Winter Nears (USA Today)

Car Booster Seats Cut Injury Risk in Half

Children in booster seats have roughly half the risk of injury during a car accident as those who are only using a seat belt, according to a study by the Center for Injury Research and Prevention at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

Published in the current edition of the journal Pediatrics, the study found that children ages 4-8 benefited greatly from the use of a booster seat, no matter if it had a high-back or was backless. Analyzing data from 7,151 children involved in 6,591 car accidents, researchers found that 70% were restrained with a seat belt while 30% used a booster seat. That 70% had double the injury risk of the 30% who used a booster seat.

The study reaffirms that the booster seats are important because they raise children up so the lap-and-shoulder belt is positioned more effectively across a child’s smaller body; seat belts are designed to restrain considerably heavier adults. Using a booster seat helps distribute the force of a crash across the most resilient parts of a child’s body — especially during side-impact crashes, which are the deadliest for children.

The use of booster seats was credited with a 68% reduction in injury risk for near-side impacts and a whopping 82% for far-side impacts.

The evidence suggest that no matter how much kids complain, booster seats are a safety priority for children in cars through age 8.

Study Reaffirms Benefit of Car Booster Seats (Reuters)

'Smart' Gas Pedal Can Stop Unintended Acceleration

Unintended acceleration has a simple solution: A “smart” gas pedal that recognizes the brake takes precedence over acceleration. This means if they’re both depressed simultaneously the software forces the engine to respond to only to the brake and decelerate.

A few European automakers already have such a system in their vehicles. BMW made the feature standard in all of its vehicles beginning with the 2005 model year. It uses a drive-by-wire accelerator and BMW’s own software, but the feature only works when the vehicle is in motion in case tough guys want to rev the engine while holding down the brake.

For Toyota’s 3.8 million recalled vehicles, a smart gas pedal system is a potential fix. Toyota has said it won’t redesign the floor mats, and new software is an option.

Other automakers that use a smart pedal system include Audi, which had its own rash of unintended acceleration cases in the ’80s, and Volkswagen. Nissan will have a similar system for the 2010 Infiniti M, and Chrysler says most of its vehicles include the technology, as well.

Smart Gas Pedals May Solve Floor-Mat Problem (Wheels)

More Americans Die on Rural Roads

In these budget-strapped times, states are devising ways to save lives on their quiet country roads, where more people die than their well-trafficked urban counterparts. In 2008, 56% of 37,261 U.S. traffic deaths occurred on rural roads, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

This may sound like only a sliver more than the percentage of fatalities on urban roads, but only 23% of the U.S. population lives in rural areas.

While more accidents occur in urban centers, fewer result in vehicle occupant fatalities. There are several factors at play. People tend to drive faster on rural roads, which themselves are not as well engineered as urban roads. Also, people drive drunk more frequently and wear seat belts less often in rural areas.

Take South Carolina, where 95% of traffic deaths occur on rural roads, which is the highest rate in the country, and 80% of those deaths involve alcohol. This has led the state highway patrol to create a unit that targets drunken drivers, and the state is retrofitting 1,600 miles of road with rumble strips to alert drivers when they’re drifting off the pavement.

Driving With the Top Down Can Damage Your Ears

File this story under “it doesn’t take an otolaryngologist (ear, nose and throat doctor) to figure this one out.”

Driving in a convertible with the top down could damage your eardrums and degrade your hearing over time, according to a study presented yesterday at the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery Foundation’s annual meeting in San Diego.

A convertible-owning British surgeon studied seven different convertibles for noise levels at more than 50 mph. The surgeon found prolonged driving with the top down results in noise levels that can damage passengers’ ears. The most offensive noises come from wind, passing trucks and other traffic. It’s been reported that wind causes more hearing damage for motorcyclists than their loud exhausts, as well.

The lesson? Retract that roof sparingly; the faster you’re driving, the more noise you’ll generate.

Convertibles May Be Hazardous to Your Hearing (Up to Speed)

IIHS Video Shows Decades of Safety Innovation Have Paid Off

When the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration takes up new standards for its crash test next year, its officials will do well to keep in mind this much-trafficked video from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety showing a collision between a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air and a 2009 Chevy Malibu. It was created to celebrate the IIHS’ 50th anniversary.

All it takes is one look at the impact — the Bel Air’s front explodes in fragments of glass and steel while the Malibu keeps its crash-test dummy cushioned — to realize how far we’ve come in terms of automotive safety. The Malibu, of course, has airbags and a frame designed to sacrifice the chassis to save the passenger (not to mention electronic stability control).

The result is both an uncomfortable and reassuring viewing experience. If it were a real-life crash, the Bel Air’s driver would almost certainly die in such an impact, but the Malibu’s driver seems like he would walk away from the crash battered but alive.

Car Innovation Crushes Nostalgia (Detroit Free Press)

NHTSA Investigating Toyota Tundra Defects

A day after Toyota officially recalled 3.8 million vehicles because of floormat problems, the company is being investigated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration over possible defects in its 2000 and 2001 model year Tundra pickup trucks.

The NHTSA has received 20 complaints due to frame corrosion. While any metal will corrode over time, this degradation is severe enough and happening over a relatively short time frame that it’s causing issues like spare tire separation and brake system failure.

Pickuptrucks.com has been following the rust issue after complaints from its own readers. You can read more about it here.