kickstart

Electronic devices are here to stay, no laws or restrictions are going to change that. It's a cycling issue because cyclists are using them too.

When I purchased my new gloves, the first feature the salesman pointed out were the touch screen pads built into the the fingers, and they had a good selection of smartphone mounts. In fact, all the LBS's sell mounts, even the hardware store has a bike section and sells mounts.

I see cyclists using devices, a few weeks ago a saw a cyclist riding with no hands on the bars, ear buds plugged in, texting merrily away. Joggers and pedestrians are doing it too, I had a jogger U-turn into me a few weeks ago, even saw a woman jogging with a stroller that had a Kindle mounted on it. And yes, I've had to avoid cyclists in an electronic haze too.

I can't do anything about what others do, but I stay vigilant.
Whenever I approach a pedestrian, jogger or cyclist, I look for ear buds or hands up and head down. For motorists, I scan for a hand up or eyes down, and the other tell tale signs. It's not fool proof, you cant see it all, but the badly distracted ones are fairly easy to spot.

I have very few issues while riding or driving on the road, its mostly electronically insulated joggers, walkers, and cyclists on MUT's. I ride with my lights on, always announce a pass with my bell, and have an old, loud, Klaxon horn for the truely unaware.

noisebeam

with maps you could generally plan ahead or needed to pull over due to difficulty in finding ones location or leave it to the navigator.
phones being hand held and with real time mapping enourages at the moment use while still driving.

CB HI

Goody for you, I applaud your ability to have personal choice in BFs. Now respect my personal choice in posting content relevant to what is mostly the current greatest hazard to cyclist these days.

wphamilton

Well I'll quibble with that, since this is A&S after all. I don't really see a judgment of the person's need factoring into it, other than as CBadRider mentioned emergency calls. In my philosophy when a person has a right to do something, they always have that right irrespective of having to justify it, except in the situations where explicitly prohibited. So it's not so much a matter of how much a person needs one thing relative to another (which varies from individual to individual), but how much potential it has to interfere with conflicting rights.

Accessing a smart device isn't necessarily impeded by turning off cell service. I know, you'd still have ways around with voip over data for instance and texting, but that could be made more difficult with the client apps. I'm thinking solely of the literal proposal someone made, of turning off phone calls. In spite of the natural reaction of "that wouldn't do much good when you still have mapping, streaming video and all the other diversions", it does make sense because it's the actual engagement that's lion's share of the problem. Not the act itself or utilizing an application. When people are engaged in a phone call, or even textual communications, that engagement takes over to a degree that isn't matched by most other smartphone functions.

Even with the cell service disabled, one can still make emergency calls. Disabling the cell phone would not necessarily mean that passengers or drivers couldn't make a 911 call.

So turn it off. It wasn't a gaping hole in our lives to not have a phone in the car before cell phones, and stopping and calling is a whole lot better than driving around looking for a public phone. It's not that big an ordeal.

CharlyAlfaRomeo

+1,000,000

The first vehicles I owned you also had to tune the radio by hand and I don't mean press a button. How did we survive?

Also I think the police chief in question's statement shows either a profound lack of realism or willful deception. There were lots of accidents before the advent of cell phones, text messaging and Internet browsing on a mobile device. If the number of accidents has gone up more than 10% I'd be shocked (not that it makes it ok) so staying that most accidents investigated involve a cell phone and texting sounds like a load of BS to me.

I'm honestly starting to think that vehicles are becoming too safe and so people don't take driving them seriously.

Bring back the fiery death trap I say.

badrad

You mean the Ford Pinto's - explode on contact? or the even the Pontiac Fiero's - spontaneous combustion? Those were wonderful times!

CharlyAlfaRomeo

Bring 'em both back, with a Corsair for good measure. Imagine how much more attention people would pay behind the wheel if there was a chance they might burn to the ground at any given moment!

howsteepisit

Did you maean the "unsafe at any speed" Corvair?

-=(8)=-

How did car people survive pre-cell phone? What did passengers do? Weren't people scared to drive back in the 20's, 30's. 40's, 50's, 60's, 70's and 80's without phones?
What a dangerous, boring and scary world it must have been.

badrad

LOL! The car that didn't know if it was going forwards or backwards? The rear looked like the front (or the other way around?).

dougmc

Dangerous, scary? It was. Motor vehicle deaths in U.S. by year.

Looks like the overall deaths peaked in 1972 and have generally dropped ever since. And if you look at the fatalities per mile driven, it's now down to less than one third of what it was in 1972, and almost down by a factor of 20 since 1921.

We seem to be doing something right here. I imagine that safer cars are a large part of it, but I suspect there's a lot more to it.

I expect to see these figures dropping more in the future, and once the self-driving car becomes popular I'm hoping they'll drop drastically.

CB HI

And some insist on participating in threads they claim to have no interest in.

JoeyBike

I STILL love cell phone motorists.

My old post on the subject:

https://www.bikeforums.net/advocacy-s...ir-phones.html

CharlyAlfaRomeo

Sure did. My auto-correct is working overtime today and I haven't been paying enough attention to catch it.

john.b

Uh, my "bike computer" is an app on my smartphone...

CharlyAlfaRomeo

Even a prisoner has the right to a phone call.

Mapping apps don't work without data service.

I've been on road trips with people who wouldn't have been able to go unless they were able to email while in transit.

Not having a phone before may not have been a gaping hole in anyone's life but the same could be said for many modern tools and conveniences. Just because a percentage of the population can't use them responsibly doesn't mean everyone should be barred from using them.

FWIW my original post was in response to someone saying phones should automatically shut off when a vehicle moves above a certain speed and I stand by my position that that is just plain stupid.

I'd be all for a legal requirement that the operator of a motor vehicle has to put their phone in the glove box any time the vehicle is not parked or something like that.

Quibble away.

CB HI

And that phone call is not on a cell phone, or in a moving vehicle and it is recorded. If it is a toll call, the receiving party has to agree to pay the charges.

So what does this part of your post have to do with distracted cell phone driving? I will help you with the answer - nothing.

FBinNY 

What about when it's used by a passenger?

CB HI

At times that may be even more dangerous, as then the passenger is not paying enough attention while still giving back seat driving instructions.

CharlyAlfaRomeo

Try reading the post I replied to before you start acting cute.

CB HI

That part of your post was a nonsensical response to the post that you replied to. It is sad you do not understand that.

FBinNY 

That assumes an awful lot. The passenger could equally be calling police to report an incident. Or be riding on a commuter train in the morning.

However, this is all besides the point, as I was responding to the simplistic solution that cell phones should lock out when in motion.

CharlyAlfaRomeo

What's sad is that you don't understand why I replied that way to his post but still feel the need to puff out your chest and stomp around like a child.

I'm starting to understand why most people on BF avoid A&S like the plague.

CB HI

You responded to well thought out post with garbage. True, many cannot stand the heat of A&S. Seems you are one of those when you start spouting this type of crap:
Time to get back on topic of cell phone and texting hazards to cyclists.

CharlyAlfaRomeo

There's no heat here, mostly just irrational posts by alarmists who'd have us all live in a nanny state.

You still don't get my post, that's fine. Maybe "the heat" has gotten to you

Also, as several people have pointed out, this thread has nothing to do with cyclists.

Clearly reading comprehension isn't your strong point.

Good night.