Georgia Injury Law Blog

Under Georgia’s current laws, drivers are prohibited from holding a cell phone while driving a car. If a recently introduced bill becomes law, that could soon change.

Senate bill 356 was recently introduced in the Georgia Senate, and would allow drivers to use their hands to hold a cell phone while the car is not in motion or when the car is at a stoplight. The bill has been introduced as a way to provide an easy solution to a common dilemma facing many Georgia drivers. According to those introducing the bill, motorists often complain that they find themselves waiting at stoplights behind drivers who are looking down at their cell phones in their hands and, therefore, not aware of the change in lights. According to the bill writers, allowing motorists to use cell phones while at stop lights would encourage them to hold their cellphone up, which would also allow them to notice the change in lights, thereby preventing them from blocking motorists behind them.

The bill is already getting a lot of pushback from interested parties. At a recent hearing, lawmakers heard from physician groups, associations of police officers and other traffic safety advocates.  They said that allowing motorists to use their hands to hold a  cell phone while at the wheel simply increases the range of distractions and is completely unnecessary.  Opponents of the bill say that allowing cell phone use of any type when a motorist is driving, regardless of whether he is at a stoplight or not, is a bad idea that immediately puts motorists in a distracted frame of mind.

A majority of all car accidents involving a single vehicle are linked to distracted driving. According to data by the Georgia Governor’s Office of Highway Safety, as many as 68 percent of single vehicle collisions involve people who were concentrating on something else rather than driving at the time.

The data came from a fact sheet which considered different types of distraction that could impact a driver’s concentration and impede his ability to drive a car safely. This distraction included manual, cognitive, and visual distractions.  Manual distractions include those involved in holding or reaching for an object like a cell phone while  driving, eating or drinking, changing climate controls or radio stations, fiddling with GPS systems, handling pets or doing other activities that cause the driver to move his head from the steering wheel even for  a few seconds. Cognitive distractions included daydreaming, thinking of other things like work while driving as well as loud noises or sudden movements that could impede a driver’s focus on driving. Visual distractions include distractions from billboards, looking at phone displays or looking at anything else inside or outside the vehicle leading to the driver taking his eyes off the road even for a few seconds.

You do not need to spend an entire minute looking at something else or having your attention diverted from the task of driving to be involved in a distracted driving accident. Even a few seconds of distraction can be sufficient to cause an accident. In fact, previous studies by the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute have found that a car can travel the length of a football field in just, four seconds which is less than the average time taken to open and read a text message.

Tesla is probably the best known for the various high-tech systems in its automobiles many of which can help a driver avoid being in an accident.  However, one newly-introduced feature most likely has the opposite effect.  A recent but little-known feature in Tesla vehicles allows occupants, including passengers, to play in-car video games in full view of the driver.

Motorists as well as passengers can play one of several popular video games while the car is in operation. The kind of distraction that this poses to the driver cannot be overstated.  Tesla has been under scrutiny for the safety of its tech systems, including the auto drive systems that allow the car to be operated without the motorist placing his hands on the steering wheel, for several months now. Tesla is also under a federal investigation regarding accidents involving its cars that have resulted in several deaths. Since 2016, more than ten people have died in accidents that were caused when the Tesla cars crashed while in auto pilot mode.  Unfortunately, Tesla has not been able to come up with a fool-proof system that will prompt the driver to keep his eyes on the road while the car is being operated automatically.

The risk of accidents involving these cars has been the subject of federal probes for serval months now, and the introduction of this new feature that allows occupants to play video games while driving the car has federal agencies even more concerned. Regulators at the federal National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which is currently leading the safety probe into Tesla models, have asked the automaker for more information about the video game features in its cars.