Auto Accidents: Texting While Driving Is In The News

If you read this blog, you know one of my pet peeves/big topics is texting while driving.

Yesterday, two texting while driving stories caught my eye.  On the national scene, Yahoo news ran a story about new efforts to enforce texting while driving bans.  The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has issued several grants to help agencies enforce bans.  The grants will help pay for a wide-range of activities from ad campaigns to “roving patrols” of cars to watch for people texting while driving. Some states have already had luck with officers in unmarked vehicles driving around to spot those texting while driving.

On the same day, Austin station KXAN ran a story about the city of Austin’s enforcement of its texting while driving ban.  Since Austin banned texting while driving, officers have written more than 500 tickets.  About half of the tickets were to drivers in their 20s, and 30 percent to drivers in their 30s.  Surprising to me, only 2 tickets were to drivers younger than 18.

You can watch the KXAN story below:

Not only teens are texting and driving