Answer to Distracted Driving Is ‘Common Sense,’ Feds Say

While there may be potential technology that could render a cell phone useless behind the wheel of a car, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood says the government is not pursuing it.

LaHood says his remarks in a recent interview on the cable news channel MSNBC were misreported as advocating for the department to go down that road. In his blog, LaHood says he had no intention of conveying that meaning.

"What I actually said was 'there's a lot of technology out there now that can disable phones and we're looking at that," LaHood says.

The Secretary said a number of cell technology innovators attended the government's recent Distracted Driving Summit in Washington and presented their technology, and LaHood admits that's one way to address the problem. But in his blog entry, LaHood says it may not be the best way.

"You have to have good laws, you have to have good enforcement, and you have to have people take personal responsibility. That's the bottom line," he wrote. "When you get behind the wheel of a 5,000 pound automobile, you have a personal responsibility to drive that vehicle safely. That means, put away cell phones and other devices that take your focus off of the road."

Federal and state efforts

Federal and state governments have taken a variety of steps to reduce the number of people who drive while talking or texting, increasingly blamed for traffic accidents. In June the Senate Commerce Committee approved a bipartisan bill that would reward states for banning drivers from talking on cell phones or sending and receiving text messages.

In August the Transportation Department kicked off pilot programs in Hartford, Connecticut and Syracuse, New York to test whether increased law enforcement efforts can get distracted drivers to put down their cell phones and focus on the road.

The pilot programs, which are similar to previous efforts to curb drunken driving and increase seat belt use among drivers, were the first federally funded efforts in the country to specifically focus on the effects of increased enforcement and public advertising on reducing distracted driving. Drivers caught texting or talking on a hand-held cell phone will be pulled over and ticketed.