Winging It: Ban sought on all cell-while-driving

Today's column is a bit of a departure because I'm tackling two issues - and one is about travel on the ground rather than in the air.

First, let me tell you about a plea that got scant attention when it was issued two weeks ago by the National Safety Council, the organization that researches and lobbies on a variety of transportation and industrial safety issues.

The council called for the legislatures in all states and the District of Columbia to enact laws banning the use of cell phones while driving, something that half of all motorists acknowledge doing at least occasionally. The prohibitions would apply to both handheld and hands-free cell phones and other electronic devices.

Officials with the safety council say that dozens of scientific studies have found that the human brain does not allow drivers to focus on the road while talking on the phone. You may think of talking and driving simultaneously as simply an example of your skill at multitasking, but it's not. You also may think using a hands-free phone is safer, but it's not.

Other driving distractions, such as eating, loading a CD player or talking to a passenger, can also lead to accidents, but they're not the same as carrying on a conversation.

The safety council cited a study by the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis that found that using a cell phone while driving contributes to 6 percent of all crashes, which equates to 636,000 wrecks that kill 2,600 people and injure 330,000 a year.

A study by the AAA motor club's Foundation for Traffic Safety released in December showed that two-thirds of motorists nationwide erroneously believe that talking on a hands-free phone while driving is safer than using a handheld one.

"Studies have shown that drivers who use a cell phone while driving are four times more likely to be involved in a crash, whether that phone is handheld or hands-free," said Catherine L. Rossi, spokeswoman for the AAA Mid-Atlantic club.

More than half the drivers AAA surveyed admitted to using a phone while driving, the same percentage that said phone use by drivers is "unacceptable." The younger and better-educated drivers are, the more likely they are to talk and drive at the same time, the survey found.

Jim McCloskey, a frequent business traveler from Sicklerville who commented on my Jan. 12 post on this topic on the Winging It blog http://go.philly.com/wing, said he used a hands-free phone - as required by law in New Jersey - but doesn't think it's any safer.

"You get in a conversation, especially a business one, and your concentration on the road diminishes," he said. "I have gotten off a call after 10-15 minutes and cannot recall going past certain landmarks that I know I went past. Even with hands free, you still have the distraction of dialing, disconnecting, looking for the phone, etc."

Already, five states, including New Jersey, and almost a dozen localities around the country, including Conshohocken, Lebanon and West Conshohocken in Pennsylvania, ban the use of handheld phones while driving, according to AAA. Seven states, including New Jersey, prohibit texting on a phone while driving, and legislation is pending in Pennsylvania and two other states to outlaw it.

But AAA's Mid-Atlantic club, which keeps track of safety issues on its Web site http://www.aaamidatlantic.com/PGA/Overview, says no state or city has a complete ban.

AAA hasn't endorsed the safety council's call for a complete ban, but the group supports comprehensive "distracted driver" legislation, such as a bill introduced but not enacted last year in the Pennsylvania legislature, Rossi said.

The Pennsylvania bill would slap an extra fine on anyone who violates reckless-driving laws while doing such things as reading, eating, drinking, putting on makeup, or talking on a phone.

Many people, I'm sure, don't think a total ban on driving and phone use would be enforceable, and they may be right. But we should at least try.

Please let me know what you think of the National Safety Council's call and AAA's less-radical position on this issue. Just don't call or send me a message from your car while it's moving, okay?

On the second subject - theft from checked baggage at Philadelphia International Airport - I have received three reports in recent weeks concerning items missing after travelers took flights on two airlines from Philadelphia to Europe.

In the summer of 2007, dozens of US Airways' customers at the airport told me about losing items to theft from checked bags, but I had heard virtually nothing about the problem from readers since then.

If you believe you have been a victim of theft from bags checked with an airline departing Philadelphia, please tell me about that, too.

And in the meantime, remember to never put anything of great value in a piece of checked luggage.