Letters to the Editor: Cell-Phone Ban, Infrastructure Funds

These Letters to the Editor appears in the Feb. 2 print edition of Transport Topics. Click here to subscribe today.

Cell-Phone Ban

Why is using a cell phone while driving likened to drunken driving? As long as you have your hands free and you have a Bluetooth device or a headset, I do not see a problem (TTNews.com, 1-12, “Group Calls for Ban on Cell Phone Use While Driving;” click here for previous article).

The problems I do see are drivers not using the blinker to signal lane changes or allowing snow to blow off the top of their trucks or cars and hit my windshield — something my husband taught me early on. He works for a trucking company and says they are supposed to clean the snow off the top of their vehicles; it is a law.

And how about the drivers who eat and smoke and drink coffee while driving, weaving in and out of traffic?

I am a pretty defensive driver. I find drivers with handheld phones and the others mentioned above to be offensive and unsafe, as are the people in 4-by-4s who drive like they are invincible and drive the pickup trucks you see in the ditch after they pass you during a snowstorm.
Yes, these are things I find more offensive than drivers using hands-free cell phones.

Dwyna Macdonald
Receptionist
Nova Biomedical
Reading, Mass.

Regarding your story on banning cell-phone use and the study by the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis that estimates 6% of vehicle crashes can be attributed to cell phones: If you research this topic in Australia, you will find they banned handheld (mobile phone) cell-phone use while driving years ago.

My company imports truck beds from Australia, and I can report that a hands-free device is a requirement there — and there are hefty fines for noncompliance. They are much more aggressive with their driving laws and, according to their research, claim mobile-phone use causes more fatalities than drunken driving — which they refer to as “drink driving.” They will stop you for holding a phone to your ear while driving a vehicle.

They also have many TV commercials with strong messages about paying attention when you are driving — pretty convincing and not subtle at all.

Randy Cryer
President
Ute Ltd.
Seattle

Infrastructure Funds

The economic stimulus package probably will be smaller than expected. How in the world can the president and Congress continue to heap hundreds of billions upon trillions of dollars and expect it to keep going ad infinitum?

There is an answer to the infrastructure problem, and the same answer may hold true for several other “problems” that have been created by Washington.

First, the monies collected from gasoline and diesel fuel taxes should not go into a general fund. Instead, they need to go into their own dedicated account. Congress cannot borrow from this account. Period.

Second, either give the president “line-item veto” authority — probably the easiest solution — or craft the measure in a way that makes it impossible for Congress to attach pure pork-barrel spending riders onto any bill they submit. The budget deficit would begin to shrink immediately.

Think about it: No more “bridges to nowhere” and no more “Sen. Billy Blowhard Memorial Auditoriums” in your state or mine. If the House or Senate believes these things are necessary, let them submit a bill and let us, the American people, decide if we want that stuff.

Then apply the first theory to Social Security and Medicare and, voila, both programs would no longer be bankrupt — probably.

I don’t remember just how much money members of Congress are paid, but it seems to be more than $150,000 a year. These men and women work for us — you and me. It is our combined tax contributions that pay their salaries.

If I had a group of employees on my payroll that held a meeting at midnight to discuss, say, the implementation of a new fuel surcharge formula and in the process voted themselves a raise, I would surely fire every one of them, and I think that you would, too.

Why should these people in Washington, D.C., who, in essence, are really our office managers, drivers and warehouse personnel, be dealt with any differently? They can be fired just like everyone else. We simply have to hold our own “board meeting” every November at the local polling precinct and hand them their walking papers.

John Head
Owner-Operator
R&W Transportation
Colorado Springs, Colo.