Monthly Archives: June 2014

Marijuana An Increasing Factor In Fatal Crashes

June 11, 2014

Columbia University researchers studying almost 24,000 driving fatalities determined that marijuana use was a factor in 12% of fatal crashes in 2010; a rate three times higher than a decade ago. Read more: Marijuana playing larger role in fatal crashes

Ask The Driving School Instructor: Why is it illegal for teens to drive late at night?

June 9, 2014

Question: Why is it illegal for teens to drive late at night? With fewer cars on the road it seems like it would be safer.
Answer: The short answer is that teen death rates skyrocket during those hours. There are several reasons for this. One is the lack of driving experience hasn’t exposed young drivers to all the possible hazards they might encounter on the roads and night time driving has its own particular types of hazards. The most obvious hazard is that it’s dark and it’s hard to see things on the road. Another is that there are many more drunks on the road at that time of night and a drunk driver, when confronted with bright lights will tend to drive toward the lights making it difficult to avoid a crash. The third reason is that people are tired and studies show that teens especially, with their busy schedules, don’t get all the sleep they need. Add distracting teen passengers and speed to that mix and the hazards multiply. The graduated driving laws are designed to ease teen drivers into the driving situation and allow them to gain driving experience before being allowed to drive with no restrictions.

Allstate Launches New AppTo Monitor Teen Driving Behaviors

June 6, 2014

Allstate Insurance has launched a new smartphone app for its customers to “identify and teach safe driving behaviors” in teen drivers. The app, called “Star Driver” is different from most teen driver monitoring system in that it used the smartphone rather than a plug-in module for the vehicle. This app follows the previously released app, “Drivewise” that all Allstate customers can use to receive feedback on safe driving behaviors and “earn rewards”. Read more: Allstate Launches Star Driver® to Help Protect Young Drivers

Photo compliments Allstate Insurance

Summer Months Are Most Dangerous For Teen Drivers

June 6, 2014

Now that the summer is here, it’s important to remember the dangers faced by teen drivers during the summer months. Traffic fatality statistics have long shown that the death rate for teens rises significantly for teen drivers and their passengers during the summer months. Twenty nine percent of all the teen drivers age 15 to 20 who were killed in traffic collisions in 2012 were killed during the months of June, July, and August. Studies by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) show that the period between Memorial Day and Labor Day is the most dangerous time for teen drivers.

With up to three months of largely free, unsupervised time on their hands, teens have many more chances to get into trouble while driving.

Parents can be pro-active in preventing their child from becoming a summertime driving statistic in a number of ways:

If this is your teen’s first summer with an operator’s license, consider limiting their driving time.
Set consistent curfews and enforce them.
Limit the number of passengers your teen can carry.
Prevent your teen from riding as a passenger of a teen driver with more than one other passenger.
Ban not only texting but any type of cell phone use while driving; they must pull over and stop to use a cell phone.
Ensure that your teen gets plenty of sleep.
Give the teens chores or suggest a summer job to keep them busy and off the road.

To help ensure that your rules are followed, negotiate a “teen driving contract” with your teen. Make sure that the rules are clear and the consequences for breaking them are well understood.

Disturbing New Study On Teen Driving Behavior

June 5, 2014

Safe Kids Worldwide an organization devoted to child safety along with the General Motors Foundation recently released a survey on teen driving behavior. In talking with 1,000 teens, they discovered, among other things that:

One in four teens don’t wear seat belts.
Teens who don’t wear seat belts are more likely to say that they text while driving than those who do.
Thirty-nine percent of teens say they have ridden with a teen driver who was texting.
More than half have ridden in a car with a parent who was using a cellphone.
Forty-nine percent of teens feel unsafe when riding with a teen driver.