Posted on 01/17/2010 12:41:06 AM PST by neverdem
Driven to Distraction
SAN FRANCISCO — On the day of the collision last month, visibility was good. The sidewalk was not under repair. As she walked, Tiffany Briggs, 25, was talking to her grandmother on her cellphone, lost in conversation.
Very lost.
“I ran into a truck,” Ms. Briggs said.
It was parked in a driveway.
Distracted driving has gained much attention lately because of the inflated crash risk posed by drivers using cellphones to talk and text.
But there is another growing problem caused by lower-stakes multitasking — distracted walking — which combines a pedestrian, an electronic device and an unseen crack in the sidewalk, the pole of a stop sign, a toy left on the living room floor or a parked (or sometimes moving) car.
The era of the mobile gadget is making mobility that much more perilous, particularly on crowded streets and in downtown areas where multiple multitaskers veer and swerve and walk to the beat of their own devices.
Most times, the mishaps for a distracted walker are minor, like the lightly dinged head and broken fingernail that Ms. Briggs suffered, a jammed digit or a sprained ankle, and, the befallen say, a nasty case of hurt pride. Of course, the injuries can sometimes be serious — and they are on the rise.
Slightly more than 1,000 pedestrians visited emergency rooms in 2008 because they got distracted and tripped, fell or ran into something while using a cellphone to talk or text. That was twice the number from 2007, which had nearly doubled from 2006, according to a study conducted by Ohio State University, which says it is the first to estimate such accidents.
“It’s the tip of the iceberg,” said Jack L. Nasar, a professor of city and regional planning at Ohio State, noting that...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
On a funnier note their are stories of people walking into open sewers while talking on the phone.
If there’s a law against being stupid how will the democratic party survive?
Traffic engineers moved the light 500' up and extended the yellow. Voila! Non-runners blocked potential "runners". "Runners" got through the intersection safely, but caused traffic blockages at "upstream" lights, thusly intensifying traffic congestion everywhere. (Yes, it IS a problem.)
I drive the entire length of I 575 to work and back each day. The distracted drivers using cellphones I see are 9/10 women driving a big SUV of some sort. They get in the vehicle, call ‘someone’, and then start out. I have been behind some (when I couldn’t get around them) for almost the entire trip. Not once did they put down their cellphone. It is really amazing.
Good thing he wasn’t chewing gum also.
Just because I think I can do it, walk, talk and text, doesn't mean it is safe for me to do.
She put down her cellphone and said, “Oh.”
How did the NY Times find these people? First they are stupid to walk into something while on the phone and they go and admit their stupidity to a national newspaper.
In all seriousness, possibly through public records of lawsuits. I know the manhole cover mentioned earlier was a thread here maybe around Thanksgiving.
Yes, our society is doomed.
Mediterranean diet protects against stomach cancer
Scientists turn stem cells into pork
FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list.
I hope her Pedestrian’s License was suspended for an appropriate period ;o)
While I was attending UC Berzerleley, one of the very liberal profs did exactly that, although it was a book, rather than a phone, and the outrage over this injustice generated some of the most 'interesting' suggestions for changing the way that sewers are maintained...
Why don’t they just outlaw all harms?
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