Letters: Hands-free phones not the problem
Dan Johnson uses a hands-free device to talk on a cellphone while driving in San Diego. The National Transportation Safety Board declared Dec. 13 that texting, emailing or chatting while driving is simply too dangerous to be allowed anywhere in the United States. But if lawmakers follow the advice of the federal board, police officers could be faced with decoding whether someone is using their cellphone or simply singing along to the radio, pleading with backseat children to stop fighting or reciting an important sales pitch. (Dec. 14, 2011) Credit: AP
Your article about Sen. Charles Fuschillo's (R-Merrick) hearing on possibly banning the use of hands-free cellphones while driving made me wonder if he has ever driven on the Long Island Expressway ["Hands-free under review," News, Dec. 27]. Every commuter knows it's not hands-free cellphone use that's the problem -- it's texting, and to a lesser extent, hand-held phone use.
Hands-free technology with voice activation is no more distracting than turning on the car radio. Making a call has been reduced to pressing one conveniently located button. The rest of the call is the same as having a conversation with someone in the passenger seat.
Texting and hand-held cellphone use, however, are very dangerous. What are these drivers thinking? Let me operate a two-ton vehicle, speed it up to 70 mph, take my hands off the wheel and look down at my lap!
But what does my government do to make me safer from these dimwits? It holds hearings on making conversations between law-abiding citizens illegal instead of giving law-enforcement officers the tools they need to enforce the good laws already on the books. The only thing that defies reason more than driving texters is Fuschillo's response to them.
Patricia Ellis, Huntington
Since "fatalities have increased with the use of cellphones . . . [in] automobiles," as stated by State Sen. Fuschillo, there seems to be a very simple solution for this growing problem. How about using our technological know-how to build cars with "no service" zones for cellphones when the ignition is on?
This would allow people to use their cellphones only when their car is stopped.
Dennis N. Franco, Massapequa Park
