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LaHood on ‘a tear’ again about distracted driving; cites disturbing figures

Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood admits he’s on “a tear” again about distracted driving.

Why? It seems that according to the University of Alabama’s Center for Advanced Public Safety more than 1,400 electronic distraction-related rashes were reported in the past 13 months in that state, a crimson tide of an entirely different sort.

And, the Birmingham News reported this weekend that more than 100 crashes a month take place in Alabama because of driver distraction from a mobile electronic device of some kind.

And, LaHood went on to write in his blog, “Fast Lane,” that the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs says that number is on the low side because not all law enforcement agencies are using a new system called eCrash to collect distracted driving information.

LaHood, who announced a second Distracted Driving Summit last week, wrote that he hopes this kind of data will lead to the Alabama Legislature passing a statewide ban on texting behind the wheel, joining 30 other states, Washington DC and Guam in doing so.

He said the new information only shows there’s more work to be done.

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