The July 11th edition of USA Today reports that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) found that handheld cellphone use and texting while driving dropped sharply in Hartford and Syracuse, New York during four periods of stepped-up enforcement coupled with media campaigns. Handheld cellphone use fell 57% and texting while driving 72% in Hartford, and both fell 32% in Syracuse, NHTSA says. The declines were based on researchers' observations of cellphone use before and after each enforcement period and on public-awareness surveys at driver-licensing offices in the two cities.
The programs, called "Phone in One Hand, Ticket in the Other," were modeled after the "Click It or Ticket" national campaigns that helped push seat-belt usage to 85% in 2010, an all-time high. The new programs included four waves of police crackdowns and education campaigns in April, July, and October 2010 and March and April 2011. They began after NHTSA determined that 5% of drivers were using handheld cellphones at any given moment during a typical day in 2009. NHTSA next plans to test the same model statewide in an as-yet-undetermined state.
