Questions you'd ask... a driver on the phone?
Discussion
I recently took a coach from Oxford to London. Don't ask, it was a works thing. I hate coaches.
8am peering out the window in slow / start / stop traffic on the M4 / A34 I decided to play a little game. Lets see how many people I can spot on there mobile phones.
The first thing i noticed was the sheer amount of cleavage and leg you get to see from a coach window. I can only imagine the sheer joy on coach and lorry drivers faces during those hot summers days!
The second trend was that women are by far the worst offenders. Especially in stop start traffic. For some reason as soon as they stop, are about to stop or even look like they might be slowing. The phone is out and head is down.
Another observation... Why do people think it is OK to hold the mobile phone in their hands, but have it on speaker phone? Still looking at it, occasionally tapping buttons. Often holding it up directly in their field of vision.
Finally, about 10 ish people were watching videos on the phone. What the juddering f
k goes through these peoples minds!
All in all, I counted 93 in an hour and half journey. And 3 crashes ware some one had simply driven up the arse of another.
8am peering out the window in slow / start / stop traffic on the M4 / A34 I decided to play a little game. Lets see how many people I can spot on there mobile phones.
The first thing i noticed was the sheer amount of cleavage and leg you get to see from a coach window. I can only imagine the sheer joy on coach and lorry drivers faces during those hot summers days!
The second trend was that women are by far the worst offenders. Especially in stop start traffic. For some reason as soon as they stop, are about to stop or even look like they might be slowing. The phone is out and head is down.
Another observation... Why do people think it is OK to hold the mobile phone in their hands, but have it on speaker phone? Still looking at it, occasionally tapping buttons. Often holding it up directly in their field of vision.
Finally, about 10 ish people were watching videos on the phone. What the juddering f
k goes through these peoples minds!All in all, I counted 93 in an hour and half journey. And 3 crashes ware some one had simply driven up the arse of another.
There are a lot of people on their phones. I may occasionally glance at my phone while driving or quickly reply to an IM, but this is when stationary with my foot on the brake, when we even think about starting to move away it goes (flame me all you like, this is the real world).
i can't see why you'd watch videos while driving!!! all the time we have in the world at work while having a st or lunch time or even in a quiet 5 minutes at work or at home in the evenings, there's plenty of time for browsing!
The biggest annoyance I have is people who clearly have bluetooth systems in their car (new F80 m3 i assume bluetooth is standard? sl55 convertible? plenty of high spec company car type vehicles). and yet they will hold a phone up to their ear.
i can't see why you'd watch videos while driving!!! all the time we have in the world at work while having a s
t or lunch time or even in a quiet 5 minutes at work or at home in the evenings, there's plenty of time for browsing!The biggest annoyance I have is people who clearly have bluetooth systems in their car (new F80 m3 i assume bluetooth is standard? sl55 convertible? plenty of high spec company car type vehicles). and yet they will hold a phone up to their ear.
I have a long held belief that, regardless of whether your phone is hands free or not, your driving is equally impaired. The simple reason being, you are thinking about your call and not your driving. Having one hand off the wheel is something I do quite often, and if people were prepared to be brutally honest, so do most of us. It isn't driving one handed that's the issue, if it was, you would never adjust the radio, eat, drink, etc, etc. The act of talking to someone on the phone is the real issue, it simply dilutes your concentration whether it's hands free or not.
Rawwr said:
"You know Bluetooth is thing, right?"
Can you play Candy Crush on Bluetooth?I cycle past a lot of traffic every morning and evening and I would say about 25% are playing with their phone. Over the last few years I have noticed they are not really hiding it any more. You can see their faces glowing when it is dark, you can see them weave about when they drift out of lane, they even see them in convertibles.
When did we become incapable of doing something for 20 mins without checking our phones?
Heaveho said:
I have a long held belief that, regardless of whether your phone is hands free or not, your driving is equally impaired. The simple reason being, you are thinking about your call and not your driving. Having one hand off the wheel is something I do quite often, and if people were prepared to be brutally honest, so do most of us. It isn't driving one handed that's the issue, if it was, you would never adjust the radio, eat, drink, etc, etc. The act of talking to someone on the phone is the real issue, it simply dilutes your concentration whether it's hands free or not.
Personally for me driving on the phone whether with phone to ear or via cars Bluetooth system I feel makes no difference to my ability to drive and no further distraction than a conversation with a passenger. Not a chance I would text or use Facebook watch videos while driving I would be all over the road.
I get to see similar volumes of cleavage and leg from my motorcycle...sadly, I also get to see similar numbers of morons using their phones while I filter past...remonstrating just gets me verbal abuse and on one occasion a woman tried to steer into me as I moved on after speaking to her about her use of facebook in moving traffic. I was sorely tempted to stop and escalate further but we were moving and she was in lane 3 of a very busy M6.
A few months ago I was travelling up the M6 at night as a passenger. We were in lane 3 trying to get past a long line of slow vehicles, but there was a car in front of us doing about 70mph and swerving all over the lane. As we got closer, we noticed the interior light was on.
Eventually, the car pulled into lane 2 and we passed. As we drove past we noticed why she had been swerving and why the light was on. She was on FaceTime/Skype. Holding the phone up next to her sun visor with one hand and steering with the other.
It was then too late to take down her reg number as we couldn't see it from in front of her.
Eventually, the car pulled into lane 2 and we passed. As we drove past we noticed why she had been swerving and why the light was on. She was on FaceTime/Skype. Holding the phone up next to her sun visor with one hand and steering with the other.
It was then too late to take down her reg number as we couldn't see it from in front of her.
jonah35 said:
If passengers in other cars were allowed to take photos and send them to the police it would help. Fine the driver £150 and give £50 to the person that shopped them.
Would you be equally happy when that progresses to passengers videoing speeding cars and sending the footage into the police? Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff