Thursday, February 3, 2011

Drivers in Bethlehem Using Cell Phones While Driving Statistics

I take periodic smoke breaks at work and have a chance to people watch for about 5-10 minutes about 4 times a day ... not a lot considering it's during an 11 hour shift without a lunch break. I work in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania by the intersection of Broad and Wood Street and the Post Office is across the street.

Today, I counted all of the vehicles that drove along on Broad Street (both directions) during each one of my breaks today that (a) had drivers talking on a cell phone, (b) were not gov't or work vehicles (except for one odd-ball worth noting) or (c) for other reasons. Here are the results:

9:00 a.m. - 9:05 a.m. ET: Out of 18, 6 were on a cell phone while driving

11:45 a.m. - 11:55 a.m. ET: Out of 50, 1 on a cell phone while driving and 3 with a nice layer of ice on the hood and roof; a cop car was in the area for the first 14 (cell law may have skewed result); 1 jaywalker; 2 nose-pickers

2:30 p.m. - 2:35 p.m. ET: Out of 33, 4 were on a cell phone while driving and vehicle and an additional 1 was on a cell phone while driving a bigger box truck (first and only one all day)

4:45 p.m. - 4:52 p.m. ET: Out of 71, 5 were on a cell phone while driving; 1 guy was tying his neck tie driving hands-free ... literally

All Times Above: Out of 172, 16 were on a cell phone while driving - not inc'ing the box truck driver; at least 1 was on a cell phone while driving each of the 4 time spans; many that were not on a cell phone while driving had passengers in the car or were older (guesstimating > 65); all that were on a cell phone while driving were solitary in the vehicle

Sad, considering Bethlehem banned cell phone usage while driving in August ... although, they are not enforcing it whatsoever and there are absolutely no signs for out-of-towners to heed instead of common sense.

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