State Police to Crack Down on Texting While Driving
Texting while driving has been illegal in Massachusetts since 2010, but police around the country have said the law is difficult to enforce. Forty percent of Massachusetts drivers say they still text while driving despite a nearly three-year-old law banning such activity and preventing any cell phone use for drivers under 18 years old, according to a poll conducted by Plymouth Rock Assurance. With the help of a federal grant, Massachusetts State Police will begin a statewide crackdown on the illegal and dangerous practice in June. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has awarded the state a $ 275,000 federal grant to increase enforcement of the Safe Driving Law, which bans the sending, typing or reading of electronic messages to or from handheld devices while operating a motor vehicle and a complete ban on the use of all handheld electronic devices by junior operators while behind the wheel, according to a state police press statement Tuesday. The law was enacted in Massachusetts on Sept. 30, 2010. The program, called “Text With One Hand, Ticket In The Other,” will make use of a “high visibility enforcement” model which uses informational road signs, command posts other tools which make the enforcement obvious to the public, according to the NHTSA website. This specialized enforcement will take place in two to four week intervals over the next two years, according to the police statement. The first installment will occur from June 10-29 on state roadways in Andover, Dracut, Dunstable, Lawrence, Lowell, Methuen, North Andover, North Reading, Reading, Tewksbury, Tyngsboro and Wilmington. A recent National Safety Council study has shown that nationwide, 24 percent of all crashes are related to the use of handheld electronic devices while driving, the statement says. As many as 3,000 deaths per year are caused by distracted driving, according to Boston Medical Center. SOUTH END PATCH: Facebook | Twitter | E-mail Updates South End Patch
Is Driving Really That Bad in Boston?
Bostonians have a (deserved?) reputation as terrible drivers, but a financial website says the city’s driving is awful even without the missing turn signals and tailgaters. Financial site NerdWallet said Boston is the fifth worst driving city in America based on the price of gas, amount of traffic and population density. Boston’s ranked worse than legendary driving nightmare Washington, D.C. in the list. “Boston drivers are known for being aggressive, and it’s no wonder they get frustrated—Boston drivers sit in 53 hours of traffic per year,” wrote NerdWallet. How should drivers navigate such a spaghetti bowl of streets and traffic? NerdWallet helpfully pointed out that “the city has excellent public transportation, so a Charlie card may be a better investment than a car.” What do you think? Is driving in Boston really that bad, or is this just an old assumption getting some new attention? Has driving in Boston gotten better in the years after the Big Dig? Worse? Do you rely on your bike, Hubway or the T to get around town? Tell us your thoughts in the comments below. South End Patch
State Driving Ban Ends at 4 p.m.
The state driving ban will be lifted at 4 p.m. Saturday. Gov. Deval Patrick tweeted from his official account just before 1 p.m.: “Driving ban lifted immediately for Nantucket County & for all communities west of I-91; driving ban lifted statewide as of 4 PM,” Gov. Deval Patrick tweeted from his official @MassGovernor account. Patrick signed an executive order to ban vehicle traffic beginning at 4 p.m. Friday. It was the first time the order had been signed since 1978. Penalties for driving during the ban include a $ 500 fine and up to one year in prison. South End Patch
Man Sentenced to 20 Years in Jail for South End Drunk Driving Crash
A Dorchester man will serve 20 years in prison for a drunk driving crash in the South End in 2010 that left one of his friends dead. Warren Tyler, 47, received the maximum penalty for manslaughter this week, after a Suffolk County jury found him guilty of being drunk and causing the crash that killed his friend, according to District Attorney Daniel F. Conley’s office. Warren was found guilty of both motor vehicle homicide and manslaughter by operating under the influence in the 2010 crash that killed his friend and passenger, 46-year-old Johnny Williams, Jr. Jurors acquitted Tyler of an additional charge of receiving a stolen motor vehicle. Prior to sentencing, Suffolk Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Locke dismissed the charge of motor vehicle homicide on the grounds that it was duplicative of the manslaughter charge, which carries a longer maximum sentence of 20 years. Prosecutors recommended a term of 19 to 20 years in state prison; Locke imposed a sentence of 18 to 20 years. At around 12:20 a.m. on Jan. 7, 2010, Boston Police spotted a blue Mazda minivan that had been reported stolen less than an hour earlier. Officers followed the vehicle on Blue Hill Avenue, but before they could pull the car over, they found the minivan had crasehd into a delivery truck at the intersection of Harrison Avenue and East Berkeley Street. On seeing the smoke, officers activated their lights and sirens and called for medical assistance. Tyler was found in the driver’s seat with broken bones. Williams sustained fatal injuries to his head and chest in the crash, which crushed the passenger’s side of the vehicle where Williams was seated. Tyler was transported to Boston Medical Center after the crash, where he told an EMT who was treating him, “Dude, I’m drunk.” Blood tests determined that Tyler’s blood alcohol level was a minimum of .14 – almost twice the legal limit of .08. Police executing a search warrant on the vehicle and found vodka bottles inside a bag along with personal papers belonging to Tyler. “Nothing in this world right now could make me feel any better than him being here,” Williams’ younger brother told the court. “He was a strong guy. We always ran to him for help. He was always there for us.” SOUTH END PATCH: Facebook | Twitter | E-mail Updates South End Patch