The Civil Guard and the regional and local police have started this Monday a campaign by the General Directorate of Traffic (DGT) to prevent drivers from being distracted behind the wheel. It will last until next Sunday, October 13 and will focus, among other aspects, on the use of mobile phones while driving. The campaign is part of Operation Focus on the Road carried out at the European level by the RoadPol association (European Roads Policing Network), as reported this morning by Tráfico.
Statistics show that distractions while driving are the leading factor in fatal accidents on the road. Last year, it was present in 30% of accidents, which represented an increase of 2% compared to 2019. Surveillance will be carried out both in the urban centers of towns and cities and on interurban roads. Traffic has recalled that it has 253 cameras installed on the roads, whose mission is to check if the driver uses his cell phone while driving or is wearing his seat belt. If any violation is detected, send the images to the complaints management center, based in León, to begin the sanctioning procedure.
The DGT places special emphasis on the fact that distractions divert attention from the tasks necessary for driving, which often means not looking at the road for a few seconds. In that time, a large number of meters can be traveled and obstacles or incidents may arise to which the driver does not pay enough attention, with the risk of suffering an accident by not acting in time. “It has been proven that activities that force the driver to look away from the road for a longer period of time and/or perform manual activities combined with cognitive activity significantly increase the risk of collision,” concludes the information from the General Directorate of Traffic.
At the top of all distractions is the use of mobile phones and electronic devices. As they have various functionalities, various studies have concluded that they can cause distractions with very serious consequences for attentive driving. That is, they eliminate precise abilities when driving such as cognitive, visual, manual or auditory, among others. Added to all this is that the impact and risk of collision vary depending on the nature of the activity that causes the distraction and its duration. It also varies depending on the context of the circulation and traffic at that moment and the driver’s own characteristics.
Obviously, the higher the speed of the vehicle being driven or the rest of the cars on the road being driven, the smaller the reaction margin of the driver who is not paying attention to the road when faced with unforeseen traffic events. Hence, it is more advisable to dedicate yourself completely to driving and leave aside all types of distractions, especially “those that involve taking your eyes off the road for a longer period of time, such as handling the aforementioned electronic devices.” , reminds the DGT.
“The most frequent type of accident due to distraction is leaving the road, along with a collision with the preceding vehicle and/or hitting pedestrians. On that journey outside the driver’s control, at a greater distance, there is a much greater probability of hitting an obstacle, another vehicle, or a pedestrian, especially in urban areas,” Traffic has described.
The misuse of a mobile phone while driving continues to be the most frequent punishable distraction. In the latest campaign to monitor and control distractions while driving, carried out from October 9 to 15, 2023, and to which 360 municipalities from 41 provinces joined, 38% of the complaints were for using a mobile phone while driving, according to DGT data.
#Traffic #increases #mobile #controls #week