Last week, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signed legislation establishing texting while driving as a "primary offense." New York's initial anti-texting law, promulgated in 2009, made texting while driving only a secondary offense, which meant police needed to pull drivers over for another offense first in order to ticket for texting. The upgrade of the law will make it easier for police to enforce the ban on texting while driving since police can now pull over a driver simply for texting.
New York's new law aligns it with Connecticut, which has had a law since the middle of 2010 that made texting while driving a primary offense.
The tougher New York law should also help reduce the number of drivers who text while driving. Prior to passage of the new law, police in Syracuse, New York saw drivers who were texting decline by just 32 percent compared to a 72 percent decline in Hartford, Connecticut, where a tougher law had already been passed.
Texting while driving is clearly dangerous - one study estimates that distracted drivers who were texting at the time of an automobile accident caused more then 16,000 fatalities between 2002 and 2007. Other studies show that texting while driving is as dangerous (or even more so) than driving while drunk.
