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Teen driving reforms get big push

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Illinois

Much ballyhoo is being made over Jesse White’s effort to tighten up teen driving laws. Illinois already has one of the more expansive restrictions on teen driving in the nation; the proposed legislation would ratchet it up even further.

Advocates for tightening teen-driving laws lauded the proposal, saying it will close gaps in Illinois law and make roads safer for everyone.

It sends a very strong message from top state officials that they’re very serious about trying to reduce the number of teen deaths,” said Judie Stone, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety.

The legislation was drafted by a task force convened by White in response to the Tribune’s yearlong examination of the root causes of accidents involving teen drivers.

The main provisions of the bill…

* Extending the learner’s permit phase from 3 months to 9 months.

* Doubling the time a teen driver is limited to having only one unrelated teen passenger in the car from 6 months to 12 months.

* Ticketing teenage passengers who violate the passenger restriction law.

* Bumping up nighttime driving restrictions one hour to 10 p.m. on weekdays and 11 p.m. on weekends.

* Requiring drivers under 18 who are ticketed for traffic violations to appear before a judge with their parents when seeking court supervision.

Protecting teen drivers is an easy position to support, but when do the regulations become unnecessary barriers?

“In highway safety, for the most part, there’s not really any organized lobbying efforts against the bill,” said state Sen. John Cullerton (D-Chicago), a longtime supporter of highway safety bills in Illinois and the lead sponsor of the teen driving bill. “The problem is some legislators have a perception that some of their constituents do not want to have highway safety laws passed.”

Also, some lawmakers will not welcome new driving restrictions in rural or suburban areas where mass transit isn’t an option.

Also,

Rep. Bill Black (R-Danville) said he has heard from parents in his district who are concerned about how nighttime restrictions would affect the ability of their children to get home from work or team practices. But Black said as long as the bill includes an exemption for teens driving to school activities or workâ€”which the current version does includeâ€”those fears should be allayed.

Black also said the cost of a provision that would require schools to provide six hours of supervised driving time on the street could be a problem for some school districts.

Most teens are irked. Any merit to their concerns?

Sara Worel, 18, said that more restrictions on teen driving might not be such a bad idea since younger drivers don’t always make the best decisions. But the West Chicago Community High School student said some rules should come from parents - not legislators.

“More practice for driving wouldn’t hurt,” Worel added. “From my experience, I didn’t learn that much from drivers ed. I learned more from my parents.”

She and other teens may have an ally in state Sen. Chris Lauzen, an Aurora Republican with two teenage sons. He questions if the state isn’t overstepping its boundaries. He’s already had calls from constituents critical of the new proposals.

“At a certain point … we need to trust our children when they’re driving the family car, or we shouldn’t allow them to drive at all,” said Lauzen.

posted by Paul Richardson
Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 9:39 am

Comments

Fast cars can be rented, but not by teens. During prom weeks, auto rental companies pull their sports cars off lots, or heavily screen renters of these cars. Even with all these precautions, auto rental companies loose a disproportionate number of their cars during these teen celebration weeks. If you take a look at the back lots of auto rental company storage lots after prom week, you will see horrific wrecks. Lots of them. All driven by teens, even though they were not supposed to be allowed to rent the car, drive the car, and their parents contractually obligated to buy the car should they violate the rental agreement.

Evidence and personal experience forces us to treat teen drivers as the danger they are. We no longer live in an era of safe $200 used cars, low insurance rates, empty roads, cheap gas, and inexpensive medical costs.

Today we surround jobless teens with $25,000 vehicles. We cannot close our eyes, do a prayer and hope for the best anymore.

Sorry, but times have changed.

Comment by VanillaMan Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 9:59 am
I wonder if Jesse ran this by the ‘Tumblers?’ I bet they don’t like this proposal much.

Comment by Gene Parmesan Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 10:02 am
I’m all for it…as long as there are exemptions for teen girls driving to get an abortion.

And the state should also mandate that parents shouldn’t be able to restrict their daughters from using the family car in order to get an abortion.

It’s a choice thing for *all* women.

Comment by Leroy Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 10:27 am
These are fine except the ticketing of passengers.
Looks a little too much like revenue enhancement.
This law will only make teens a little more disrespectful toward authority once arrested or fined just for riding in a car. Think this out a liitle more please.

Comment by Mr. Ethics Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 10:46 am
I support these measures although my teenagers won’t be happy. But it does seem more than a bit ironic that legislators will put these safety measures involving parents and more laws for teen driving (when most are safe drivers and kids survive most car rides) while some of the same legislators who will vote for these proposals will also vote for no parent involvement for a serious medical procedure where that same parents grandchild is guaranteed not to survive. Where is the constistency?

Comment by suburb Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 11:08 am
The higher the level of conditions that are imposed on teens makes it less likely that teens in at risk situations will meet them. This leads to teens driving without a licence. Once they are convicted, they can’t get a license. Before long, when they are caught a number of times, they get jail or even prison sentences. Jesse should be aware of this problem and include some effort to solve it. But that would not be popular and could be hard to do.

Comment by blogman Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 11:37 am
Great…now let’s do the same thing for anyone over 65. They are dangerous, too.

Comment by Johnny USA Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 11:42 am
But old people vote. A lot. Teenagers can’t vote or organize any opposition. Imagine if you tried to get all of the crazy old ladies that can’t see over the steering wheel off the roads. The AARP would swoop in and declare Marshall Law, requiring all driver’s to be in bed after Wheel of Fortune. But teenagers, we can make up all the laws we want for them.

Comment by Gene Parmesan Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 11:53 am
If these same laws were imposed on any other group of high-risk drivers people would call it fascist, and that would be the correct name for it.

Just imagine if these same restrictions were placed against african-american drivers because statistically they’re more likely to commit a crime. What would the public reaction be? Why shouldn’t we look at the issue the same way for teen drivers?

If I were a teen and this was my first introduction to the legal system, I would come away with the idea that equal rights and justice under the law are complete jokes.

Comment by Sango Dem Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 12:19 pm
suburb,

I suppose a difference might be that the teen driver could drive into other people, but whether or not a young woman chooses to be a mother doesn’t particularly impact people outside the immediate family.

Rear your daughters to be pro-life too and you shouldn’t ever have to worry about parental notification.

Comment by cermak_rd Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 12:19 pm
No problem…just have the teens declare themselves ‘undocumented workers’…then they get full driving privileges without any paperwork!

Comment by Leroy Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 12:34 pm
As a father of a soon to be driving licensed teenage daughter, I’ve pretty much put the same restrictions on her that these laws cover.

I also lost about four friends to prom night collisions back in my high school days.

Despite this, I’m dead set against most of the laws, at least partially because they’re unenforcable and perhaps increase the risk to the teenagers.

For instance, when I was in high school, I worked as a cook and dishwasher and often drove home after midnight clean up.

How was a police officer to know that I was coming home from work?

Most likely, a police officer would pull a driver over first to find out.

Does a teenage driver, tired from working 12 hours at a minimum wage job, look drunk to an officer? Do things escalate and become violent?

Ask any officer about their biggest risks, and auto stops are one of the biggest concerns they have about things getting “out of control”.

That risk is far greater, IMHO, than letting a teenager drive after 11 pm.

What about a senior high school driver giving a ride home to schoolmates? Do they get ticketed because they chose to get a ride from a teammate rather than walk on a dark road home, perhaps without sidewalks, because no other ride was available?

The fact is that if a police officer sees a teenage driver driving dangerously or irresponsibly, they already have the authority to ticket or arrest the driver for numerous violations.

Let’s not go down the road of giving punishment because a driver MAY drive irresponsibly later, and ticketing them for that possiblity based on presumption of FUTURE guilt.

PS: I’m fine with extending the periods for learners permits and increased supervision by an adult, as well as an parent going to court with their child, which they should be doing anyway.

Comment by PalosParkBob Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 12:37 pm
PalosParkBob makes some good points. This law also means that the police can pull over anyone who “looks” like a teen driver from a distance during certain times of night. Essentially, it legalizes being pulled over for Driving While Black/Brown for anyone in their teens or 20’s.

Comment by Sango Dem Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 12:44 pm
So, if teens are such dangerous drivers, why don’t we just have them get their permits at 16 and their license at 18? Or why not start them driving at 14? They just need practice at driving. Saying that they can only have one non-related passenger is a wierd rule. So remember kids, those other three people in the car are your “cousins”. It doesn’t matter if the cops saw you kissing or not.

Comment by Lovie's Leather Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 1:02 pm
I am absolutely, positively against this proposal. Good parents take care of these issues and bad parents don’t and all the new laws won’t change that. If they have this need to spend money then use it to hire more driver’s ed teachers.

Comment by i d Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 1:22 pm
im wating for the first legislator to propose the dumb idea of not giving out licenses till kids turn 18. Someone will metion it, wait and see…

Kids driving unsafe is not new, its been going on for dozens of years. Suddenly, as soon as a kid or two gets killed, everyone is jumping on this topic again. Kids will be kids, and parents need to better monitor that stuff, not let the government do it.

Comment by pickles!! Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 1:32 pm
I never thought I’d say this but I sort of agree with Senator Lauzen. Parents need to step in decide when their kids should or shouldn’t drive.

Before long kids will have to wait till their 18. Ridiculous.

Comment by ChiCountryGuy Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 1:48 pm
I think some of these ideas make sense (more driving hours with parents) and some don’t (passenger restriction).

Young drivers can be stupid. As a relatively young person (25) I went through a lot of this stuff recently. I went through drivers ed the last year before graduated licenses etc… I got my hours in , got a good grade in drivers ed, and did all the right things. But the day I turned 16 I went out on a country road to see if I could drive 100. Why? Because I was 16 and thought it sounded like a great idea.

We can legislate all we want, but we can’t cure stupidity. We can do our best to make young drivers good drivers, but I would argue that most of the prom night and fatal accidents you guys love to talk about occurred not because a driver was uneducated or bad at driving, but because they were young, stupid, and carefree.

I think it is good to put in place a system that teaches teens to be smart drivers, but to punish people for driving late or driving with a few friends in the car is dumb. I particularly think the friends limit is ridiculous. We can never legislate all the distraction out of a young drivers mind. We can limit kids, prohibit cell phones, or anything else. But there are radios, other cars, cool houses, defrosters, heaters, air conditioners, etc. to play with.

These laws are a lot like curfews. The people they are intended to curtail usually disregard them and the people that are responsible end up paying the price for them.

Last thing - As a young driver that has just about a decade behind the wheel, I would prefer driving on a street/freeway full of teenage drivers over a street/freeway of elderly drivers. I feel elderly drivers are much more of a risk because they are such unpredictable drivers.

Comment by Robbie Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 1:48 pm
pickles 1:32

Someone has already mentioned it…

http://www.dailyherald.com/story.asp?id=273320

“Most of White’s measures were sparked by a proposal last year that would have bumped the legal driving age to 18. State legislators quickly dismissed the idea, saying the wait was too long”

Comment by Paul Richardson Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 2:00 pm
I think moving the time up is problematic in terms of driving curfew–what about kids in high school with church or community activities and not just school or work?

Otherwise, I don’t see a big problem–in fact, as a guy who flipped a car three days after getting his license, the graduated license might have done me some good.

Comment by ArchPundit Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 2:04 pm
Pickles: Although a kid ot two getting killed may not seem significant to you, it is undescribably devastating to the surviving families and friends. In Tazwell County last year there were over 15 teen related fatalities. In 2005 there were over 260 traffic fatalities involving teens. According to previous comments one would assume you should blame this on the parents for not supervising their children appropriately. I don’t think so. Teens believe they are invincible and take risks they should not. Far too often they pay for this with their lives. Anything we can do as a state to save just one life, let alone “a kid or two” is worth doing. BTW, when similar legislation was proposed and passed in North Carolina citizens were in an uproar making many of the same arguments I read here. Guess what, once the bill passed and the dust settled, the majority of people decided it was a pretty good thing and not near the inconvenience they imagined. What’s the worst that can happen? You end up having to spend a few more months of your life driving your teen around spending time with them. Sounds like good parenting to me.

Comment by Trooper4Life Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 2:06 pm
I get your point, Trooper, and I’m not saying it isn’t a problem, or that a death of a child behind the wheel is insignificant. But is a few more months of education going to stop a kid from driving recklessly? it may in some cases, but not all.

I just don’t think we can easily legislate, or enforce, a solution to this problem thats been going on for years. In many of these cases, I think kids have to easy access to cars from their parents or older adults, and too much freedom to do what they want. its almost like a license to do stupid things. We have all done them.

This issue may fall under the topic of you can’t legislate common sense.

Comment by pickles!! Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 2:21 pm
I think Robbie had lots of good points. from my perspective, i think parents should have to participate in a class with their soon to be driver before they can get their license to help parents understand driving dangers as well. too many parents hand over the keys and don’t care - i know my parents gave me the keys and never said as i walked out the door ‘drive safe, call me, no drinking, and here are my rules or you lose the car”. ALso, wouldn’t be a bad idea to put together continued classes/drivers ed until they turn 18 or graduate from high school. Have Jessee send out speakers on speeding, accidents, drinking and driving. Make it real - share stories. I know when RYan was SOS he had a great speaker who went to high schools and told her story about drunk driving and she relaly made an impact. More training for the kids before getting their license, some class time for kids and their parents, and continuing education through high school can make roads safer and hopefully kids much smarter.

Comment by annoyed all the time Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 2:23 pm
These restrictions make sense. Driving is a privilege and not a right. Parents may have to drive their kids home late at night. Big deal. That’s what being a parent is about. Ticketing teen passengers is fine. It helps the teen driver enforce the no passenger rule because he/she can say - hey, my giving you a ride could cost YOU! This isn’t just about keeping our teens safe - it’s about keeping other drivers and pedestrians safe.

Comment by Way Northsider Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 2:41 pm
I stand strongly against this proposal and if the state of Illinois passes this, they should also provide funding for Public Transportation throughout the entire state.

I also believe it’s time to implement for laws for Jesse’s Crew… those over the age of 65. Those are just as dangerous. However, we all know this won’t happen because they have the lobbyist, when will the youth of Illinois rise up and truly work for change.

This is an issue most (if not all) could get behind… young people, call your legislators, call your governor (of course you won’t talk to him), march on the Capitol, Make a difference!

Comment by Jeff Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 3:11 pm
Ask your Agent! As a rule, it isn’t a matter of if but when your 16 year old will have an incident. Palos, if your child works long late hours, then he/she is the exception and you won’t have to worry. Leather and Pickles, the Insurance industry would love to see minimum age for drivers to be 18. The Auto industry’s lobby is stronger. Keep in mind that Auto Insurance rates would decrease if the companies weren’t paying out all the claims that 16 year olds are responsible for. Here’s to lower rates!!

Comment by Chicago Lou Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 3:14 pm
Is this a surprise?

Blagojevich and his people are corrupt from the top down, and it is systematic, hypocrtical, and covered up

Blago will soon join George Ryan in the perp walk of shame
and no Jim Thompson to blackmail and Dan Webb to do 20 million in legal defense bills

Comment by Lon Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 4:23 pm
This is the typical playbook phony legislation.

1. The media (in this case, the Chicago Tribune) does an “investigative report” and
2. The media is shocked to discover a “crisis” and
3. Editorials bemoan the lack of caring on the part of our legislators, and
4. Some politician is smart enough to know that this will mean positive stories from that media outlet for at least a year if he/she sponsors legislation to “cure” the “problem” and
5. Solemn news conference with said politicians, followed by glowing praise from said media outlet.

Bull-Oney!

Comment by Bad Boy Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 4:28 pm
I know many people will think this is a ridiculous point… but what about kids having fun? Most of my memories from high school involve driving around and causing a bit of trouble. Teens don’t want to sit at home. We can’t legislate the fun out of life.

Comment by Just Observing Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 4:56 pm
My son is about to get his drivers license.
I want him to live.

Comment by Dad Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 5:59 pm
I voted for Jesse White, but this is going to far.
Illinois already has a governor who proposes to many laws to keep himself in the news. Let parents parent.

Comment by ug! Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 6:44 pm
The longer permit period is probably the best idea, to insure that teens gain experience in all kinds of weather and driving conditions. I happen to know that the father of one of the Tazewell County teens who died last year was very strongly in favor of this. His daughter (and two of her friends) died when their car crashed into a tree along a rain-slicked road at a high rate of speed; the driver had only had his license for a week before the accident.

Comment by 'Lainer Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 7:40 pm
Define teenager in the bill? Is it anyone under 18 or does it include 18 and 19 year olds too?

Comment by Anonymous Thursday, Jan 25, 07 @ 9:39 pm
You guys & girls would not believe how bad teen [and most other] drivers are today; distractions from cell phones, changing CDs, not signalling, speeding, bouncing & talking with your high school pals while losing control of dad’s SUV on an exit ramp. The stats make it clear that teens are most likely to get into serious injury and fatal crashes… they don’t have the experience to know how to steer out of trouble and wind up killing your daughter or son as they learn. ANYTHING that gives them more experience, more restrictions and more awareness before being cut loose is a good thing. It is NOT a $$$ generator since the people who get fine $$$ are the circuit court system of the county where the infractions happen.

Remember, driving is a privilege, not a right. If we had it our* way, all traffic fines would start at $350: double for those going to court + being found guilty. For perspective; More of us are killed on IL roads than in Iraq…. if tightening up some driving problems helps, great!

Comment by North of I-80 Friday, Jan 26, 07 @ 12:36 am
I think the time of the driving restrictions shoudl coincide with their curfew hours - if they’re not supposed to be out after hours, then they shouldn’t be driving around after hours either.

Comment by Sahims2 Friday, Jan 26, 07 @ 12:30 pm
If you take a closer look at the accident statistics, you’ll find that male drivers have double the fatal accident rate as females, and female drivers 16-20 have a better safety record than male drivers 30-40. It works out this way whether you look at accidents per driver or accidents per mile driven. I want everyone to be safe, but I think the whole issue would be reported about and responded to a lot differently if it were the female drivers causing the majority of accidents rather than the male drivers. Take a look at the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (nhtsa.gov) and other sources and judge for yourselves.

Comment by NoGiftsPlease Friday, Jan 26, 07 @ 7:21 pm
They absolutely should toughen up driving laws for teens b/c then maybe their would be less collisions involving teen driver. I am a teen driver and I say they need to go for it!!!! ASAP!

Comment by moushie89 Sunday, Jan 28, 07 @ 12:14 pm