Coalition urges Alberta cellphone ban while driving

Source: CHTV.com

ALBERTA - When Tammy Henkel hits the road in Edmonton, she turns off her cellphone and stores it in the trunk until she arrives at her destination.

That wasn't always the case for the interior designer, but became a new, urgent, self-imposed rule in 2007 after her 70-year-old mother was hit and killed by an Edmonton Transit driver while she was crossing on a green walk light near the Edmonton Journal at 101st Street and Macdonald Drive.

A court witness said the bus driver had been talking on her cellphone minutes before she made a right-hand turn directly into Norah Tomlin Henkel.

The driver was fined $2,000, had her driver's licence suspended for three months and was found guilty of careless driving and failing to yield to a pedestrian.

Henkel said the conviction helped, "but it does not erase the anger or frustration I feel knowing that a cellphone was a cause of the collision."

On Monday, Henkel's voice joined a student-led coalition urging businesses, municipalities, towns and associations to ban cellphone use while driving.

A survey done by the Coalition for Cellphone-Free Driving determined 38 of 510 organizations contacted - approximately seven per cent - had a formal policy in place that banned employees from using both hand-held and hands-free cellphones while behind the wheel.

Strathcona County, which bans hand-held cellphones while driving, was considered one of 291 organizations without a full policy, even though RCMP gave out 120 tickets in September and October to drivers talking on their cells.

The coalition wasn't able to determine if 186 other organizations had a cellphone-free driving policy in place.

"I need something to change but until more people lose loved ones, I don't see our driving culture changing," Henkel said. "Until it is your loved one who is lost, the statistics are acceptable."