Living in cities makes wannabe legislators of us all. Every day, urbanites have occasion to shake a scornful fist and say, There oughtta be a law. There can't be a modern city behavior more liable to elicit this high-handed oath than the guy who walks down the street, or worse, crosses the street, with his head buried in his phone.
Some people are legislators in real life, not just in their passive-aggressive daydreams, so when they feel like there oughtta be a law, they put forward a private member's bill. That's what Ontario Liberal MPP Yvan Baker has done with the Phones Down, Heads Up Act. It would slap fines on people caught staring at their devices while crossing the street.
20%	reduction in cyclists killed or seriously injured on the roads.
178	drivers pulled over and given a lesson in safe overtaking.
>350 prosecutions made using footage given to them by the public.
We've seen a significant change in driver behaviour across the region as a result of the operation and the campaign...hopefully that's going to have a profound impact on the amount of people we have killed or seriously injured on our roads in the coming years.
The study released Thursday is the latest by University of Utah professor David Strayer, who has been examining the impact of infotainment systems on safety for AAA's Foundation for Traffic Safety since 2013. Past studies also identified problems, but Strayer said the "explosion of technology" has made things worse.
"It's adding more and more layers of complexity and information at drivers' fingertips without often considering whether it's a good idea to put it at their fingertips," Strayer said. That complexity increases the overall amount of time drivers spend trying to use the systems.