090707
- Received some interesting
observations from Martin Hyde, VA7HYD.
They are cut and pasted below:
"Good
Evening Bill,
I downloaded the discussion paper (all
20+ pages) on cel phone
etc usage from the government website.
Of interest is that the discussion paper
indicates that 25% of
accidents are due to driver distraction,
but no where in the
paper is there any mention of what
portion of that 25%
is due to cel phone or electronics use.
One reference I found on line suggests
that cel phone usage
accounts for 5% of distraction...or
1.25% of total accidents....
That suggests that a possible means of
tackling this issue is
to put cel phone use in perspective by
ranking it along with
other causes of accidents and suggesting
that increased enforcement
etc of the top ten causes of accidents
might pay more of a
dividend than adding new laws.
Regards,
Martin
VA7HYD"
090706
- I have received some extra PDF
documents which I am attaching for the
interest of Amateur Radio operators in
British Columbia.
ARRL Mobile Policy Statement
Ontario Minister of Transportation
Background Document
RAC - Letter to Ontario Transportation
Minister
RAC
- Background letter to Ontario
Transportation
The Canadian Association of Rally Sport
090702 - British Columbia has
recently identified that they are
looking to introduce legislation to
limit the use of cell phones and other
electronic devices, while driving
Recently, a number of jurisdictions have
been looking at this issue, and have
introduced or passed legislation to that
effect. A concern of Amateur Radio, is
that our equipment and use needs to be
specifically excluded from the
legislation.
British Columbia is at a very early
stage of this legislation. This link
http://www.pssg.gov.bc.ca/legislation/current.htm
shows the Province's position, and
provides an opportunity to download a
position paper, as well as to leave
feedback.
At
this time we would encourage you to
download the position paper and read
it. I think many, if not most of us,
would be hard pressed to argue that the
use of a cell phone, at least without a
hand's free device, is not distracting
to at least a large portion of the
population. Our concern, is to make
sure that if the legislation goes
through, it specifically excludes the
use of Amateur Radio equipment.
I will
be posting more information here as
events emerge. I would encourage you to
send me an email with any issues or
concerns you have, or ideas on how we
can provide a positive message back to
the Province. Until we actually see the
proposed legislative language, we don't
know if we are in or out of scope of the
law.
Feedback will be accepted by the
Province through early August. We have
time to do some research, to prepare a
position, and ask for your support on
this important threat to Amateur Radio.
I can
be reached at VE7XS @ RAC.CA
Bill
Gipps, Director, Radio Amateurs of
Canada, BC & YK
