Attorney Tim Hollister, Shipman & Goodwin, Hartford | Blog helps parents avoid his personal loss

You began a blog for parents of teen drivers (http://fromreidsdad.org/index.php) in the wake of your son Reid’s fatal, single-car accident in December 2006. Why go public with such a personal tragedy?

My family’s tragedy was my own concern until I served, as a bereaved parent, on Governor Rell’s Teen Safe Driving Task Force in 2007-08. From that service I learned that, while I thought I had been a well-informed, mainstream parent while my son was driving, that was not the case. I learned that teen driving is much more dangerous than the literature available to parents states; that many parents are like I was, distracted from the dangers by the convenience of having a new driver in the house and pride in my child passing a milestone toward adulthood; that Connecticut in 2006 and prior years had one of the weakest teen driver laws in the country; and that the main obstacle at the legislature to stricter teen laws was parent opposition. My blog is an effort to collect for parents in one place all of the information I gleaned from my task force service. I also confirmed that there is nothing like my blog out there, nothing from a parent to parents. And I suppose that it takes a bereaved parent to have the credibility to warn other parents, and to do so with conviction. These are the reasons I have chosen to “go public.”

You say on your blog, “There’s no such thing as a safe teen driver.” Is that true? Are there really no safe teen drivers? It seems like a broad brush to paint them with.

One of the central points of my blog, and one of the key messages I am hoping to convey to parents, is that teen drivers have three characteristics that prevent even the best-trained and law-abiding among them from being “safe” drivers. First, science has now documented that the brains of teens do not fully appreciate risk and danger; teens suffer from a chemical imbalance that does not disappear until they are in their 20s. Second, driving requires judgment, both to avoid unsafe situations and to react properly when one arises. The experts tell us that such judgment takes several years of driving, not the 20-40 hours that most states require before licensing. Third, we train teens on local streets but then they venture out into places they have not driven before, so they are learning to drive and to navigate at the same time – a very difficult task. So, while there are well trained and law abiding teens, and there are many ways for parents to reduce risks, the facts are that teen drivers are at much higher risk than any other age group. Driving is the leading cause of death for teens in the United States.

You raise a point getting a lot of coverage lately. Long-term, driver’s education has little benefit for teen drivers. Why is that?

I have addressed this exact point in my most recent blog post, “Why Driver’s Ed Matters — Except When It Doesn’t.” Driver’s education instructs teens about the rules of the road and how to operate a vehicle, but it does not and cannot overcome the three factors noted above. So, driver’s ed is essential and it does reduce the risk. We would never allow on the roads someone who had not received basic instruction in how to operate a vehicle but drivers ed and obeying the law, by themselves, do not make teen driving “safe.”

How does one overcome the tendencies of teen drivers? What can realistically be done to cure this problem?

Bearing in mind that parents can only reduce the risks, there are several things that have proven effective: Obviously, obeying all of the laws about speeding, reckless driving, impaired driving, fatigued driving, passengers, seat belts and electronic devices are critical. Enforcement of teen driving laws is first and foremost up to parents, not the police, who have limited ability to know when these laws are being violated. Parents should also recognize the particularly high risks of distracted driving – electronic devices/texting, and passengers. Next, parents should bear in mind the important difference between “purposeful” and “recreational” driving” – when teens have a clear destination, route, and arrival time, they are more likely to drive safely; if they are driving for fun or escape, that’s when the problems start. Finally, use a parent teen driving contract. Allstate Insurance, the DMV, and other organizations have models.

You say, “A nighttime curfew, passenger restrictions, seat belt laws, and cell phone/electronics bans are difficult for the police and parents to enforce.” What would make these easier to enforce? Do parents of children need to encourage self-enforcement through good practices?

The problem here is the police cannot stop a driver based solely on perception of his or her age. Connecticut’s task force discussed a system used in the U.K. of putting a sticker on the cars of teen drivers. New Jersey is about to become the first state to try this. Our task force received a great deal of pushback on this from parents, especially parents of girls, worried about their teens being targeted on the highways. Another potential technological solution is a chip embedded in the license plate that only police can detect. Perhaps other solutions will emerge that do not upset parents so much. For now, the bottom line remains that teen driving laws are hard for the police to enforce, and parents are the first line of defense.

You were part of the Governor’s Teen Safe Driving Task Force. Do you think its work has accomplished much to date? Were there any immediate benefits from the new laws?

In 2008, Connecticut went from having one of the weakest teen driving laws into country to one of the strictest. In July 2009, the DMV issued a preliminary report showing that crashes and fatalities in Connection are down significantly. Some of this may be attributable to the higher cost of gas in 2008-09 and the huge public awareness campaign that occurred in 2008-09 regarding the new laws and the reasons for them. At this time, I am satisfied that the new laws are tough enough; now we just need a continuing statewide effort to educate the public and enforce these new rules. Connecticut licenses about 30,000 new teen drivers every year, so each year we have a new group of parents and teens to educate, as well as big group in need of reminders. The work cannot stop.