Lawrence KS cell phone ban

The City of Lawrence is currently debating a proposed ordinance that, if enacted, will be the strictest cell phone ban in the country. The ban applies to everyone while they're driving, and even includes conversations made on cell phones in "hands-free" mode. This means that if you're driving down the road, talking into your speaker phone, you could be pulled over and cited. I have to assume it also means that if you're driving down the road and singing, you could be pulled over, since police have no way to know the difference.

There are already laws on the books against inattentive driving. Evidentally the City of Lawrence has not done a good job of enforcing those laws, so now they want even more laws to compensate. I've never quite understood this thinking, but it seems to permeate all levels of government. So what really is the point of this new law?

During the course of the debate, one official made the following comment:

“This (ban) would send an important message that safety is more important than personal convenience,” Traffic Safety Commissioner Paul Graves said.

Following this logic, if safety was more important than personal convenience, we wouldn't be driving cars in the first place, as they are nothing more than personal convenience, and, statistically speaking, extremely dangerous.