Standing at a busy downtown intersection, it doesn’t take long for Salvation Army volunteer James Phillips to spot a motorist holding a cell phone–and breaking the law.
“Here goes one right here,” Phillips says. “See what I’m saying?”
Nearly six months after the introduction of a citywide ban on holding a cell phone while driving, it’s unclear if the law has been effective in making city roads safer. But Phillips hasn’t seen a difference.
“I haven’t seen any behavior change,” Phillips says. “The drivers are still on the cell phone talking like they always do. I don’t really think they’re taking the ban on cell phones seriously in the city.”
The ban, which requires drivers talking on a cell phone to use a hands-free device, went into effect July 8. In Chicago, more than 3,600 citations have been issued by police since July 8, according police spokeswoman Monique Bond.
Motorists caught holding their cell phones while driving face a $50 fine, which rises to $200 when cell phone conversations cause accidents.
However, traffic control aide Cecilia Moon, who directs traffic during morning and lunch rush hour at the intersection of Michigan Avenue and Pearson Street, told RedEye she has not seen a single driver pulled over since the start of the ban.
“The police don’t care,” said Moon, who works for the Traffic Management Authority and is not authorized to give tickets for moving violations. “You see the CTA bus drivers using their phone. The taxi cab drivers are using their phone. The first week or two a lot of people got their [hands-free devices], but they don’t use it now.”
Chicago Police Officer Kristina Schuler said she thinks the ban has been working. Most of the roughly 50 motorists she and her partner have pulled over for violating the ban were aware of it, and many apologized. A few tried to make excuses, she said.
“Usually [they would say] ‘I had to take this call’ or ‘It was my mother, I hadn’t heard from her in a while,'” Schuler said. “I had one person claim to be a physician and it was an emergency. She was a physician. I don’t know whether it was an emergency. The law states you’re supposed to pull over and take the call.”
Schuler, who now works in the police news affairs department, was on patrol in an unmarked car until early November.
Although she pulled over dozens of people, she only wrote two or three citations, she said, using her prerogative to give warnings if the motorists were cooperative.
“They were law-abiding citizens who are apologetic and may or may not have known about the law,” Schuler said.
“Instead of troubling them and wasting my time when I can be finding drug dealers, I give them the warning and move on.”
Lakeview resident Rob Davis, who was waiting for a bus on Michigan Avenue on Wednesday, said he doesn’t know anybody who has been pulled over, and likens the cell phone to police attempts to enforce seat belt laws.
“In principle I’m in favor of it, but in general it seems a little impractical,” Davis said. “They can probably be doing better things than sitting around monitoring who’s talking in their car.”
———-
jgreenfield@tribune.com
