Beware of “Ping Only” GPS Trackers

At Safe Teen Driving Club we’ve noticed a flood of low cost, limited GPS tracking units hitting the market in recent months. Many of these are from new resellers and off-shore manufacturers just jumping into the market for teen driving safety. But take note!

If you’re shopping for GPS monitors, beware of “Ping only” GPS systems. Those units allow you only to “ping” or “locate” the car to find out where it is and how fast it’s going right now. But there’s no way to see where he drove this morning, or last night. Or how fast. Or at what time. Or at what street addresses.

Many of those GPS units masquerade as full-featured GPS trackers and sport a low price, usually $200-$350 — but they don’t give you any driving history. If you are serious about enforcing and monitoring your teen’s driving, don’t be misled by low cost “ping only” units. They can’t give you the information you need to monitor and coach your young driver.

On the other hand, the Vehicle Tracker gives you weeks of driving history by sending location and speed data continuously to the tracking web site whenever the ignition is ON. This real time reporting lets you have meaningful discussion with your teen about driving behaviors and performance. It’s a best seller and continues on sale through July 31. Be sure to check out the details and learn about possible insurance discounts as well.

The Vehicle Tracker monitors vehicle location, speed and other parameters via global positioning satellites (GPS) and makes reports when pre-set limits are exceeded using an integrated cellular device to parents’ phone and email. A secure, password-protected website allows you to view vehicle driving history in great detail.

This history of driving behavior includes maps and reports showing where the vehicle has been at specific times, at what speed it has been driven and related information that helps parents monitor and enforce the agreements they have established with their youngsters.

How to Adjust Side View Mirrors

Adjusting Side View Mirrors to Eliminate Blind Spots

Thousands of accidents occur each year because people changing lanes fail to see a vehicle that is right next to them. Adjusting side view mirrors properly should let cars approaching from the rear seamlessly move from your rear-view mirror to become visible in your side-view mirror.

The folks at CarTalk have some nice, illustrated instructions to help you set your mirrors to eliminate blind spots. Take a look at their instructions here (PDF)

Caveat! We’ve been driving with mirrors adjusted as outlined at CarTalk for a few years now. It did take a bit of getting used to! So take care as you begin driving with the new mirror adjustments and be sure to rely on your rear-view mirror first!

What’s a Safe Following Distance When Driving?

Variable Following Distance

Here’s a tip you can share with your teen, courtesy of Dr. Charles McDaniel. Dr. McDaniel is the author of Parents Deserve a Brake, a best-selling CD program that helps parents teach their teens to become safe drivers. Dr. McDaniel holds a Ph.D. in Curriculum Development-Highway Traffic Safety and has led many traffic safety initiatives across the country over several decades. You can read more about him here.

For years, a safe following distance behind the vehicle in front of you was based on one car length (20 feet) for each 10 mph you were traveling. In the late 1960s, this was changed to the two-second rule. The two-second rule is adequate for speeds up to 35 mph. Today, many driving programs and some states recommend a three-second following distance. We recommend a Variable Following Distance, as follows:

• Two-second following distance, 0-35 mph

• Three-second following distance, 36-60 mph

• Four-second following distance, 61+ mph

If driving conditions involve fog, snow or ice, you should increase your following distance by one or more seconds, depending on the severity of the weather. If you are following a motorcycle, extend your following distance by at least one additional second.

How do you gauge the distance? Just pick a landmark on the road ahead. It could be a utility pole, a shadow, a bridge or even a mark on the road. Count one-thousand-one, one-thousand-two, etc. to see how long it takes you to reach the landmark. Then adjust your speed to leave the appropriate distance between you and the vehicle ahead. This is especially easy to do on freeways and other limited access highways where speeds are higher.

Reader’s Digest “Save Your Teen’s Life”

The August edition of Reader’s Digest contains an excellent article that hits all the major points parents and teens need to understand about the dangers of teen driving. Even better, there’s an interactive edition of the article at their site. Take a few minutes to see how your state laws and traffic fatality rate stacks up against the rest of the nation.

RD rated each state based on the number of teen deaths, seat belt laws, DUI laws and graduated driver licensing laws. It’s a sad comment that in 2008 we still have 12 states, almost one-fourth of the nation, given an overall rating of “Worst State.” The worst five states in terms of teen driving fatalities are Mississippi, Wyoming, Montana, Alabama and Missouri. Some of those states ranked at the bottom are heavily agricultural or have sparser populations, where parents are not inclined to support legislation that puts a lot of restrictions on new drivers. Others have a preponderance of rural roadways, which tend to be the scene of a disproportionate number of crashes.

Why don’t all our states have a uniform set of laws that limit teen exposure to the riskiest driving situations? Generally, it’s because legislators in those lowest ranked states cannot get support for restrictions that safer states have in place. The article quotes Vermont State Rep. Kathy Lavoie saying “When it comes to an infringement on parental rights, I get nervous.”

What infringement? The “right” of parents to let their kids drive after midnight – when all the research shows a skyrocketing rate of fatalities after 9PM. The “right” of parents to allow a novice driver to carry other minors in the car – when research shows up to 500 percent increase in crash rates with other teens in the car.

I replied to a 42-year old person on the RD forum who said that driving at 16 should be allowed so the kids could experience a “first date” at 16, rather than waiting until they were a bit older. After all, he seemed to reason, why make a teenager wait for his or her first date? The kids deserve all the fun they can have as soon as possible.

I might just be way too conservative – but I don’t think so. To me, keeping our kids safe and alive is the #1 responsibility of every parent. I would no sooner let a 16-year old with just 40-50 hours of driving experience drive another teen around town than I’d let them jump off a bridge just to get the rush of falling. It’s a parenting issue. And IMHO, no one should confuse proper parenting with silly talk about “infringement of parental rights.” Let’s get real and keep our kids alive!