According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 10 percent of the 35,092 fatal crashes last year involved at least one distracted driver, resulting in 3,477 fatalities, up 9 percent from 2014. It is therefore stepping up its efforts on that front, and this time the initiative is on smartphones.
Aiming to reduce driver distraction, the NHTSA has just issued a set of new, voluntary guidelines aimed at device manufacturers and app developers alike.
The Agency, Autonews reports, wants smartphones to be paired with the car’s infotainment systems and operates solely through them; moreover, it asks that certain functions, such as text messaging, internet browsing and social media content, be locked out in that operation.
Additionally, it is calling for the automotive equivalent of the “Airplane Mode”, in which a simplified “Driver Mode” will limit the device’s functions to those that do not pose a distraction to the driver.
“As millions of Americans take to the roads for Thanksgiving gatherings, far too many are put at risk by drivers who are distracted by their cellphones”, U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said. “These common sense guidelines, grounded in the best research available, will help designers of mobile devices build products that cut down on distraction on the road.”
This new set of guidelines comes at a time when in-car connectivity is all the rage at the automotive industry and most major manufacturers are integrating Apple’s CarPlay and Google’s Android Auto in the infotainment systems of most of their new models.
