The New Year is upon us. Football, both college bowl games and pro playoff games are all the rage. And God forbid that anything occur during one of these games that might cause our favorite team to lose - like a blown call on a catch, a fumble, or a touchdown. It's a matter of winning and losing. And who wants to be on the losing end?
For this reason, both college and pro football (along with basketball and baseball) have instituted video review processes to make sure they get the call right. The key is that the latest in technology is utilized. After all, no one wants to lose due to human error.
Yet, when it comes to applying technology to roadway safety, the response to usage is often vehement opposition. Why? We don't want electronic gadgets monitoring our speed, or red-light running, or our actions behind the wheel. It's too intrusive, and after all it's only a matter of life and death, not winning and losing.
If life and death matter more than winning and losing - and being alive each day can be a victory in and of itself- than the challenge of 2010 and the decade ahead is to critique and implement select technologies that will indeed preserve the lives of thousands in our country, and millions worldwide. These are our children, our parents, our sisters and brother, our friends.
But there is plenty of controversy when it comes to implementing technology to decrease traffic-related deaths. A quick scan of sites related to "traffic photo enforcement" brings up dozens dedicated solely to getting out of paying traffic tickets versus taking responsibility for our driving behaviors. Controversy is not likely to go away any time soon.
What are your thoughts when it comes to automated/photo enforcement of traffic laws in the U.S.? Please contribute your thoughtful responses by clicking on "comments" following this blog. And, please keep your comments civil. It is difficult to make progress by antagonizing one another.
A final thought: Is it possible for technology to matter as much on our roadways to get things right and keep folks alive as it does in getting the calls rights in sports?"Don't let the 2 minutes you 'save' be the last 2 minutes of someone's life." David Townsend (Tia's Dad)
In safety,
Tom Everson
Keep Kids Alive Drive 25 - A Non-Profit "For Action" Organization
www.KeepKidsAliveDrive25.org
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