As I was driving home from work the other day, I noticed numerous vehicles pulled over by Highway Patrolmen. I thought the amount of traffic stops seemed much higher than normal, when it dawned on me – Ohio’s new Distracted Driving Law went into effect on April 4.
For the next six months, officers will pull drivers over and issue warnings about using their phones while driving. In October, you will actually get a ticket for texting and talking while driving.
More and more laws like the new one in Ohio are going on the books or already there (I found that out years ago in Reno, NV). I say it’s about time.
Of course, though they’ve also all been put into place for one safety reason or another, not EVERY traffic law on the books is still necessary. Here are some of the wackiest rules you might not have heard about in Driver’s Ed.
Unless you have a lantern attached to the front of your vehicle, it’s illegal to drive the wrong way down a one-way street in Alabama.
You’ll be ticketed for honking your horn after 9 p.m. outside of Arkansas dining establishments that serve sandwiches or cold drinks.
“Though they’ve all been put into place for one safety reason or another, not all traffic laws are still necessary.”
Unless you’re killing a whale, it’s against the law to shoot animals from your vehicle in Tennessee.
You can be ticketed in Massachusetts for having a gorilla in your back seat.
Remember how I said I once got pulled over for holding my phone in Reno? You also can’t ride camels on the highway in Nevada.
In Montana, it’s illegal to be alone with sheep in a truck – you must have a chaperone.
In certain parts of Missouri, you cannot, under any circumstances, drive with an uncaged bear in your car. That’s only in certain areas – in other areas, however, it’s obviously allowed.
In California, women are not allowed to drive in a housecoat. In Memphis, TN, Louisiana and Virgina, women aren’t allowed to drive at all, apparently, unless their husband walks in front of the car.
Don’t drive blindfolded in Alabama.
No matter how much your dogsled team loves being outside, it’s illegal to tie a dog to your car roof in Alaska.
In Florida, if you tie an elephant, goat or alligator to a parking meter, you have to pay the standard fee.
It’s illegal to spit from a car or bus in Georgia, but it’s OK to spit from a truck.
Apparently in Indiana, it’s against the law to sell cars on Sundays, while you can’t BUY one in Maine.
Oklahoma has been against distacted driving for so long that it’s illegal to read a comic book while driving.
In Oregon, you must yield to pedestrians when driving on the sidewalk.
While some may complain that Ohio’s new cellphone law is overkill and the cops should have better things to worry about, the National Safety Council says that distracted driving is a vastly underreported and underappreciated social problem. You’ve seen the knuckleheads weaving around the highway, oblivious to everyone else on the road because their conversation is so important…Hang up the phone and drive, people!
So, even though it may be legal to eat road kill in West Virginia, it doesn’t sound like a very good idea. To me, texting and talking while driving is just as unappetizing.
I once worked with a Romanian technician named Alex. He was a tiny guy who chain-smoked. His greatest fear was not a totalitarian dictator. It was fire and falling cars.
Back in those days, we used drop lights with incandescent bulbs. This was long before LEDs and rechargeable batteries. The bulbs would typically stop working when they were lightly jostled. If they were dropped, the glass bulb would shatter.