The decals on the doors of Vermont State Police cars are printed by inmates at Northwest State Correctional Facility. The center of the decal includes a drawing of a cow and an evergreen tree in a green field, with snow-covered mountains in the distance.

In 2008, an inmated opened the computer file and redrew one of the spots on the cow to resemble a fat little pig. Then in 2009 the state ordered new decals for use on new cars or older car where one door had been repaired or replaced.  The state estimates that 60 decals were printed, and some 30 state police cars drove around with the tiny bit of hidden sarcasm for a number of years before the pig was spotted.

You can read the entire story in the Burlington Free Press here.

The truck plummeted over the edge of the bridge, crashing into the creek below and bursting into flames, killing the driver. The car and its occupants — a 36-year-old woman and her two daughters, ages 10 and 10 weeks — were left dangling over the edge of the bridge for at least one hour before being rescued.

Most remarkably, the ten-week-old baby slept for most of that hour while she and her family awaited rescue. California Highway Patrol credits the child’s safety to the mother having used a properly installed rear-facing child safety seat.

As Comedy Guys Defensive Driving reported last year, The American Academy of Pediatrics and The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration recommends keeping children in rear-facing seats for even longer than previously recommended because of the additional safety it provides.

You can see video coverage of the crash site and the rescue here.

Colorado: Denver City County Give Initial Approval to Cameras
Following an audit that criticized Denver’s traffic photo-enforcement program as having unproven results, the City Council on Tuesday gave initial approval to renew the contract of the photo red-light program.

California: Local Communities Get More Control over Speed Limits
California communities now have more leeway in setting speed limits. As a result, yellow light intervals will also be reduced.

Louisiana: New Orleans Police Officers Owe Large Portion of Unpaid Tickets
Some of the biggest accumulators of unpaid traffic tickets in New Orleans are city employees. But it’s unclear how many of them are racking up tickets while they race to fires or hurry to crime scenes as opposed to simply violating traffic laws for no good reason.

These driving news stories found via
NMA Driving News and other sources.

No one argues that texting while driving is stupidly dangerous.

But is a conversation on a hands-free phone just as bad?

Popular Mechanics contributing editor and Instapundit blogger Glenn Harlan Reynolds argues that it is not and that the NTSB is stretching the facts to support its proposal. Read what he has to say here.

Texas: Speed limits going up on area highways
Signs with an unfamiliar message “speed limit 75” have been showing up on major Central Texas roads this fall, the result of a change in state law earlier in the year.

New Mexico: New Mexico: Speeding case focuses on illegal speed limits in Edgewood
Since 2002 the speed limit signs along residential streets in Edgewood have read 25 mph, and until
three weeks ago no one thought twice about it.

Maryland: “Speed Trap State” may be state’s new motto
As Maryland adds speed cameras at a rapid and apparently unchecked rate, it risks annoying more than its
populace. The state is gaining the same reputation as the shabby rural town that tickets unwary outsiders
to finance the sheriff’s convention trip to Hawaii.

These driving news stories found via
NMA Driving News.

Many individual states and cities in the USA have their own restrictions on the use of cell phones by drivers, yesterday the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) called for nationwide ban on drivers placing phone calls or sending/reading text messages. The new ban, if passed, would outlaw all non-emergency calls and texts by every driver in the USA, including both handheld and hands-free devices.

The proposed NTSB ban far exceeds current laws existing in at least 35 states.

Evidence so far shows that existing laws have not diminished texting while driving. The Associate Press reports that NHTSA data shows it increasing. Roughly 20% of USAmerican drivers – including half of drivers aged 21 to 24 – say they’ve texted or sent email while driving.

Overstated Risks?

In a strange coincidence, the NTSB ban was announced on the same day that new analysis of existing data claims that the dangers of cell phone use while driving may have been overestimated.

Researchers at Detroit’s Wayne State University School of Medicine re-examined two influential studies on distracted driving and car crashes and found problems in the methodologies used.

The two studies in question, a 1997 Canadian study and a 2005 Australian study, compared cell phone billing records of people who’d been involved in crashes. The billing records concretely determined the amount of phone use, but according to Richard Young, lead author of the new analysis, claimed that the studies weren’t as diligent about determining the amount of driving done by these drivers over the same period.

The Wayne State analysis was published in Epidemiology. You can read the Time Magazine story of both the proposed ban and the research analysis here.

Missouri:  Lt Governor Campaigns Against Red Light Cameras
Former judge Michael Carter to land the number-two job in Missouri state government is hoping his opposition to red-light cameras will put his candidacy over the top.

Illinois: Chicago City Employees Pay $1.1 Million in Overdue Fines, Bills
Local government employees with overdue parking tickets and water bills have coughed up $1.1 million in the five weeks since Mayor Rahm Emanuel threatened to fire or suspend them if they didn’t settle their debts.

Louisiana: Court upholds citizens rights to make DUI arrests
Private citizens can arrest other motorists suspected of driving under the influence of alcohol (DUI), the Louisiana Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday.

These driving news stories found via
NMA Driving News.

This time, though, that’s a good thing.

Allstate has released their 2011 America’s Best Driver’s Report, which lists – among other things – the cities with the worst drivers. Not a Texas town on the list.

• Washington, DC
• Baltimore, Maryland
• Glendale, California
• Newark, New Jersey
• Providence, Rhode Island
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
• Hartford, Connecticut
• Jersey City, New Jersey
• San Francisco, California
• Alexandria, Virginia

MainStreet.com has ranked the Top Ten States with the Worst Roads. Heading its list are Louisiana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, West Virginia, Arkansas, Hawaii, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Kentucky and Alabama.

Oklahoma: Speeding tickets may fund new police headquarters
Oklahoma City leaders will look at raising the cost of speeding tickets to help pay for the new police headquarters.

Texas: League City police chief accused of issuing ticket quota
A local police chief has been accused of threatening to punish officers if they do not write a certain amount of tickets.

Louisiana: Newspaper sues New Orleans to get names of traffic-camera violators
More than 16,000 motorists owe the city of New Orleans at least $500 in traffic-camera fines, and The Times-Picayune filed suit last week seeking their names.

These driving news stories found via
NMA Driving News.

Illinois: Would speed cameras really save lives?
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel says he wants speed cameras legalized in the city to protect kids, but federal data suggest the effort may have a limited impact on reducing fatalities.

Colorado: Denver collects fines on drivers who stop at red lights
The city of Denver is bringing in thousands of dollars in fines every year by ticketing people who stop at red
lights. They are ticketed because their tire goes over the white line that marks where the vehicle should stop.

Tennessee: Bluff City asks court to dismiss $6 million speed trap lawsuit
Bluff City, its mayor and American Traffic Solutions (ATS) are asking that a $6 million lawsuit filed against
them in September be dismissed.

These driving news stories found via NMA Driving News.

It’s an old argument: who are the safer drivers, men or women?

CBS Moneywatch.com recently reported some poll information that asked men and women drivers to rate themselves regarding how safe they are behind the wheel.

• In a survey conducted by Quality Planning for insurer MetLife, 51% of women said that women drive more safely, but only 39% of men claimed that male drivers were safer.
• And some evidence supports the women’s view of themselves. According to this study, men are 3.4 times more likely to get a ticket for reckless driving and 3.1 times more likely to be ticketed for drunk driving.
• Men are also more at risk for road-related deaths. According to a study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, more than 11,900 male drivers died in the USA from traffic accidents in 2009.Based on miles traveled, men died at a rate of 2.5 deaths per 100 million miles traveled, as opposed to 1.7 deaths for women.
• Apply the same question to teenage drivers and the numbers shoow upward: 9.2 deaths per 100 million miles for males 16 to 19 years old and 5.3 deaths for female of the same age.

You can read the complete article comparing men and women drivers here.

Here at Comedy Guys Defensive Driving, we’ve never done a study of whether there are more men or women in our defensive driving classes, but the question might be interesting.

If so, then check out IBM’s 2011 Survey of Commuter Pain. Researchers interviewed more than eight thousand commuters in twenty cities on six continents to get the details about their daily drive to work. Results were compiled and compared, ranking these cities from best to worst in terms of how painful it is to commute to a job.

Of the 20 cities in the survey, Mexico City was ranked as the most painful city for a daily commute. The highest ranking USA city was Los Angeles, but the survey also included New York City and Chicago.

“Commuter pain” on this survey is a combination of hours spent in traffic, gas prices, and stress felt by drivers. This is the fourth year that IBM has conducted the survey.

On August 14, Timothy Raines of Ft Worth was spotted driving erratically south of the TCU campus on a forklift, which was later revealed to have been stolen from Holiday Inn construction site at Rosedale Street and Forest Park Boulevard. According to the news account that followed, Raines had his dog along as a passenger and drank his beer as he drove along, even hurling empty cans at the police cars that followed.

Beers, dogs, stolen forklift, and running from the cops — there’s got to be a country song in there somewhere.

UTA student Nathan Lowery, also of Fort Worth, was driving south on South University Drive to get gas when he spotted the freewheeling forklift, made a U-turn, and whipped out his camera. As a result we have this wonderful video footage below.

View more videos at: http://nbcdfw.com.

In a later story, Fort Worth Police stated that Lowery and his roommate, who was riding along as a passenger, may face charges for violating traffic laws while putting themselves and the public in danger by following the chase.

On August 10, two Colorado police officers were driving through Goshen County, Wyoming on their way to a funeral for two officers recently killed in the line of duty in South Dakota. A volunteer fireman spotted the car, which was reportedly speeding, driving erratically, and using its emergency lights to pass other vehicles.

Goshen County Sheriff’s Capt. Brian Morehouse said he clocked the car going 57 mph in a 40 mph zone. After pulling them over, he smelled alcohol and found beer in a cooler inside the car. The officer driving was charged careless driving and speeding. His breathalyzer test revealed a BAC of .07, just under the legal limit of .08. As a result of this, he was charged with the misdemeanor DWUI instead of DUI.

Check out the local news coverage here.

On occasion, people complain that Comedy Guys dedicates so much time in its defensive driving classes to the dangerous combination of alcohol and moving vehicles. Well, law enforcement people hear about this more than you’ll hear in ten defensive driving classes, and still they can forget the risks and take stupid chances with their own and others’ lives and safety.

Phillip Contos, a New York truck driver and former US soldier, was taking part in the Independance Ride, an annual protest ride sponsored by the Syracuse, New York chapter of  ABATE, American Bikers Aimed Toward Education.  The group is not necessarily opposed to helmets; they protest instead laws that make their use mandatory.

The collision occurred after the 55-year-old Contos hit his brakes. His Harley-Davidson fishtailed out of control and hit a guardrail, sending Contos over the handlebars to land on his head. Medical experts have suggested that his life would have been saved had he been wearing helmet.

By the afternoon following the crash, Phillip Contos’s older brother Richard was already sick of getting calls from reporters, pointing out the irony of the death. Calling his brother “a rebel,” he told reporters that if his brother had it to do all over again, he’d probably still ride without a helmet.