The Lane Ranger: Shaping new teen driving law
Joey Ledford - Staff
Wednesday, January 10, 2001

Sixteen or 17, that is the question.

Gov. Roy Barnes' proposal that teens in some metro Atlanta counties wait until age 17 before they can drive alone has suddenly become the hot button issue in the debate over tougher teen driving laws.

Barnes has yet to release a final list of the counties where he believes teens should drive with adult supervision until age 17. But at the least, he said, Fulton, Cobb, DeKalb and Gwinnett counties would be on the list.

The move is aimed at heading off almost certain opposition from rural legislators to any driving-age hike. But the urban-rural split might also cost

Barnes allies he could count on with a wholesale change to 17.

"The art of politics is supposed to be the art of compromise, and I guess that's what this is supposed to do," said Tom Enright, a longtime federal highway safety official. "But I'm not sure it's going to save many lives."

Crash data, said Enright, make it clear that teen driving deaths aren't limited to metro Atlanta.

There were at least 10 fatal crashes and 17 deaths involving 16-year-old drivers in the four counties mentioned by Barnes, according to a state Department of Public Safety count of year 2000 teen traffic deaths, which includes fatalities from as late as October. But across the rest of the state, there were at least 22 other fatal crashes that killed 27.

Seventeen-year-old drivers, ironically, don't fare much better. In Fulton, Cobb, Gwinnett and DeKalb, they were involved in at least nine fatal crashes that claimed 11 lives last year. In the rest of Georgia, there were at least 28 fatal crashes and 32 victims.

Clayton County police Capt. Doug Jewett said he fears a rise in driving age in some counties will just move the fatalities to a different age group.

"Personally, I think better education is a better way to go," he said. "Requiring not just classroom, but actual training with a vehicle (shows them) that when an emergency happens, there are ways to react other than to panic."

Jewett and another traffic enforcement veteran, Cobb County police Cmdr. Georgia Hatfield, said legal 16-year-old drivers in some counties who are prohibited from driving in neighboring counties would create an enforcement nightmare.

Hatfield noted that a stretch of Ga. 92 in Paulding County passes through Cobb before re-entering Paulding. A legal 16-year-old Paulding County driver would be subject to a citation just by crossing into Cobb.

"If we stopped him at a roadblock, he'd be in violation of the law," Hatfield said. "Would it be fair to charge him?"

Hatfield said he would prefer a statewide hike to 17. "I think kids mature a little more" at 17, he said. "They've got another year of life on them in which hopefully they've matured and learned some things."

David Eby, a research scientist at the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute, who has studied teens' cognitive development, agreed.

"The fact that the drivers are 1 year older will mean that they are more mature," he said. "This should make a positive impact on crashes."

But John Morris, a longtime local safe teen driving advocate, was highly critical of the age hike proposal.

"If you want to shift the deaths from 16-year-olds to 17-year-olds, it's a good idea," he said. "As far as making it where 16-year-olds can't drive in Atlanta, it's stupidity without question."

Morris said he fears reopening the 4-year-old teen driving law will lead to 11th-hour legislative tampering that could end up weakening a measure that has saved lives. For example, he said, it could give lawmakers who oppose suspending the licenses of teens convicted of speeding more than 24 mph over the limit a chance to strike that provision.

"I would like to see some good legislation down there, but from my perspective, it's easier to destroy bad legislation than it is to create good legislation," Morris said.

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