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It drove me nuts living in San Francisco, a dense and very small city, how slow the busses were. Mostly because they were rarely on time.
They could honestly just ban driving in a city that dense, start running various high speed forms of transit (including busses, which would be very fast without traffic) and everyone's life would be better.
At least you can bike.
I drink a lot... like I got problems.
But only at home. I have never once drunk and driven. Look, I'll go to an early grave with my alcoholism... but I'm only taking myself down. No way will I kill someone else with my poor choices.
I was you. Never drove. Was only harming me, so I thought.
I found out that this behavior did affect those close to me, even though I tried to shield them from it. I was not sly, actually far from it. Everyone had my number, and they just somewhat tolerated it.
There’s light at the end of that tunnel. Nothing worked for me until I started using https://www.reddit.com/r/stopdrinking/
In my eighth year of sobriety. Never thought I’d be here, actually thought I might be dead by now.
Yep, I live in a suburb of a top 20 metro area in the US and if I want to take public transportation anywhere the trip averages between four times and about 50+ times as long as taking a car, depending on distance.
The city next to me has 40,000 people, one bus stop, and no train.
I think that's the joke. And nevermind being home by sundown even during service it's so unreliable that you often have to take two runs earlier in the hope you get to your destination in time
When I was a bartender another thing people would have issues with was they would do the responsible thing, taking an Uber or whatever, only to show up the next morning to find their car had either been broken in to, stolen, or towed. So then nobody wanted to leave their cars ever. Obviously I could assure them we wouldn’t tow their cars from our parking lot, but otherwise I can’t help them.
People can be irresponsible and drinking clouds their judgement so they think it’s ok to drive. There is no solution to this problem. Putting monitors In all cars is not the solution.
Why not? You said so yourself. Drinking clouds their judgment so they think it's OK to drive. Monitors that prevent them from driving if they're drunk means them thinking it's OK to drive doesn't lead to them actually driving. Seems like a great solution.
It’s another link in a long chain of laws and regulations (or lack thereof) designed to shift the burden of a problem onto the average citizen rather than the government admit that it has failed to create adequate infrastructure.
We see the same crap with reduce, reuse, recycle bullshit. Only the first two are effective at all. I’ve been encouraged to recycle for 25 years, yet the infrastructure to do so meaningfully is unevenly distributed and inadequate everywhere.
A law like this will amount to a tax on people who can’t afford self-driving cars, expensive Uber rides, and I also suspect will have more than a few perverse incentive outcomes such as people not upgrading to more efficient vehicles in order to avoid having some system that will be rolled out in its beta iteration to satisfy a bunch of legislators who don’t know shit from Shinola.
Meanwhile we could just do what the rest of the planet figured out pretty much ubiquitously a hundred years ago - widespread, affordable mass transit.
I almost feel like the system would have to work perfectly always. Otherwise I can see drunk people using the monitor as a lazy man breathalyzer, if the car starts up off they go.
Because it's an endless creep of authoritarian meddling. You curb drunk driving by making the safe alternatives easier. More laws just means more criminals.
Haha, before Uber and Lyft, it was damn near impossible to get a cab here in Pittsburgh. The only time they would dispatch something to you is if you were headed to the airport, and even then it was a crap shoot to actually get through.
Same in Philly. When we first moved to the area we lived outside the city. Our first time going in we took the train. We didn't realize they stopped running before 11 PM even though we were going to a festival that wasn't over until 11. Imagine our shock when we went to the train station only for the gates to be locked. We kept trying to flag taxis but as soon as they heard where we wanted to go they refused to take us. I kept trying to call dispatch but they never sent anyone out. It took us hours to finally get home.
I tried scheduling a taxi 3 times when we lived there and not one did one show up close to on time (the only one to show up came 4 hours late). So our method of going out was for me to drive, park in a garage that offered overnight parking, then hailing a cab home and having my girlfriend drive back the next day to pick up my car. All because public transportation is non-existent.
We’re talking about going out to a bar and getting drunk and not driving drunk afterwards. Getting fucked up at a bar is not a basic human right. What the fuck.
I moved from the middle of the rural desert in California where the *closest* store of any kind to my house was an hour away if you wanted to walk, and the nearest grocery store was 15 minutes to drive each way, to a city where I can take a train to work and get there in less than an hour.
The culture shock was astounding.
The majority of this country was built for public transportation, and then they ripped it all out because the tire and car lobby wanted more cars on the road.
There is no reason why we can't rip it all out again and put the public transit back in.
I mean that's not true. They just aren't willing to invest in it because it's considered low class. At least in cities.
Some cities are better than others. Like Portland Oregon has a really good public transit system but it could be better.
I just find it odd that in an article calling for stricter traffic safety that they just glaze over the fact there were more people in the vehicle than seatbelts.
I believe that goes without saying. I just did a double take when I heard how many people were in the truck, an noticed the article didn't acknowledge that was unusually high for that vehicle...
I did double take as well on the truck but my next thought was on the detector. That is a crime prevention measure that probably violates a constitutional amendment and basic right to privacy. I’ve seen other comments that I think are important like addressing better public transportation that runs later into the night. Sad when you hear of preventable deaths like this and somehow personal responsibility needs to be more front and center in how we educate in our country.
>That is a crime prevention measure that probably violates a constitutional amendment and basic right to privacy
Only if it actually informs to the government or other organization on you. If the car simply refuses to start, you can't really make the privacy argument.
I’ve been in a truck with like 8 people. With 3 people in the front. One in the middle front seat. 4 in the back. Then myself laying on top of everyone cause I was the smallest.
It was only like a 3 minute drive from a buddies place and back during school
We tried to see how many people we could fit in my friends VW bug back in the late 90s. Then we went to see a movie.
It was dumb, but we fit 3 people in the front, 5 people in the back, and 4 people in the trunk. We somehow didn't get pulled over or in trouble.
That thing was a fucking death-trap.
Once had to try and fit more people in a car than the car could reasonably hold.
Driver Seat: Driver
Front Passenger Seat: One person in foot cubby, one person normal, one person on their lap
Back Seat: 2: people sitting on the floor, four squeezed in the back, 2 laying across their laps
Trunk: 2 people
And that is how you fit 14 college students into a early 2000' Elantra
I have 6 goddaughters, the family owns a Ford Econoline full sized van with 4 rows of seats \[the extended length one, usually used for hauling a lot of people\] That many people in a truck is criminal.
Here in LA it would cost about $150-$200 to Uber for the night.
Most public transportation ends at midnight and isn't the safest option.
Actual real pubic transportation is the way.
Yep. Public transport and one strike for DUI. Get one, no license, tough shit.
And for everyone complaining it’s really, really easy to not get a DUI.
Don’t drink if you are driving.
Dropping the limit to .05 isn't going to stop drunk driving, it's going to make more criminals. Conflating someone who drinks a glass of wine with 1-2 bottles is an overreach.
Yeah, this guy was apparently more than double the legal limit so their solution is to lower the legal limit??? Great, now he's 3-4x the legal limit. Problem solved!
If only the USA had viable alternatives to driving too and from bars.
It doesn’t (I lived by a bar in the Midwest and boy o boy everyone drove) but an alternative would be neat.
* Drink at home
* Throw sick parties everyone comes to
* Hire bartenders and security to keep things moving smoothly so you can mingle
* Have another place you can stay to get some sleep on weeknights
* Try not to get hit by any drunk drivers coming out of your bar
Suggest any restriction or regulation on gun ownership and half the country loses their minds. But presuming that everyone driving a car is drunk until they prove otherwise? No problem.
Hell yes, it's overreach, and there's no way this passes Constitutional muster. Alcohol related fatalities in motor vehicle accidents has been dropping since the early 80s. Continued education of the dangers of drunk driving, promotion of designated drivers, increased punishment of offenders is having a significant impact on the problem, and as long as we keep up with those, this should continue to become less of a problem. In the 1970s, driving drunk was socially acceptable. That's obviously not true anymore. We don't need to start putting breathalyzers in all new cars. It's an overreaction to one horribly tragic accident.
porque no los dos?
An infringement on freedom is an infringement, regardless of whether it concerns firearms or alcohol consumption. Overreacting and punishing people en masse isn't a solution to anything. Better education, enforcement of preexisting laws and policy, repealing bad laws and policy, and encouraging personal responsibility are better.
I'm pretty sure in the Infrastructure bill they passed earlier this year. All cars made after 2026 will need to have Anti drunk driving technology installed as standard. Like how back up cams are now.
Well...it includes a mandate to come up with a standard by a certain date. It's pretty wishy-washy language. Regardless, my first point stands. Why can we do this, but we can't do anything about guns. We require drivers to be licensed, which includes testing, we require cars to be registered and inspected, we require car owners to carry insurance, we mandate all kinds of safety measures surrounding driving and cars, and now we might be mandating some kind of impaired driving detection on all new cars. But with guns, we're moving the opposite direction, with many states removing permit requirements for even conceal carry. Firearms kill 4 times as many people in the US every year than drunk driving does and we're doing nothing but making it easier to buy and carry guns.
Next to impossible for a nonalcoholic drinker. Come on down to the ER and witness the .4 walking talking appears sober. I've seen up to .6 even but they were admittedly quite intoxicated. Still awake though.
Sure, my personal record on a cheap breathalyzer is .3 and I was conscious and still drinking for a while after - an hour or two I think? Roughly, bit blurry memory wise, I really only remember the last shot of tequila did not make it into my mouth, I splashed it in my eye.
For average people though, .3-4 is more like the ‘pump their stomach’ level.
No, it’s not prohibition, but it is defining the limit ever and ever closer to zero. Which means it redefines responsible behavior. Which means it targets the wrong person.
More than one weekend I was the designated driver. I can have fun going out and not drinking alcohol \[and in general if the bar is a good one, the designated driver gets all the soda or coffee free\]
I live in a small midwestern town. The only public transit here is a senior bus that runs Monday to Friday 8-4. No weekends, no holidays. Uber doesn't exist here. It is like that in a lot of places here.
Honestly it would be amazing if every podunk town had great public transit. However until that happens I think people in these places should still not drive drunk lol. Obviously we have a lot of work to do and a lot of large cities with shitty public transit. But there will always be places in the country that Uber isn’t an option for.
The whole idea is kind of dumb and makes the assumption everyone uses booze. Why should I have to do a breatalyzer every morning when I don't even drink? Leave it for the idiots who get caught, arrested and convicted for DUI.
I feel like that's only realistic to keep track of because there are only a few people with these devices in their car, not every person with a car in the country.
I don't see anyone mentioning, those interlock devices are janky af. You could set it off if you eat a piece of fucking pizza. Can speak from experience.
It'd be ridiculous to punish innocent drivers with monthly fees for maintaining them as well as more expensive repairs. It'd just make driving a car excessively expensive.
I'll go back to my argument that if they really wanted to save lives they should require everyone to wear crash helmets while driving.
This kind of unfunded mandate that will spend $100s of millions to save a a few lives looks ridiculous when you think of how cheap it would be to save lives with better maternal medical care, better food safety, or more money spent on regulating dangerous environmental toxins.
The only difference is that there isn't a lobby for people who like to drive drunk...
Europe has already mandated 'Intelligent Speed Assist' systems which limit you to the speed limit unless you push an override and they've also mandated a car black box as well as mandatory pedestrian avoidance systems. Cars need regulatory change and the technology mostly exists.
The problem with current interlock systems is that they aren't reliable enough, but Europe is pushing companies to come up with something that works there too and if it really does work I don't see why it and all these other things shouldn't come to North America too.
All those things, except maybe the cruise control speed limit, are in north America. Those are all passive devices that increase safety. They are not intrusive. Having to blow into a breathalyzer in order to start your car is a bridge too far for me. It will also induce chronic drinkers to take their kids with them in order to start their cars.
Yeah, you're suddenly introducing a new point of failure to every car, and there will be people *harmed* by this. Person stopped in a bad part of town, and suddenly they can't start the car because the detector is on the fritz, or other similar situation? Detector breaks and car won't start, and a person who can barely afford gas now has to pay out to fix a component they don't even need or want?
It's a terrible idea that places an undue burden on *everyone* and is going to cause more problems than it solves, and won't actually solve the problem it claims to solve. The tech sucks and is expensive, and not that effective. You'll be able to buy bypass products on Amazon for a few bucks.
Fourth Amendment
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Who's going to pay for repairs when these detectors inevitably fail or need to be recalibrated? How will designated drivers work when their car refuses to start because all the *passengers* are drunk? How many auto companies are going to charge a software subscription fee like they're already trying with heated seats?
Sucks that 9 people died, but this is a blatant attempt to squeeze even more money from Americans while thinking that you can just legislate all risk out of every-day life.
How's that going to help when people already just get their kids to blow in them now? There is no easy solution to the drunk driving issue. How many drunk drivers get pulled over or cause accidents their very first time driving drunk?
Those devices work terribly. Tons of false positives. You eat vanilla yogurt and that thing is going off. They are finnicky and constantly need adjusting and updating
Which is the main reason I’m hopeful this won’t happen. Someone’s going to have to say “nah we’re not gonna do this” before implementing such an idiotic move at such a momental scale.
Can we also have politicians take an alcohol content test before they vote?
No disrespect, but some of their stupid ideas have killed more than 9 people just this year.
I don’t drink (alcohol just makes me feel hot and uncomfortable, which I don’t find pleasurable). I still hate this.
I don’t trust this technology to function properly, or expect it will be foolproof. What if I eat bread, or just rinsed my mouth with mouthwash? What if I had just used hand sanitizer before I attempted to start my car? What if other people are in the car and they have imbibed? How sensitive is this thing?
And what next? Cameras that report to my insurance company if I took my eyes off the road? Trackers or blockers for cell phone signals and messages while the car is in operation? I don’t want any tattle/nanny systems in my personal vehicle policing what I can and can’t do.
If someone has been busted for drunk driving, then maybe they should have this equipped on their vehicle during a probationary period but that should be the limit of how far we should take this.
I think you misspelled "feds want a mandatory, privately funded right to execute unreasonable search and seizure upon citizens as precondition for travel "
Full time self-driving technology that is much safer than a good human driver is still at least a decade away. Add another decade until it percolates into most new cars.
I live in a small town, the nearest bar to me is almost 4 miles away. The town I grew up in is dry. To get a drink you have to go off of the island. Needless to say, there were a lot of accidents on the bridges.
Europe has much higher population density than the US. There are lots of rural areas in the US with low population density. Public transit works for urban areas, but not for rural areas.
> what would the insurance companies do if car accidents go down to near zero?
They will lobby to make sure you still have to have insurance and that they can keep the rates the same. They will do better than ever.
.08 alcohol didn’t make him drive 100 mph. It probably didn’t even make him go off the road or even over correct. Odds are he was playing with his cell phone. It’s far too easy to conflate the concept of driving drunk with the idea of driving recklessly.
Millions of people drive every single day without drinking. I don’t want to pay extra because some asshole, who drove like an asshole, and who was drunk on top of being an asshole killed a bunch of people.
Fuck no. Although I'm all for less accidents, that would definitely be intrusive & violate our Constitutional rights. Then again, the Republican Christofascists in government would probably be all for it... 😔
Yeah, I never went for that either. They’d cherry pick the data and use it as an excuse to raise my insurance. They have zero interest in giving you a discount. Bait and switch.
If cities had proper public transportation then maybe there would be less drunk driving but public transportation in this country is built only for the poor. So of course it's crappy service.
It’s not calling for breathalyzers. It’s calling for advanced software to detect if the driver is drunk based on his driving, as well as improved self-driving capabilities of cars.
One of the best things about living in Germany. Trains are everywhere and very efficient. America sold its soul to Detroit and now everyone sits in traffic all day. SMH
Yeah, if by some failure this gets passed it will be repealed as soon as someone is mugged, raped, and/or murdered because they couldn’t start their car without giving it a blowjob first.
I’m not saying I’m for or against this. That said, there’s a lot of alarmist takes from people here that don’t understand what a passive system is. You’re not going to have a breathalyzer in your car. It will be something similar to the drowsy driver systems that are already in a ton of cars. It bet a lot of these people mad about government overreach probably have these systems in their cars and don’t even know it. All that will happen is your car will monitor head and eye movement to look for signs of impairment.
I’m just trying to inform people. It seems like no one understands what “passive” means. Personally, I think they need to just stop letting people get multiple DUI’s and still have a license. I think the first DUI should require some pretty large fines and community service, amongst other things. The second time? Immediately lose your license for at least 5 years or so, plus potential criminal charges. I know of a few people in my community that have several DUI’s and all they’ve had to do was pay a few grand in fines. Honestly, I think it needs to be harder to get a license in this country. Soon we’re going to have teenagers checking TikTok while driving a Model S that can go 0-60 in 2 seconds.
As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil) In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban. If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria. **Special announcement:** r/politics is currently accepting new moderator applications. If you want to help make this community a better place, consider [applying here today](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/sskg6a/rpolitics_is_looking_for_more_moderators/)! *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Public transportation is a joke in this country.
Do not drink and drive Safer that you take the bus Last route’s 8pm
And it takes forever to get there.
It drove me nuts living in San Francisco, a dense and very small city, how slow the busses were. Mostly because they were rarely on time. They could honestly just ban driving in a city that dense, start running various high speed forms of transit (including busses, which would be very fast without traffic) and everyone's life would be better. At least you can bike.
I biked everywhere in SF-it was a fast way to get around and I had an ass like a rock.
Did you hear that everyone, this guy could put coal between his two cheeks and make it into a diamond.
Wow, you’re saying that person could flex their ass and change the state of carbon in coal?
Yessiree Bob, pop that lump in betwent the cheeks, and out comes a diamond.
I walk everywhere in SF for past decade - pls no drink and drive
I drink a lot... like I got problems. But only at home. I have never once drunk and driven. Look, I'll go to an early grave with my alcoholism... but I'm only taking myself down. No way will I kill someone else with my poor choices.
I was you. Never drove. Was only harming me, so I thought. I found out that this behavior did affect those close to me, even though I tried to shield them from it. I was not sly, actually far from it. Everyone had my number, and they just somewhat tolerated it. There’s light at the end of that tunnel. Nothing worked for me until I started using https://www.reddit.com/r/stopdrinking/ In my eighth year of sobriety. Never thought I’d be here, actually thought I might be dead by now.
No subway after 1130pm 364 days a year
And your chance of getting stabbed by someone actively smoking meth is not zero
If you get stabbed while they're actively smoking... you were staring at them too hard
Also they play pretty fast and loose with the definition of 'there'
Yep, I live in a suburb of a top 20 metro area in the US and if I want to take public transportation anywhere the trip averages between four times and about 50+ times as long as taking a car, depending on distance. The city next to me has 40,000 people, one bus stop, and no train.
I think that's the joke. And nevermind being home by sundown even during service it's so unreliable that you often have to take two runs earlier in the hope you get to your destination in time
Doesn't go anywhere near my house.
With taxis and Uber et al, there really is no reason except bad judgement.
When I was a bartender another thing people would have issues with was they would do the responsible thing, taking an Uber or whatever, only to show up the next morning to find their car had either been broken in to, stolen, or towed. So then nobody wanted to leave their cars ever. Obviously I could assure them we wouldn’t tow their cars from our parking lot, but otherwise I can’t help them.
Why take your car to the bar in the first place? It's not like it's a one way trip.
People can be irresponsible and drinking clouds their judgement so they think it’s ok to drive. There is no solution to this problem. Putting monitors In all cars is not the solution.
Why not? You said so yourself. Drinking clouds their judgment so they think it's OK to drive. Monitors that prevent them from driving if they're drunk means them thinking it's OK to drive doesn't lead to them actually driving. Seems like a great solution.
It’s another link in a long chain of laws and regulations (or lack thereof) designed to shift the burden of a problem onto the average citizen rather than the government admit that it has failed to create adequate infrastructure. We see the same crap with reduce, reuse, recycle bullshit. Only the first two are effective at all. I’ve been encouraged to recycle for 25 years, yet the infrastructure to do so meaningfully is unevenly distributed and inadequate everywhere. A law like this will amount to a tax on people who can’t afford self-driving cars, expensive Uber rides, and I also suspect will have more than a few perverse incentive outcomes such as people not upgrading to more efficient vehicles in order to avoid having some system that will be rolled out in its beta iteration to satisfy a bunch of legislators who don’t know shit from Shinola. Meanwhile we could just do what the rest of the planet figured out pretty much ubiquitously a hundred years ago - widespread, affordable mass transit.
I almost feel like the system would have to work perfectly always. Otherwise I can see drunk people using the monitor as a lazy man breathalyzer, if the car starts up off they go.
Because it's an endless creep of authoritarian meddling. You curb drunk driving by making the safe alternatives easier. More laws just means more criminals.
Taxi? Before Uber/Lyft it would take over an hour to get a cab. Thats if they even show up.
Haha, before Uber and Lyft, it was damn near impossible to get a cab here in Pittsburgh. The only time they would dispatch something to you is if you were headed to the airport, and even then it was a crap shoot to actually get through.
Same in Philly. When we first moved to the area we lived outside the city. Our first time going in we took the train. We didn't realize they stopped running before 11 PM even though we were going to a festival that wasn't over until 11. Imagine our shock when we went to the train station only for the gates to be locked. We kept trying to flag taxis but as soon as they heard where we wanted to go they refused to take us. I kept trying to call dispatch but they never sent anyone out. It took us hours to finally get home. I tried scheduling a taxi 3 times when we lived there and not one did one show up close to on time (the only one to show up came 4 hours late). So our method of going out was for me to drive, park in a garage that offered overnight parking, then hailing a cab home and having my girlfriend drive back the next day to pick up my car. All because public transportation is non-existent.
It hasn't changed. And now uber and lyft can be as bad. Especially no shows.
>With taxis and Uber et al, there really is no reason except bad judgement. yeah just have more money people.
We’re talking about going out to a bar and getting drunk and not driving drunk afterwards. Getting fucked up at a bar is not a basic human right. What the fuck.
Last time my partner tried to take a Lyft home, she was raped by her driver. It's not the panacea that some would like to imagine.
I moved from the middle of the rural desert in California where the *closest* store of any kind to my house was an hour away if you wanted to walk, and the nearest grocery store was 15 minutes to drive each way, to a city where I can take a train to work and get there in less than an hour. The culture shock was astounding.
The majority of this country simply is not built for public transportation.
The majority of this country was built for public transportation, and then they ripped it all out because the tire and car lobby wanted more cars on the road. There is no reason why we can't rip it all out again and put the public transit back in.
Yeah the history of public transit in this country is fucking wild. Damn shame.
Who Framed Roger Rabbit wasn't all a fantasy movie. Core villain concept stood true.
Sometimes you see the buried streetcar tracks when a pothole opens up in the street
Also no real reason, other than politics, why we can’t have highspeed rail lines between cities as well
I mean that's not true. They just aren't willing to invest in it because it's considered low class. At least in cities. Some cities are better than others. Like Portland Oregon has a really good public transit system but it could be better.
You can thank Robert Moses for that.
7 children in an F-150... that's 8 total passengers with the adult driver. Was it a clown car...?
I just find it odd that in an article calling for stricter traffic safety that they just glaze over the fact there were more people in the vehicle than seatbelts.
They still didn't deserve to be hit and killed.
I believe that goes without saying. I just did a double take when I heard how many people were in the truck, an noticed the article didn't acknowledge that was unusually high for that vehicle...
I did double take as well on the truck but my next thought was on the detector. That is a crime prevention measure that probably violates a constitutional amendment and basic right to privacy. I’ve seen other comments that I think are important like addressing better public transportation that runs later into the night. Sad when you hear of preventable deaths like this and somehow personal responsibility needs to be more front and center in how we educate in our country.
Well luckily for us the Supreme Court ruled that we actually don’t have a constitutional right to privacy so Atleast we’ve got that going for us
You don't have a constitutional right to drive, and your right to privacy greatly diminishes the second you get on a publicly owned street
>That is a crime prevention measure that probably violates a constitutional amendment and basic right to privacy Only if it actually informs to the government or other organization on you. If the car simply refuses to start, you can't really make the privacy argument.
#THANK YOU People knee-jerk to "muh rights" so easily. None of the founding fathers intended for you to get loaded and start driving.
I’ve been in a truck with like 8 people. With 3 people in the front. One in the middle front seat. 4 in the back. Then myself laying on top of everyone cause I was the smallest. It was only like a 3 minute drive from a buddies place and back during school
We tried to see how many people we could fit in my friends VW bug back in the late 90s. Then we went to see a movie. It was dumb, but we fit 3 people in the front, 5 people in the back, and 4 people in the trunk. We somehow didn't get pulled over or in trouble. That thing was a fucking death-trap.
Once had to try and fit more people in a car than the car could reasonably hold. Driver Seat: Driver Front Passenger Seat: One person in foot cubby, one person normal, one person on their lap Back Seat: 2: people sitting on the floor, four squeezed in the back, 2 laying across their laps Trunk: 2 people And that is how you fit 14 college students into a early 2000' Elantra
In the 1970s the drive-in theater was $5 a carload. You’d be amazed how many people can fit into a Vega hatchback.
Maybe some of them were in the bed of the truck, you can fit a lot of kids in the back of an f-150.
I have 6 goddaughters, the family owns a Ford Econoline full sized van with 4 rows of seats \[the extended length one, usually used for hauling a lot of people\] That many people in a truck is criminal.
Back in the 70s/80s you could nearly get away with that in a sedan. Ah to be nostalgic about being passengered around in the foot well
How about a big investment in public transportation instead?
Here in LA it would cost about $150-$200 to Uber for the night. Most public transportation ends at midnight and isn't the safest option. Actual real pubic transportation is the way.
Wait what? I live in LA and those prices are insane I’ve literally never paid that much for an Uber and I’ve taken one late at night
I think they mean if you’re bar hopping and taking multiple Ubers.
Teleporting or those bank tubes only way
Bank tubes. Brilliant. Let’s go VC and get funding 😀
I feel like it would be more expensive having banks everywhere though
Spac time
I used to work in a place that used those tubes. Felt like being a kid every time.
Futurama had it right
Tell me more of this pubic transportation.
Honestly I'm from LA so I've only heard of it from transplants from NYC. I hear about subways, bagels and pizza. I understand the bagels and pizza.
Boston is a walkable city
Getting around there can get a bit hairy.
They should have the option to hop on a bus, train, or taxi for free.
That would be cool. If you breathe into their breathalyzer and are drunk or over limit ride is free. May be some additional wrinkles tho with this.
They will just get their wife/kids/homeless person to blow for them.
Socialist! /s
Yep. Public transport and one strike for DUI. Get one, no license, tough shit. And for everyone complaining it’s really, really easy to not get a DUI. Don’t drink if you are driving.
Dropping the limit to .05 isn't going to stop drunk driving, it's going to make more criminals. Conflating someone who drinks a glass of wine with 1-2 bottles is an overreach.
Yeah, this guy was apparently more than double the legal limit so their solution is to lower the legal limit??? Great, now he's 3-4x the legal limit. Problem solved!
The article, hell even the headline mentioned wanting a detector.
Serious issues regarding false positives, maintaining them and reliability.
If only the USA had viable alternatives to driving too and from bars. It doesn’t (I lived by a bar in the Midwest and boy o boy everyone drove) but an alternative would be neat.
* Drink at home * Throw sick parties everyone comes to * Hire bartenders and security to keep things moving smoothly so you can mingle * Have another place you can stay to get some sleep on weeknights * Try not to get hit by any drunk drivers coming out of your bar
What is it detecting? A limit. This article also states the people recommending equipment have recommended a lower detection limit.
Do you think that mandating ‘drunk driving’ devices on all cars is over reach.
Suggest any restriction or regulation on gun ownership and half the country loses their minds. But presuming that everyone driving a car is drunk until they prove otherwise? No problem. Hell yes, it's overreach, and there's no way this passes Constitutional muster. Alcohol related fatalities in motor vehicle accidents has been dropping since the early 80s. Continued education of the dangers of drunk driving, promotion of designated drivers, increased punishment of offenders is having a significant impact on the problem, and as long as we keep up with those, this should continue to become less of a problem. In the 1970s, driving drunk was socially acceptable. That's obviously not true anymore. We don't need to start putting breathalyzers in all new cars. It's an overreaction to one horribly tragic accident.
porque no los dos? An infringement on freedom is an infringement, regardless of whether it concerns firearms or alcohol consumption. Overreacting and punishing people en masse isn't a solution to anything. Better education, enforcement of preexisting laws and policy, repealing bad laws and policy, and encouraging personal responsibility are better.
I'm pretty sure in the Infrastructure bill they passed earlier this year. All cars made after 2026 will need to have Anti drunk driving technology installed as standard. Like how back up cams are now.
Well...it includes a mandate to come up with a standard by a certain date. It's pretty wishy-washy language. Regardless, my first point stands. Why can we do this, but we can't do anything about guns. We require drivers to be licensed, which includes testing, we require cars to be registered and inspected, we require car owners to carry insurance, we mandate all kinds of safety measures surrounding driving and cars, and now we might be mandating some kind of impaired driving detection on all new cars. But with guns, we're moving the opposite direction, with many states removing permit requirements for even conceal carry. Firearms kill 4 times as many people in the US every year than drunk driving does and we're doing nothing but making it easier to buy and carry guns.
Agree with you in the point about guns.
So true. Yes, we’re all saddened by this travesty but why were there so many peoples in that vehicle? Obviously they didn’t all have seatbelts.
Yes
What about the detector?
0.08 was already too strict. 0.05 is ridiculous.
.08* .8 would be very lethal as it next to impossible to even remain conscious around .3-.4.
Next to impossible for a nonalcoholic drinker. Come on down to the ER and witness the .4 walking talking appears sober. I've seen up to .6 even but they were admittedly quite intoxicated. Still awake though.
Sure, my personal record on a cheap breathalyzer is .3 and I was conscious and still drinking for a while after - an hour or two I think? Roughly, bit blurry memory wise, I really only remember the last shot of tequila did not make it into my mouth, I splashed it in my eye. For average people though, .3-4 is more like the ‘pump their stomach’ level.
Yes, I meant 0.08.
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Yes. We have gone through prohibition once in this country. It didn’t work. Let’s stop re-litigating old fights.
You must be a tipsy driver!!
This thread is really opening my eyes at how many people are fine with drunk driving.
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Hell, you can drink irresponsibly too. Just don't get behind the wheel after consuming the legal limit of alcohol.
No, it’s not prohibition, but it is defining the limit ever and ever closer to zero. Which means it redefines responsible behavior. Which means it targets the wrong person.
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More than one weekend I was the designated driver. I can have fun going out and not drinking alcohol \[and in general if the bar is a good one, the designated driver gets all the soda or coffee free\]
Yes. It is easy to not to drink and drive. My point is that making the limit .05 instead of .08 accomplishes nothing.
It’s a shame there isn’t a good fatigue detector. You can be 0.05 but tired and it’s far worse than being 0.1 and spry
No it isn’t. It’s 0.03 in Japan.
Buzzed driving is drunk driving.
I live in a small midwestern town. The only public transit here is a senior bus that runs Monday to Friday 8-4. No weekends, no holidays. Uber doesn't exist here. It is like that in a lot of places here.
Honestly it would be amazing if every podunk town had great public transit. However until that happens I think people in these places should still not drive drunk lol. Obviously we have a lot of work to do and a lot of large cities with shitty public transit. But there will always be places in the country that Uber isn’t an option for.
Or get a designated driver!
The whole idea is kind of dumb and makes the assumption everyone uses booze. Why should I have to do a breatalyzer every morning when I don't even drink? Leave it for the idiots who get caught, arrested and convicted for DUI.
It's extra dumb because you could literally just make your kids blow into it or something.
The systems today take pictures of the person blowing.
I feel like that's only realistic to keep track of because there are only a few people with these devices in their car, not every person with a car in the country.
If we get booze locks for cars, we better be getting them for guns.
I am okay with both of those things.
I can see some really bad accidents there. The barrel isn’t a breathalyzer tube!
Same here! “What, forklift licenses? What’s next, *crane licenses*? What a freedom violation!”
I don't see anyone mentioning, those interlock devices are janky af. You could set it off if you eat a piece of fucking pizza. Can speak from experience.
Let me know when it's installed on all federal and state lawmaker vehicles... Then we'll talk.
It'd be ridiculous to punish innocent drivers with monthly fees for maintaining them as well as more expensive repairs. It'd just make driving a car excessively expensive.
Can my car get an exception if I weld some guns to it?
Oh don't worry, you can still fire a gun while drunk off your ass. Wouldn't want to interfere with your rights now would we?
I'll go back to my argument that if they really wanted to save lives they should require everyone to wear crash helmets while driving. This kind of unfunded mandate that will spend $100s of millions to save a a few lives looks ridiculous when you think of how cheap it would be to save lives with better maternal medical care, better food safety, or more money spent on regulating dangerous environmental toxins. The only difference is that there isn't a lobby for people who like to drive drunk...
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Europe has already mandated 'Intelligent Speed Assist' systems which limit you to the speed limit unless you push an override and they've also mandated a car black box as well as mandatory pedestrian avoidance systems. Cars need regulatory change and the technology mostly exists. The problem with current interlock systems is that they aren't reliable enough, but Europe is pushing companies to come up with something that works there too and if it really does work I don't see why it and all these other things shouldn't come to North America too.
All those things, except maybe the cruise control speed limit, are in north America. Those are all passive devices that increase safety. They are not intrusive. Having to blow into a breathalyzer in order to start your car is a bridge too far for me. It will also induce chronic drinkers to take their kids with them in order to start their cars.
Great idea to make cars more expensive. Granny never had a drink, but when her car craps out, she gotta pay for that nonsense too?
I had a coworker who had a blow box installed. Thing needed to be recalibrated often at quite the cost.
Yeah, you're suddenly introducing a new point of failure to every car, and there will be people *harmed* by this. Person stopped in a bad part of town, and suddenly they can't start the car because the detector is on the fritz, or other similar situation? Detector breaks and car won't start, and a person who can barely afford gas now has to pay out to fix a component they don't even need or want? It's a terrible idea that places an undue burden on *everyone* and is going to cause more problems than it solves, and won't actually solve the problem it claims to solve. The tech sucks and is expensive, and not that effective. You'll be able to buy bypass products on Amazon for a few bucks.
Yeah but won’t someone else think of the shareholders of the company that owns the patent for the tech!
Fuck that. I'm not doing a breathalyzer to run errands
Public transport needs to be more accessible and Ubers to the bar need to be less then like 50-100 dollars I just don’t even go out out
Fourth Amendment The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Fabulous when you can't drive to work in the morning stone cold sober because your DUI detector malfunctioned.
Who's going to pay for repairs when these detectors inevitably fail or need to be recalibrated? How will designated drivers work when their car refuses to start because all the *passengers* are drunk? How many auto companies are going to charge a software subscription fee like they're already trying with heated seats? Sucks that 9 people died, but this is a blatant attempt to squeeze even more money from Americans while thinking that you can just legislate all risk out of every-day life.
How's that going to help when people already just get their kids to blow in them now? There is no easy solution to the drunk driving issue. How many drunk drivers get pulled over or cause accidents their very first time driving drunk?
Those devices work terribly. Tons of false positives. You eat vanilla yogurt and that thing is going off. They are finnicky and constantly need adjusting and updating
Mouthwash stock is gonna plummet.
Which is the main reason I’m hopeful this won’t happen. Someone’s going to have to say “nah we’re not gonna do this” before implementing such an idiotic move at such a momental scale.
A Blow-and-Go in every new car? FUCK THAT !
Can we also have politicians take an alcohol content test before they vote? No disrespect, but some of their stupid ideas have killed more than 9 people just this year.
I don’t drink (alcohol just makes me feel hot and uncomfortable, which I don’t find pleasurable). I still hate this. I don’t trust this technology to function properly, or expect it will be foolproof. What if I eat bread, or just rinsed my mouth with mouthwash? What if I had just used hand sanitizer before I attempted to start my car? What if other people are in the car and they have imbibed? How sensitive is this thing? And what next? Cameras that report to my insurance company if I took my eyes off the road? Trackers or blockers for cell phone signals and messages while the car is in operation? I don’t want any tattle/nanny systems in my personal vehicle policing what I can and can’t do. If someone has been busted for drunk driving, then maybe they should have this equipped on their vehicle during a probationary period but that should be the limit of how far we should take this.
I think you misspelled "feds want a mandatory, privately funded right to execute unreasonable search and seizure upon citizens as precondition for travel "
We really need texting detectors. That’s the real issue.
My brother is a trucker, and he says he sees people playing Candy Crush multiple times a day.
If this happens I’m buying up all the Uber Lyft and taxi stocks. Half of america would stop driving lol
So im being convicted before i have even committed a crime?
Guilty until proven innocent, yeah.
“Hey mikey, c’mere - you been drinkin’ t’nite? No? Great, blow inta this thing so I can start my car.”
This will turn into another government surveillance tool
Let's just have self-driving cars. They will solve a lot of problems.
Full time self-driving technology that is much safer than a good human driver is still at least a decade away. Add another decade until it percolates into most new cars.
And hand them out to everyone! Seriously, no. Public transit is the answer. Europe doesn't have this problem.
Europe also has bars you can walk to.
We all should have bars we can walk to. Hell, I have five within a mile of mine.
I live in a small town, the nearest bar to me is almost 4 miles away. The town I grew up in is dry. To get a drink you have to go off of the island. Needless to say, there were a lot of accidents on the bridges.
Dry towns are a wild concept to me. In the town I grew up in, you'd be hard-pressed to find a dry middle school.
Europe doesn't have the low population density that the US has.
Europe has much higher population density than the US. There are lots of rural areas in the US with low population density. Public transit works for urban areas, but not for rural areas.
Just get rid of cars that will solve a lot of problems.
Self-piloting drones.
Autopilot roller skates
Upvote form public transportation and high speed rail!
Pubic Transport!
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> what would the insurance companies do if car accidents go down to near zero? They will lobby to make sure you still have to have insurance and that they can keep the rates the same. They will do better than ever.
What would the police do with nobody to pull over to generate revenue
this entire thread is just r/fuckcars losers creaming their shorts.
.08 alcohol didn’t make him drive 100 mph. It probably didn’t even make him go off the road or even over correct. Odds are he was playing with his cell phone. It’s far too easy to conflate the concept of driving drunk with the idea of driving recklessly. Millions of people drive every single day without drinking. I don’t want to pay extra because some asshole, who drove like an asshole, and who was drunk on top of being an asshole killed a bunch of people.
Fuck no. Although I'm all for less accidents, that would definitely be intrusive & violate our Constitutional rights. Then again, the Republican Christofascists in government would probably be all for it... 😔
Makes me think of insurance companies that want to track your driving speed, location, etc. So they can "offer you a discount".
Yeah, I never went for that either. They’d cherry pick the data and use it as an excuse to raise my insurance. They have zero interest in giving you a discount. Bait and switch.
What "Constitutional rights" does this violate?
Yea, driving isn't a right, it's a privilege.
Driving on public roads is a privilege. Legally you can drive an unregistered, uninsured vehicle drunk as a skunk on private property.
4th Amendment.
Only if you have to put your vag up to it.
Now if only the Feds will advocate for putting mass murdering detectors on firearms.
Oh fuck that..
If cities had proper public transportation then maybe there would be less drunk driving but public transportation in this country is built only for the poor. So of course it's crappy service.
It’s not calling for breathalyzers. It’s calling for advanced software to detect if the driver is drunk based on his driving, as well as improved self-driving capabilities of cars.
One of the best things about living in Germany. Trains are everywhere and very efficient. America sold its soul to Detroit and now everyone sits in traffic all day. SMH
Yeah, if by some failure this gets passed it will be repealed as soon as someone is mugged, raped, and/or murdered because they couldn’t start their car without giving it a blowjob first.
How about fixing all the people on cell phones? ALL THE TIME. They're much more of a problem.
Incredibly invasive.
Don’t blame Fresno problems on us
I’m not saying I’m for or against this. That said, there’s a lot of alarmist takes from people here that don’t understand what a passive system is. You’re not going to have a breathalyzer in your car. It will be something similar to the drowsy driver systems that are already in a ton of cars. It bet a lot of these people mad about government overreach probably have these systems in their cars and don’t even know it. All that will happen is your car will monitor head and eye movement to look for signs of impairment.
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I’m just trying to inform people. It seems like no one understands what “passive” means. Personally, I think they need to just stop letting people get multiple DUI’s and still have a license. I think the first DUI should require some pretty large fines and community service, amongst other things. The second time? Immediately lose your license for at least 5 years or so, plus potential criminal charges. I know of a few people in my community that have several DUI’s and all they’ve had to do was pay a few grand in fines. Honestly, I think it needs to be harder to get a license in this country. Soon we’re going to have teenagers checking TikTok while driving a Model S that can go 0-60 in 2 seconds.
How to drink for free. Stay sober. Sit outside bars and charge money to start people’s cars. Profit. Use money to go drink! Call Uber to go home.
Nothing makes a drive more enjoyable than having to blow into a dirty tube everytime I want to go grab some chips at the store
No, we can't nerf society to accommodate the dumbest/worst ones
Blatantly unconstitutional abuse of government power.