Texting while walking may be neither smart nor good sidewalk etiquette, but that doesn’t necessarily make it deadly, according to a new city Department of Transportation report.
As the number of Americans who own smartphones continues to skyrocket, studies indicate that phone-ogled pedestrians are putting themselves in danger and driving up the national rate of traffic fatalities.
But city and federal crash data tell a different story.
Since 2017, just two-tenths of a percent of of NYPD reports filed after pedestrian deaths have mentioned the victim’s mobile phone, according to DOT researchers — for a grand total of just two mobile-related pedestrian deaths out of hundreds.
Of those two incidents, only one involved a victim using a phone at the time of impact. In the other, the victim was struck while bending down to pick a phone up off the ground.
Data from the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration cited in the city report show an identical rate of device-involved pedestrian deaths: In 2015, 12 fatalities out of 5,376 nationwide involved “pedestrian use of portable electronic devices.” Other factors, such as distracted driving or speeding, were far more common.
“Despite growing concerns, DOT found little concrete evidence that device-induced distracted walking contributes significantly to pedestrian fatalities and injuries,” the report said.
“Estimates of annual mobile device-related injuries are dwarfed nationally by pedestrian injury estimates where pedestrian distraction was not cited.”
To further make the point, the DOT also dispatched researchers to three signalized intersections in Queens, where they observed just 13 percent of pedestrians crossing while distracted by their phones.
Other forms of distraction, such as daydreaming or being stressed, likely have a similar impact, the report suggests.
Despite the city’s view that texting is a marginal cause of traffic fatalities, a 2017 state law sponsored by late Queens State Sen. José Peralta required the DOT report on its efforts to educate drivers and pedestrians about the “dangers of distracted walking.”
The report comes as state legislators in New York and New Jersey are reviving efforts to ban texting-while-walking and make crosswalk texting punishable by fine.
In Albany, Senate Transportation Committee Chair Tim Kennedy (D-Erie) has sworn the legislation won’t see the light of day.