Teen drivers working to keep eyes on the road

Cars today are safer than they’ve ever been: automatic braking to avoid collisions, for example.

But modern drivers also have more distractions than ever, including texting while driving, and Johnston County leaders worry that the newest drivers are most at risk.

Last week, Johnston County Teen Drivers launched its 2015-16 safety campaign during a luncheon at the Agricultural Center near Smithfield. County leaders created the group in 2010 to raise awareness of the dangers and responsibilities of being behind the wheel.

Last week’s assembly brought together teen-driving committees from the county’s high school. Joining them were school and county leaders.

“It does my heart good to see all these young people engaged in efforts to improve the safe-driving record of our county,” said Ed Croom, superintendent of Johnston school. “A lot of this work really gets done in the schools.”

Johnston County’s rural roads are statistically some of the most dangerous in North Carolina for teens. And JoCo Teen Drivers was a response to one of the most deadly years on record, 2007, when 11 teens lost their lives on Johnston roadways, the most in the state that year.

Soon after that, the number of deaths began to fall – three in 2010, four in 2011, two in 2012 and one in 2013. But last year saw an uptick six teen fatalities, third in the state behind Wake with nine and Robeson County with six. Robeson has ranked as the most crash-prone county for four straight years.

Troy Lee, who teaches driver education at Clayton High School, said texting had replaced alcohol as the greatest threat to teen drivers. Inexperience amplifies bad choices, he added.

“They see older adults texting behind the wheel when we’re out practicing, setting a bad example,” Lee said. “The teens think, ‘Well, I can do it,’ but those drivers have more experience and are more comfortable behind the wheel.”

Lee noted that state law requires 60 hours of behind-the-wheel practice for teens with a learner’s permit, but he recommends parents demand more than that of their young drivers. Inexperience behind the wheel, he said, is the biggest challenge for his students. It’s a shortcoming made worse, he said, by Johnston County’s unforgiving roads.

“These roads don’t have two- or three-foot shoulders,” Lee said. “ In some cases, there aren’t any shoulders at all; it’s just a ditch.

“You used to have kids learning in parking lots or on tractors on the farm, but you see a lot of kids now who haven’t driven at all.”

Last week’s kickoff featured three speakers: Bob Gfeller, executive director of the Childress Institute for Pediatric Trauma; Dereck Whittenburg, assistant to the men’s basketball coach at N.C. State University; and Ashley Underhill, Miss Greater Carolina 2016. Each spoke about the dangers of losing focus behind the wheel and how great the consequences can be.

“Texting is really scary,” Whittenburg told the crowd. “It takes a lot of courage to do the right thing. If you see someone doing the wrong thing, tell them. Never be afraid to challenge them.”

Underhill leads the charity Choices for Chase, named after her younger brother, who was one of two teenagers killed in a street-racing crash in 2012.

“The two cars lined up to race, then lined up again after a false start,” she said. “There are so many choices teenagers have.”

This story was originally published October 19, 2015 at 7:31 AM with the headline "Teen drivers working to keep eyes on the road."