Texas Teens Driving Down Fatal Crash Rate

Report credits license limits, peer talks for fastest drop of any state

By Michael A. Lindenberger / The Dallas Morning News
Published: July 28, 2009

Texas teenagers are getting a bit better at the most dangerous things they do: driving.

A new report by the Texas Transportation Institute found that the state's rate of fatal teen crashes is dropping faster here than anywhere. Researchers looked at 37 states that put restrictions on teen drivers' licenses and found Texas is alone in seeing the number of teen drivers involved in fatal crashes drop for five consecutive years.

"Texas is doing a better job than any of the other states," said Texas Transportation Institute researcher Bernie Fette, co-author of the 46-page report released Monday. Fette credited not just the license restrictions but also programs in high schools to get kids focused on safe road behavior.

Since 2002, when 625 teen drivers were involved in fatal crashes, Texas' numbers have come down each year. In 2007, 419 fatal crashes involved teen drivers.

That's still a lot of lost lives, and it's still keeping some parents on edge over the prospect of turning over the keys. Just ask Gracie Mendez, who turns 16 in two months, but won't be doing any driving soon.

In March, Gracie's friend Miriam Ramirez, 16, left school with two friends and died a few minutes later, when she lost control of her Taurus and smashed into a sport utility vehicle.

"That's the reason my mom is not going to let me drive till maybe I am 18," said Mendez, who will be a sophomore at Adamson High School in Oak Cliff. "That's the conversation we are having. I am hoping to change her mind, but she says even if I am being safe, it's the people around me she is worried about. Somebody next to me might be driving drunk or something."

Her mother, Maria Guerrero, said it's about more than just the risk of other drivers. A license requires responsibility - and she's not sure her daughter has it yet.

"If she gets her license now, and then gets some tickets, well, when she is 18 she is going to have to pay for herself," Guerrero said. "And I don't want her insurance to be sky high by then."

Teen restrictions

Teen driving risks have been on the minds of lawmakers in Texas at least since 2002, when new rules for young drivers known as graduated driver's licenses took effect.

Since then, new Texas teen drivers have had to spend six months with a learner's permit before getting a license. After that, they must spend another six months with other restrictions, including a prohibition against driving between midnight and 5 a.m.

This year, lawmakers extended those probationary periods to 12 months each, and outlawed the use of cellphones by young drivers.

But Fette said his research suggests that tougher laws are only part of the reason for Texas' success in making fatal crashes involving teen drivers less frequent.

After all, Texas' laws have not been as strong as those in many other states. And some states with graduated driver's license laws actually saw their fatal crash rate go up, Fette said.

In Texas, he said, 300 school districts are implementing a first-in-the-country program called Teens in the Driver Seat, an initiative that gets teens talking to their peers about the risks of driving. Preliminary research says the program, begun in 2003, has worked.

"The [graduated-license] law is a necessary foundation," Fette said. "But that law can be reinforced or made stronger through a peer influence program like Teens in the Driver Seat. If you have a combination of the two, as Texas does, what you have is a really good one-two punch."

To test how effective the program is, researchers observed teen drivers in Garland, where the program has been in place since 2006 in seven high schools, and in Mesquite, where no school has implemented the program.

Since the program began, teen drivers in Garland were 14 percent more likely to wear their seat belts, and observers reported a 30 percent decline in cellphone use behind the wheel. In the four years previous in the city, 12 people died in crashes involving teen drivers; only one has since.

Maybe the most telling example, though, was in how many back-seat passengers buckled up. In Garland, where teens have been talking about the need for everyone to wear belts, 49 percent of those in back seats were strapped in. In Mesquite that number was just 27 percent.

Fette said education plays a big role. Surveys show that most teens say alcohol, speeding or cellphones are the biggest risk factors for crashes. Instead, he said, driving at night is the biggest risk.

"But just 3 percent of teens could even name that as a danger at all," Fette said. "So we have a risk that is at the top of the danger list, but at the bottom of their awareness."

More awareness

The good news of fewer teen deaths correlates to the conversations longtime driving instructor of All American Driving School Dorothea Hoyt overhears from her teenage students. She's been an instructor for 30 years, and today's teens, she said, seem more aware of the dangers of driving than those in the past.

"They are really getting a bit more mature," she said. "They do take it seriously, a lot of them do, because they have seen so many of their friends in wrecks."

Guerrero isn't ready to change her mind, however.

"I just think, 'Just wait a bit. What's the rush?' She is only 15. I just don't think it's safe for her. A lot of accidents happen."

Her daughter said her friends' deaths have made more vivid the risks of driving, so she's not pushing her mom too hard.

"I do see where she is coming from, because I saw the mothers' faces [at the funeral] and I wouldn't want my mom going through that," Mendez said.

And when she does get in a car with friends, she's paying a lot closer attention than she used to.

"I am usually sitting there watching through the windows to see if there is any trouble coming," she said.