Calgary teens take distracted driving challenge

Calgary teens take distracted driving challenge Navigating a car through a marked course of pylons may not seem too difficult for the average Calgary driver. "They've come to understand that it is dangerous, but nothing really cements that and helps them to realize how dangerous and how much it affects them until they have that real experience," said Liam Crotty, program coordinator with advocacy and community services at AMA. He was one of a handful of Calgary high school students solicited to make videos raising awareness about the risks of distracted driving as part of a program by city police and the Alberta Motor Association. "I was like, 'Oh I could probably do this no problem,' I thought I could just blaze right through, but no actually, it did become a lot harder," said 17-year-old Simon Pacentrilli. "It sounds easy but when you get in there and you're trying to concentrate on counting these numbers while you're trying to know where your bumper is and make the right turns and not take out a pylon, all of a sudden it becomes very difficult. The students on Thursday underwent specialized driving tests with AMA instructors - first manoeuvring the course while concentrating fully on the road, then again while dealing with a handful of distractions. Const. Among the distractions forced upon the students while they practiced lane changes and four-point turns were having to count backward in twos from 400 and saying "yes" every single time an organism was mentioned in a list of non-living items on a CD. "In the lane changing, I had one person almost run over a barricade of cones, the other person clipped it with the back end of the car," said driving instructor Susan Vold. "Hopefully they're going to take that and run with it and they're going to begin educating their friends and family," he said, "The bottom line is it's very, very dangerous. Calgary teens take distracted driving challenge Trade News selected by Local Linkup on 04/05/2012