New Houston Ordinance to Protect Vulnerable Road Users

Are you a Houston City bicyclist? This news may interest you: Just this past week Mayor Annise Parker and the Houston City Council approved an ordinance to protect Houston's cyclists and other vulnerable road users by requiring cars and other motor vehicles to keep a separation of more than three feet while passing, and trucks or commercial vehicles to keep a separation of more than six feet. The ordinance is effective immediately.

Vulnerable road users are defined as a walkers or runners; the physically disabled, such as someone in a wheelchair; a stranded motorist or passengers; highway construction, utility or maintenance workers; tow truck operators; cyclists; moped, motor-driven cycle and scooter drivers; or horseback riders.
In addition to requiring safe passing and trailing distances from vulnerable road users, this ordinance prohibits any motor vehicle occupant from throwing or projecting any object or substance at or against them.

 BikeHouston, several state and local leaders and other groups advocated and/or voiced support for this ordinance, including: Senator Rodney Ellis, BikeTexas, AARP, Better Houston, Bikin' Babes, Citizen Transportation Coalition, Houston Access to Urban Sustainability Project, Houston Tomorrow, Northwest Cycling Club and Richmond Rail.
Similar ordinances have already been enacted by Austin, Fort Worth and San Antonio.
The Safe Passing ordinance is another initiative, led and/or supported by Mayor Parker, to encourage more cycling in Houston. Others include the launch of Houston Bike Share last month, closing gaps in Houston's bike trail system; the voter-approved Bayou Greenways initiative; and approval of HB200, which will allow Houston's utility easements to be used for hike and bike trails.

http://www.yourhoustonnews.com

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Zachary Quinto vs. Leonard Nimoy: "The Challenge" Audi Commercial

In preparation for the release of upcoming Star Trek Into Darkness, which opens in theaters on May 17th, Audi teamed up with the film franchise and produced a commercial featuring both the original Spock and the successor (Leonard Nimoy and Zachary Quinto) in a battle of wits. This may be only entertaining to geeks like myself but surely everyone can appreciate the splendor of the Audi as Zachary Quinto so lavishly boards it as if it were the Enterprise itself! Well, I guess you would have to be a geek to identify with that as well huh...

Suffice it to say that the original Spock, Leonard Nimoy, steals the show from the franchise's new Spock, Zachary Quinto. I particularly enjoyed the Bilbo Baggins chant he so candidly sang. Zachary Quinto has quite a task before him to fill such big shoes! So far he's doing grand :). 

After we are led to believe Leonard Nimoy to be the winner of the Challenge, the final scene of the commercial serves as enlightenment as Audi manages to amaze both these Vulcan's and we all realize that the winner was Audi all along. 

The video was ultimately clever and entertaining. I am excited to see how the movie pans out.

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KidsEmbrace New Child Safety Seats - Cool or Not?

If you're in the market for a new flashy way to transport your child about in the car safely, KidsEmbrace may have created the perfect product for you. The company makes specialty car seats fashioned after Spongebob, Dora the Explorer, Batman and NASCAR legend Dale Earnhardt Junior.

Why? For the Kids of course! Well more for the money but that's corporate America. What's important is if your child would actually enjoy this new product. The Batman seat features a cape and arm rests styled after the Dark Knight's own arms, complete with hands for cup holders. It will catch the attention of many young boys, and will be an increase in visual stimulation in comparison to the dull standard safety seats. And don't worry, they didn't leave safety by the wayside while designing this kid friendly comfort. The Kids Embrace design team has over 60 years combined experience in manufacturing and engineering child safety equipment. Their chief engineer serves as a consultant to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the Federal agency that sets standards for vehicle safety.  Rest assured, this is not only a fun product, the KIDSEmbrace™ child safety seat is also one of the safest seats available today.

You can head over to the KidsEmbrace site to take a look for yourself. The seats can be had for around $149 or so.  I would love to hear if your child loved it or hated it.

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Texas House Bill 1190

Currently there is a House bill in Texas that will affect all defensive driving courses in Texas .

The bill is the following:

By: Flynn

H.B. No. 1190

	A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
	AN ACT
	relating to statutory minimum fees for driving safety courses.
	BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
	SECTION 1.  Section 1001.205, Education Code, is amended to
	read as follows:
	Sec. 1001.205.  REQUIREMENTS FOR DRIVING SAFETY SCHOOL
	LICENSE. The commissioner shall approve an application for a
	driving safety school license if on investigation the agency
	determines that the school:
	(1)  has driving safety courses, curricula, and
	instruction of a quality, content, and length that reasonably and
	adequately achieve the stated objective for which the course,
	curricula, and instruction are developed by the course provider;
	(2)  has adequate space, equipment, instructional
	material, and instructors to provide training of good quality;
	(3)  has instructors and administrators who have
	adequate educational qualifications and experience;
	(4)  maintains adequate records as prescribed by the
	commissioner to show attendance and progress or grades and enforces
	satisfactory standards relating to attendance, progress, and
	conduct;
	(5)  complies with all county, municipal, state, and
	federal laws, including fire, building, and sanitation codes and
	assumed name registration;
	(6)  has administrators, owners, and instructors who
	are of good reputation and character;
	(7)  does not use erroneous or misleading advertising,
	either by actual statement, omission, or intimation, as determined
	by the commissioner;
	(8)  does not use a name similar to the name of another
	existing school or tax-supported educational establishment in this
	state, unless specifically approved in writing by the commissioner;
	(9)  maintains and uses the approved contract and
	policies developed by the course provider;
	(10)  does not owe an administrative penalty under this
	chapter;
	[(11)   will not provide a driving safety course to a
	person for less than $25;] and
	(11) [(12)]  meets additional criteria required by the
	commissioner.
	SECTION 2.  Section 1001.352, Education Code, is amended to
	read as follows:
	Sec. 1001.352.  FEES FOR DRIVING SAFETY COURSE. A course
	provider shall charge each student[:
	[(1) at least $25 for a driving safety course; and
	[(2)] a fee of at least $3 for driving safety course
	materials and for supervising and administering the course.
	SECTION 3.  The change in law made by this Act to Section
	1001.205, Education Code, applies only to an application for a
	driving safety school license submitted on or after the effective
	date of this Act. An application for a driving safety school
	license submitted before the effective date of this Act is governed
	by the law in effect immediately before the effective date of this
	Act, and that law is continued in effect for that purpose.
	SECTION 4.  The change in law made by this Act to Section
	1001.352, Education Code, applies only to a driving safety course
	provided on or after the effective date of this Act. A course
	provided before the effective date of this Act is governed by the
	law in effect immediately before the effective date of this Act, and
	the former law is continued in effect for that purpose.
	SECTION 5.  This Act takes effect September 1, 2013.

We are petitioning to prevent the passing of Texas House Bill 1190.

In summary, five reasons to be opposed to HB 1190, although there are many, many more:
1. Reduces the opportunity for small businesses in the driving safety field to startup and compete on a level playing field with larger multistate operations.
2. Could create similar deceptive advertising techniques that other states have resorted to similar to Florida and California.
3. Will eventually result in a loss of jobs within the industry with lower skilled workforce of instructors due to lower pay.
4. Closing of currently operating small businesses in the driving safety field due to the inability to be price competitive with online courses with call centers in other states and abroad.
5. Reduced profitability in the industry as a whole therefore reducing the taxes collected hurting State and Federal Governments.
Small businesses within the driver safety and driver education industry in Texas, along with the families they are composed of, will hurt tremendously if the bill is passed.

Texas Defensive Driving

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Cost of owning a car is on the rise

Overall, the costs of car ownership have risen compared to last year, according to an annual study by AAA, which says it now costs 2% more to own a sedan than it did last year.

The costs vary a lot according to the type and size of vehicle, though. It costs about $7,000 a year to own a small car in the United States but about $11,600 to own a four-wheel-drive SUV, according to AAA.

The study factored in costs such as fuel, maintenance, insurance, tires and depreciation.

Maintenance costs have risen the most, according to AAA, going up 11.26% compared to last year. Maintenance costs almost 5 cents for every mile driven. Those costs have gone up because of increases in labor costs, replacement parts prices and extended warranty prices.

Insurance costs have gone up 2.76% for sedans, AAA said. The drivers' group based its annual estimate of $1,029 assuming that a driver has a clean record. Insurance companies in seven states showed small increases for sedans of all sizes.

Fuel costs rose only 1.93% compared to last year. While the price of gasoline rose 3.84%, that was partly offset by improvements in the fuel economy of new cars. The cost of tires was unchanged from last year.

Article from: http://money.cnn.com

Defensive Driving Texas

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Google Does Not Want You To Drive

Getting you to take your eyes off the road could be worth billions in new search revenue to Google.

Google has never said exactly how it will make money off the self-driving vehicles it has been developing. Will it manufacture cars? Try to become the operating system for our highways?

The patent, titled “User interface for displaying internal state of autonomous driving system,” covers the idea of a vehicle dashboard that uses lights to cue a driver when it’s safe to relinquish control of their vehicle to a computer.

The patent includes an extremely telling schematic (shown below) of a driver behind the wheel of a self-driving car. Because what will people do when the car is driving? Obviously, they’re going to play with their iPhones.

While Google has never said how it plans to commercialize automated vehicles, it’s clear that keeping people’s eyes on the Web instead of on the road could itself mean a substantial boost to the company’s revenues.

Baloney, you say. Well, getting people to use Google services instead of doing something else is already a key strategy of Google’s. That is one reason the company can afford to maintain its free Android operating system for smartphones. All those phones mean more people on the Internet, searching via Google, and clicking on ads.

So just how much could Google earn by making sure drivers are not distracted from the Internet?

Based on U.S. Census Data there are 250 million adults in the U.S., of which 119 million work. Of those, 76 percent drive to work alone spending about 25 minutes to get there. Round trip, call it an hour. Times 260 workdays per year. That comes to about 23,514,400,000 extra person-hours a year to play with phones out of about 1,460,000,000,000 hours American adults spend awake each year. Or about 1.6% more free time overall.

Given Google’s revenue of $46 billion a year (and assuming the rest of the world behaves like Americans) the calculation suggests that by freeing up commuters to surf the Internet driverless cars are worth an additional $736 million in search revenue to Google.

Oh, and let’s not forget the point of this patent: Google’s car will tell you when it’s safe to start searching.

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Driving with the Black Box

     The National Highway Traffic Safety Board is proposing that the event data recorder be mandatorily installed during the manufacturing of all new vehicles beginning on September 1, 2014. Also known as the Black Box, it is said to have the capability of improving safety technology because it will be able to detect design problems and safety hazards within any vehicle. 

     Although it may be improving safety on U.S. Roadways some are raising the question that it may be crossing privacy barriers. The Black Box can detect all of the following; speed, brake pedal position, location of vehicle, if the passengers are wearing a seatbelt, and if air bags were deployed during a crash. 

     Insurance companies, lawyers, and police departments seem to be in the highest benefits of this new device. Insurance companies will be able to increase or lower your rates depending on the data provided to them by the device. Lawyers will be able to provide more significant data in wreck-less driving or DWI cases, and policemen will be able to quickly note the speed a vehicle was going before being involved in a crash. The Center for Auto Safety seems to provide sufficient information that the data recorders will in fact be benefiting more than anything. In all, the new device is going to approve the safety of most drivers on the roadway.

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