An alliance of insurers and safety groups paired with Washington, D.C.-based Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety suggest Wyoming’s traffic laws are some of the worst in the country. Three examples the groups gave for this ranking are the young age of drivers, absence of helmet requirements for motorcyclists, and the allowance of open containers.
Wyoming residents are allowed to attain a learner’s permit at the age of 15 and after a year and half of supervised driving can attain a full license at 16 and 6 months. This graduated license law went into effect in 2005. Lt. Tom Pritchard said he believed the current graduated license law is an efficient way to give young drivers adequate driving experience.
“They are not allowed to have more then one person in the vehicle under 18 who is not related to them,” said Pritchard. “I think this is very efficient way to get kids to learn how to drive properly.”
Eighteen-year-old John Gruzo, a Laramie native, fully agreed that the current laws in place requiring teenagers to have a year of supervised driving is more then enough practice and the stipulated 50 hours of adult-accompanied driving paired with a signed time sheet is a great way to ensure accountability.
“It is a great way to ease kids into driving,” said Gruzo. “Having the extra training allows time for them to hone their driving skills.”
Allowing teens to attain a full license before 17 is not unique to Wyoming though; it is practiced by 15 states. Pritchard questioned the way in which the insurers and safety groups ranked worst laws, claiming Wyoming’s laws are similar to a large number of other states.
“[The insurers and safety groups] always take numbers in proportion to our population,” Pritchard pointed out. “You can’t rank us against California when our population is a quarter of LA.”
As far as helmet laws are concerned, Wyoming is one in eighteen that require riders 17 and younger to wear helmets when operating a motorcycle. The trooper expressed that he believed the same principle concerning seatbelts should be applied to helmets as requiring these safety measures reduce injury and save lives.
“We encourage people to wear helmets on bicycles and they are riding at a much slower speed,” said Pritchard. “There are kids every year that have head injuries just on bicycles.”
In response to the claim Wyoming’s law allowing open containers in parked vehicles, Pritchard surmised that legislators have this allowance for such events as tailgating at a sporting event and that there is no tolerance for any person drinking alcohol and operating a vehicle and the current law is an improvement from the previous law permitting alcohol to be consumed while operating a vehicle as long as they were not over the limit. In the end Pritchard asserted he thinks there is some room for improvement such as implementing a primary seatbelt law, but aired his doubts concerning the credibility of the article criticizing Wyoming’s traffic laws.
“I don’t know what we would have to do to meet these standards [these agencies are insinuating should be met],” said Pritchard. “There are ways to increase highway safety but I’m not even sure if we need to be [striving] to meet whatever standards the claim is based off of.”
