The thought of their teenager getting behind the wheel of the family car is enough to drive parents to distraction. But a device available to Annandale area families might be a way to teach teens to be better drivers while providing Mom and Dad with some peace of mind. It’s little wonder that letting their teenagers become drivers produces high anxiety in parents. Insurance industry statistics show that teens have the worst driving records, says Doug Kantor of American Family Insurance in Annandale. "Research has identified motor vehicle crashes as the leading cause of death for teens in the United States," according to Jack Salzwedel, the company’s president and CEO. But American Family has been trying out a program that includes installing a camera in teens’ cars to record risky driving behavior such as swerving, hard braking, sudden acceleration and collisions. The Teen Safe Driver Program has been a pilot project in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Indiana since March and has just expanded to five other states. "Results from the pilots … show the program reduces risky driving behavior by 70 percent or more," the company said. Ten of Kantor’s customers are using the camera in their teens’ cars, he said, and his 16-year-old son, Kam, was probably the first teen to use it in Minnesota. The heart of the program is a video and audio camera produced by DriveCam Inc. of San Diego, Calif., that mounts on the windshield behind the rearview mirror. Once an American Family car insurance customer registers for the program, MCP Collision Center in Annandale installs the camera, Kantor said. "It’s always on," but it doesn’t store anything unless it’s triggered by abnormal movement. Once activated, it stores the previous 10 seconds and the next 10 seconds and sends the data via satellite to DriveCam. Trained analysts review it and add comments, then it’s put on a secure web site for viewing by the parents and teen driver. "What that does," Kantor said, "is give the parent a teachable moment." The parent can take the recording to the driver and discuss what he or she should have done differently. The technology has been used in commercial vehicles for years, Kantor said. The camera – you might call it the Kam cam though the Kantors don’t – was installed in Kam Kantor’s car in mid-March and has "definitely" improved his driving, Doug Kantor said. The worst incident Kam has had involved going into the ditch while driving on a slushy road the morning of April 3, the day before he turned 16 and received his driver’s license. They reviewed the video clip several times and figured out Kam was going too fast for conditions. That’s been the only accident recorded by any of the 11 cameras in use by Annandale area parents and teens. "As a parent, I feel it gives a great deal of peace of mind," Doug Kantor said. Not totally alone "You know that your child’s doing the right thing because if he weren’t, they’d notify me." Instead of sending him out totally alone in a car, it’s like a neighbor is with him, Kantor said. And he’s learning good driving habits because that’s what keeps the camera off. "He wishes it weren’t there because he knows he’s being watched, but at the same time he knows it’s doing exactly what it was designed to do." Kam Kantor said he at first regarded the camera as a device for spying on him. And he initially set it off almost all the time by making turns that were too sharp. "Then it didn’t go off hardly at all" once that was corrected. "It ends up being quite a help," he said. "It does make me a better driver because it showed me what I was doing wrong. "Thinking it through helped me improve because I knew it would catch me if I did something wrong. So I would be more cautious." Some of his friends wondered why he would want the camera in his car and what kind of parents would do that to him, he said. But it’s not that bad, and some friends have noted it’s for the better and it’s just temporary. Using the camera landed the young driver a brief appearance on the CBS Evening News last month in a story about teen driving and the DriveCam approach. He spent about three hours in the interview and taping shots of his car, which translated into about 90 seconds on the air. American Family customers can register for the year-long no-cost program at www.teensafedriver.com.
