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General Assembly Raised Bill No. 825
January Session, 2019
LCO No. 3733
Referred to Committee on TRANSPORTATION
Introduced by:
(TRA)
AN ACT CONCERNING DISTR ACTED WALKING.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General
Assembly convened:
Section 1. (NEW) (Effective October 1, 2019) (a) For the purposes of 1
this section, "mobile electronic device" means any hand-held or other 2
portable electronic equipment capable of providing data 3
communication between two or more persons, including, but not 4
limited to, a mobile telephone, a text messaging device, a paging 5
device, a personal digital assistant, a laptop computer, equipment that 6
is capable of playing a video game or a digital video disk, or 7
equipment on which digital photographs are taken or transmitted, or 8
any combination thereof, and "viewing" means looking in the direction 9
of the screen of a mobile electronic device. 10
(b) Except as provided in subsection (c) of this section, no pedestrian 11
shall cross a highway while viewing a mobile electronic device. 12
(c) The provisions of subsection (b) of this section shall not apply to 13
(1) the use of a mobile electronic device for the sole purpose of 14
communicating with any of the following regarding an emergency 15
situation: An emergency response operator, a hospital, physician's 16 Raised Bill No. 825
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office or health clinic, an ambulance company, a fire department or a 17
police department, or (2) any of the following persons while in the 18
performance of their official duties and within the scope of their 19
employment: A peace officer or firefighter, as those terms are defined 20
in section 53a-3 of the general statutes, or any emergency medical 21
responder, emergency medical technician or paramedic, as those terms 22
are defined in section 19a-175 of the general statutes. 23
(d) Any person who violates the provisions of this section shall, for 24
a first violation, receive a warning and, for any subsequent violation, 25
be fined twenty dollars. 26
Sec. 2. Section 14-300d of the general statutes is repealed and the 27
following is substituted in lieu thereof (Effective October 1, 2019): 28
Notwithstanding any provisions of the general statutes, [or] any 29
regulations issued thereunder, sections 14-299, 14-300, 14-300b to 14-30
300e, inclusive, section 1 of this act, or any local ordinance, [to the 31
contrary,] each operator of a vehicle shall exercise due care to avoid 32
colliding with any pedestrian or person propelling a human powered 33
vehicle and shall give a reasonable warning by sounding a horn or 34
other lawful noise emitting device to avoid a collision. An operator 35
who violates any provision of this section shall be fined not more than 36
five hundred dollars. 37
This act shall take effect as follows and shall amend the following
sections:
Section 1 October 1, 2019 New section
Sec. 2 October 1, 2019 14-300d
TRA Joint Favorable