Car tracking keeps tabs on young drivers
By Alan Mascarenhas
February 26, 2005
Kirk Marks was worried his 22-year-old son, Alex, might crash while driving at night.
So, seven months ago, he fitted a tracking device to Alex's vehicle, ensuring he could monitor his son's location and speed. All from the comfort of home.
Mr Marks said yesterday that the result had been peace of mind. "Alex works late in the evenings, travelling through various suburbs until 11pm or 1am. He thought [installing the device] was a bit of an invasion initially ... but as you can imagine, if you've got a a car in the family, you want to [make] sure it's being driven in an appropriate manner."
Mr Marks insisted he was no "Big Brother", saying Alex agreed the surveillance was necessary in case the family's $32,000 vehicle was stolen. "Unfortunately in this day and age, it's important to know where our kids are and what they're doing."
NSW road toll figures show that people younger than 26 comprise 15 per cent of licence holders but are involved in 36 per cent of road fatalities.
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This prompted the Roads Minister, Michael Costa, to propose recently that the minimum age of P-plate drivers should be increased to 18. This idea was shot down later by the Premier, Bob Carr.
Vehicle-tracking systems have been used in Australia for about 12 years. A typical model involves fitting a SIM card to a vehicle to log the driver's journey.
The managing director of vehicle-tracking firm Satrak, Dean Penhorwood, said parents could be text-messaged if their car went out of a certain area or above a certain speed.
