Vancouver police officers have been writing distracted-driving tickets at a fevered pitch lately.

According to an October 3 media release, the force issued close to 2,000 of these fines since barely more than a month ago, beginning on September 1.

“If you know someone who just won’t give up their phone while driving, maybe you can have some influence,” VPD Sergeant Jason Robillard said quoted there. “We have at least 1,969 reasons to remind our loved ones to pull over or leave the phone alone while driving.”

The price of a ticket for using a mobile device in B.C. is $368.

That's up from $167, a change that came into effect on June 1, 2017.

Distracted driving tickets are primarily associated with people using a phone or another mobile device while operating a vehicle. But they can be issued for just about anything that takes a driver's mind off the road. Last month, the B.C. RCMP warned one can receive a distracted driving ticket for eating while driving.

For the VPD, so many of these tickets issued in just one month will bring in a pretty good haul for the force. If each fine is paid at the rate of $368, 1,969 tickets equates to $724,592.

The VPD describes the focus on drivers as a campaign aimed to "educate motorists and discourage the use of mobile devices while driving".

"The high number of tickets written during the campaign proves distracted driving is still a problem on Vancouver roads," the release continues. "Distracted driving has shown to be one of the leading contributing factors of traffic fatalities in B.C. – even surpassing impaired driving."

Indeed, just last week (September 27), Vancouver lawyer and Straight contributor Sarah Leamon began an article like this: "Distracted driving has been branded as the 'new' drunk driving."

She notes there that according to the Canadian Automobile Association, a driver is 23 times more likely to be involved in an accident if they are using a mobile-electronic device while driving.

This isn't the first time that the VPD has gone on a ticketing blitz against distracted drivers. Through March 2015, the force issued 1,500 fines to drivers who were caught on a mobile device or were otherwise distracted while driving in Vancouver.