Relatively Small Improvements Could Help Make Virginia’s Transportation System Significantly Safer
Relatively Small Improvements Could Help Make Virginia’s Transportation System Significantly Safer
By Nancy Rodrigues
The transportation funding problem in Virginia has reached such a critical point that even the most reluctant should admit that drastic, expensive measures are no longer avoidable.
The time for such steps has come – the band-aid approach just cannot fix our wounded and broken-down infrastructure any longer. Combine our state’s vital tourism industry, which is heavily dependent on a clientele that arrives by car, and the soul-numbing, spirit-emptying experiences that most commuters’ daily drives have become, and the case for drastic action is clear.
The inevitable reinvigoration and reconstruction of Virginia’s transportation system presents the opportunity of a lifetime to incorporate the newest, proven safety features known to 21st Century civilization.
As the former executive director of DRIVE SMART® Virginia for nearly a decade, I speak from experience when I say I am optimistic about what this emphasis on improving transportation will have on our record of vehicle-related injuries and deaths. Last year, 922 people lost their lives on Virginia’s roadways and 78,487 were injured. There were 153,907 crashes reported to law-enforcement agencies. If we’d had more safety technology available to us, many of these could have been easily prevented, or at least minimized.
The Federal Highway Administration reported in a one-year study that 23 percent of crashes on the Capital Beltway involved drivers whose vehicles veered from the road. These accidents typically involve one vehicle and often take place at night, which usually indicates a momentarily distracted or fatigued driver. Rumble strips, implanted in the roadbed to make jarring noise and to jolt the driver into waking up, are obvious remedies, as are more and better highway rest stops for travelers and truckers. It costs approximately $1500 per shoulder mile for rumble strips. Compare that cost against the average cost of an auto collision, which is $28,209 (calculated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in year 2000), and you have a real bargain. (The figure includes costs associated with medical expenses, emergency services, market and household productivity, insurance administration, workplace and legal costs, travel delay and property damage – but not pain and suffering and other intangibles.)
In 2003, the Virginia Department of Transportation projected it would cost $12.35 million to install rumble strips on all shoulders of Virginia’s interstate system. However, new research from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety finds that installing rumple strips along the centerlines of undivided two lane rural roads decrease the number of sideswipes by passing cars by about 20 percent. Overall, crashes in the study, which included data from seven states, showed a 14 percent drop. Most importantly, crashes with injuries decreased by 15 percent. Please note that rural crashes often result in more fatalities and approximately 75 percent of these crashes occur on undivided two-lane roads.
Crowded highways also lead to more crashes. One vehicle slows or stops on the highway as a sea of brake lights glow ahead and the vehicle behind it fails to brake in time, resulting in a rear-end collision and, frequently, a chain-reaction. Typically the initial car slowed or stopped due to congestion. Side-swipes also escalate as drivers try to change lanes to get around the congestion.
When roads are constructed or improved, they can help to not only keep vehicles on the road and prevent crashes, but they also minimize the impact when crashes occur. A simple barrier prevents an accident in one lane from becoming a multi-lane, two-direction catastrophe. More lanes and wider shoulders in critical areas cut down on congestion and allow drivers to avoid crashes ahead.
Because our collective population is aging, transportation systems will have to have better, easier-to-read signage, lanes for slower drivers, safer entry and exit lanes. Public transit will play a more demanding role as we age since many older drivers no longer have the ability to drive due to failing vision or manual dexterity. The numbers from the Virginia Department of Aging are startling: the number of Virginians 60 years of age or over is projected to grow from 14.7 percent of the population in 1990, to nearly 25 percent by 2025 (a time when there will be two million Virginians in this age group).
More money for Virginia roads will most certainly relieve the daily frustration we have to deal with. It will also help to keep the cost of transporting goods down and reduce the amount of fuel burned (an environmental plus). From my perspective, it will also reduce substantially the actual and emotional cost resulting from those thousands of Virginians who become victims of our highways.
It’s time, Virginia, to make our transportation infrastructure safer. We cannot wait any longer. Visit the It’s Time Web site at www.itstimevirginia.org to learn more about ways you can help be a part of the solution.
Nancy Rodrigues is the former executive director for DRIVE SMART® Virginia and currently leads the government relations division of Goldman & Associates. She is also a member of Virginians for Better Transportation (www.itstimevirginia.org).
