Remarks by Secretary Slater at the High Risk Locations Press Conference

Rodney E. Slater, United States Secretary of Transportation
June 30, 1999

REMARKS PREPARED FOR DELIVERY
SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION RODNEY E. SLATER
HIGH RISK LOCATIONS NEWS CONFERENCE
JUNE 30, 1999
WASHINGTON, D.C.

Thank you for the important work you are taking on. Safety is everyone’s responsibility and I welcome the efforts by State Farm in the cause of highway safety.

Safety is President Clinton’s top transportation priority and the Department of Transportation is committed to saving lives. It remains the North Star guiding everything we do. On President Clinton’s watch, highway fatalities per mile traveled and drunk driving fatality rates have reached record low levels; seat belt use is at an all time high of over 70 percent -- up from under 50 percent in 1990. Highway-rail crossing deaths are at a record low, down 58 percent from 1988.

Impressive as these accomplishments are, the President has said "This is not a time to rest, but a time to build." We at DOT are not resting. We are building.

Among our current projects are physical improvements to the roads and highways, particularly intersections; the design of more crash-worthy vehicles; and working with states to support .08 blood alcohol standards for drunk driving.

Safety is a very timely subject. This coming weekend, the Fourth of July holiday, is one of the heaviest driving periods of the year. I have an estimate from the National Safety Council, an estimate that between Friday, July 2 at 6:00 p.m. and noon on Monday, July 5, there will be 500 deaths and 26,700 nonfatal crashes.

Given the number of crashes at intersections on the State Farm list, many of those collisions and even some deaths during the holiday weekend may come at places you’ve highlighted.

We at DOT have given special attention to intersection safety since the Highway Safety Act of 1973. More than $700 million has been invested through the Act to improve safety at high risk intersections. We have seen positive results through a concentration on enforcement, education, and engineering.

The Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century, known as TEA-21, passed just one year ago. It guarantees at least $198 billion in federal funds through 2003 to invest in building and repairing highways and bridges, roadway safety, and public transit. TEA-21, as much as anything, is a safety bill.

Today, we are working in partnership with organizations in every state on a wide range of life saving efforts. For example, we are partnering with private sector groups in a national educational campaign to warn Americans about the dangers of red light running. In some cities, these campaigns have reduced red light running collisions by one-third.

New and developing technology offers hope for even greater reductions in intersection crashes in the future.

The international community has been using photo enforcement successfully for years. Some U.S. cities are starting to use the technique and are documenting success. For example, Fairfax, Virginia City police report that their program is responsible for cutting the number of crashes by approximately 35 percent.

Last week, I announced the first Intelligent Vehicle Initiative operational test. Collision warning technology helps prevent crashes by detecting and assessing hazardous conditions in a vehicle’s forward path, such as a rapidly decelerating or stopped vehicle, and alerting the driver.

As we build the transportation system of the new century and the new millennium, moving from strength to strength, we must join together to save lives. Safety is a promise we must make together -- and keep together.

I welcome State Farm’s intersections project to our safety partnership . . . to the family of companies, communities, states, federal agencies and involved citizens everywhere who are devoting their time, energy and money to save precious lives.

####

Source:  U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT)