How Safe Is Americas Roadway System?
The U.S. roadway system’s positive trends have plateaued at a fatality rate that is the lowest in history at 1.5 deaths per 100 million miles of travel (down from 5.5 fatalities in 1966). However, that’s still not good enough. In 2002, almost 3 million people were injured and 42,815 people died on our nation’s roads. The number of annual roadway fatalities had remained virtually unchanged (40,000-42,000) for the past ten years, but now there is an upward trend. How Significant is the Work Zone Safety Problem? With more than a 55% increase in work zone fatalities between 1997 and 2002, work zone safety is a growing roadway safety concern. In 2002, there were 1,181 work zone fatalities; this figure represents 2.8% of all roadway fatalities for the year. Four out of every five work zone fatalities were motorists. In all, there were 117,567 work zone crashes and over 52,000 people were injured in work zone crashes (1.8% of all roadway injuries). Can You Put This in Perspective? One work zo
