Transportation For America » Highway deaths are plummeting

Highway deaths are plummeting — can we make the drop permanent?

April 7, 2009
By Andrew Bielak

Aftermath of a fatal collision on Interstate 540 in Arkansas. Deaths from crashes like these were down nine percent in 2008 over the previous year. Photo by Steve Davis

You’ve probably heard that Americans are looking to save money and fuel by leaving their cars behind in order to walk, bike and use public transportation in historic numbers. What you might not know about is one of the most important byproducts of this shift in travel demand and decline in miles driven — much safer roads, and far fewer highway deaths.

A new release from the Federal Highway Administration shows that in 2008, a total of 37,313 people died in vehicles crashes, a nine percent decrease from the previous year and the lowest overall level in nearly 50 years. That means that almost 4,000 fewer people died in car crashes last year than in 2007 — something that comes as a rare piece of good news in a tough economic environment.

Though certain states may be making concerted efforts to ramp up safety, no one can deny that the continued drop in driving, which is due to both the economic crisis and fluctuating gas prices, has a profound effect on the safety of our roads.

While these numbers are certainly something to celebrate, they should give us no reason to think that we don’t have much more work to do. One hundred Americans still died each day on our roads last year, and our existing set of local, state and federal policies are doing little to help improve that. That’s like a small commercial airliner full of passengers crashing each day. And it’s hard to imagine that we wouldn’t be shocked into action were that the case with airline travel.

That’s why Transportation for America is pushing Congress and the Obama administration to develop a comprehensive plan for designing safe, complete streets for all users, holding states accountable for reducing fatalities and injuries, and directing targeted efforts to vulnerable groups like seniors and people in rural areas.

Help us out by joining with others to send a message to Congress urging that they support the complete streets bills to make our roads safe, hospitable and accessible for everyone who needs to use them.