With winter weather (hopefully) behind us, April typically marks the beginning of road repair work in many states. It’s also a good time for motorists to remember their obligation to look out for the safety of those who share the roadways.
That’s a message that National Work Zone Awareness Week, which this year run from April 9-13, aims to highlight. Its theme, "Work Zone Safety: Everybody's Responsibility”, focuses the safety issues surrounding work zones and necessity of awareness and planning on the part of everyone they affect. That includes everyone from road and utility workers to police and emergency responders to pedestrians, cyclists and motorists.
In Indiana, for instance, road workers are more likely to be killed in motor vehicle crashes than from any other hazard on the job, including those involving workplace violence and machine-related accidents. Since 2014, at least 12 people on average have been killed each year in INDOT roadway work zone crashes. Eighty percent of those killed are motorists or their passengers.
That’s according to the Indiana Department of Labor (IDOL). The department’s website also mentions that the most common causes of collision noted by police include:
-Following too closely.
-Unsafe lane movement.
-Failure to yield right-of-way.
-Ran off roadway.
-Ran over object in roadway.
-Improper lane change.
-Driver inattention.
-Unsafe speed.
The most common types of collision from these cause are rear-end, same direction sideswipe, head-on between two motor vehicles, and leaving the roadway.
For more information on National Work Zone Awareness Week, visit https://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/wz/outreach/wz_awareness.htm