TxDOT to Join in National Work Zone Awareness Week

A State department will join the federal government in an awareness week for the people that work on our roads.

The Texas Department of Transportation will join the Federal Highway Administration in the 2012 National Work Zone Awareness Week, which will run from April 23^rd through the 27^th.

Motorists driving through the TxDOT Lubbock District’s 16 counties will see some “office spaces” complete with desks, filing cabinets, and orange cones on TxDOT maintained facilities to remind drivers that that the work zones are some employee’s offices.

“The guys you see behind the barrels and cones in hardhats and safety vests have families just like the motorists traveling through the work zone,” said Douglas Eichorst, Lubbock District engineer. “Each of us has the power to protect lives as we drive. We just need to put our cell phones down, stop adjusting the radio, and focus on driving safely.”

The awareness week is also designed to not only raise awareness of the road worker, but also other motorists traveling through the work zone.

In 2010, 100 people were killed in highway construction and maintenance zones in Texas, down from 108 in the previous year.

There were 3,073 distracted driver crashes in work zones in Texas, involving 7,468 vehicles, resulting in 14 fatalities. Nine out of every ten work zone fatalities are motorists traveling through the work zone, and of the 100 work zone fatalities in 2010, 54 were drug and alcohol-related.

TxDOT maintains approximately 80,000 miles of highway.