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Minnesota Department of Public Safety
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St. Paul, MN 55155-1899
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Minnesota Toward Zero Deaths program wins international safety award
ST. PAUL, Minn. — Minnesota's Toward Zero Deaths Program was one of 11 projects from eight countries honored Jan. 11 by the International Road Federation for contributions to excellence in the road industry.
Minnesota’s TZD program, a multi-agency partnership, received the federation’s 2009 Global Road Achievement Award for safety, which recognizes significant contributions to improving road safety by devising concepts, products, processes or systems in relation to road infrastructure, road/vehicle interaction and driver behavior.
“The Minnesota TZD program is a testimony to what can be accomplished when enforcement, education, engineering, emergency management services and local partners work together toward a common goal of reducing deaths on our highways,” said Minnesota Transportation Commissioner Tom Sorel.
“We are truly honored to have been selected for this award,” added Sue Groth, Minnesota Department of Transportation’s state traffic engineer and TZD co-chair. “The strength of Mn/DOT's safety program comes from the many people around the state that identify, design and build the most effective safety projects.”
TZD’s achievements include:
:
- Reaching a goal of fewer than 500 fatalities two years sooner than expected.
- Setting a new goal of fewer than 400 fatalities by 2010.
- Continuing a downward trend for traffic fatalities and serious injuries.
- Achieving a 20 percent reduction in fatalities since 2001 (from 568 to 455).
- Achieving a 45 percent reduction in serious injury crashes since 2001 (from 2,274 to 1,248).
- Having an annual fatality rate (fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles traveled) below 1.0 for the last four years.
Besides using the “four E’s” - enforcement, education, engineering and emergency management services - to improve safety and reduce fatalities/serious injuries, changes to Minnesota law also are modifying driving behaviors, including:
- Primary seatbelt legislation, which requires drivers and passengers in all seating positions to be buckled up, effective June 9, 2009.
- No texting while driving, effective Aug. 1, 2008.
- Blood alcohol content limit of .08, effective Sept. 1, 2005.
“Driver behavior is a factor in 93 percent of our nation’s road fatalities,” said Cheri Marti, Department of Public Safety’s Traffic Safety director and TZD co-chair. “Minnesota TZD is working hard to impact the behavioral and engineering aspects of road safety in Minnesota.”
In addition to Mn/DOT and DPS, TZD’s principal partners include the State Patrol, Department of Health, Center for Transportation Studies at the University of Minnesota, the Federal Highway Administration and other local safety partners, including counties and cities.
The award was presented in Washington, D.C.
The International Road Federation is a nongovernmental, not-for-profit organization with the mission to encourage and promote development and maintenance of better, safer and more sustainable roads and road networks.
For statewide travel information visit www.511mn.org, call 5-1-1 or log on to www.mndot.gov.
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Note: Minnesota’s 2009 preliminary traffic death count is 403, which marks an 8 percent drop from the 455 deaths in 2008. The 2009 traffic death number will rise as the Department of Public Safety receives more fatal reports. The state projects a final death number of around 420, which would be the fewest number of fatalities since 1944 when 356 were reported. The final number will be available early this summer.