Wrong-way crash fatalities are a problem in Texas. Here’s why

While on his method to his nightly shift Tuesday night time, Dallas police officer Jacob Arellano was caught by a wrong-way driver. Arellano, 25, died the following day to the grief of his colleagues and lots of in Dallas.

Wrong way-crashes are uncommon, making up lower than 1% of crashes all through the state a 12 months, Scott A. Cooner, Program Manager with the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, mentioned.

“But when they do happen they almost always have a fatal or an incapacitating injury associated with them,” he mentioned.

Experts offered the profile of how typical wrong-way driving accidents occur.

They happen generally on freeway intersections and exit ramps between midnight and 5 a.m., with a spike at 2 a.m. when bars start to shut.

Drivers, intoxicated about two thirds of the time, will generally flip left onto an exit ramp in try to enter onto a freeway, as a substitute of crossing beneath the freeway after which turning left.

Not solely are wrong-way drivers generally drunk, they are sometimes closely inebriated. The common driver has over twice the authorized restrict of alcohol in their system.

Arellano, a three-year veteran of the drive, was driving northbound on Spur 408 close to Kiest Boulevard on his method to begin his shift. The improper manner driver in a sedan hit his automobile head-on in the center of three lanes.

The preliminary crash precipitated Arellano’s automobile to be pushed into the best lane the place it was hit once more by a tractor-trailer. His automobile then rolled a number of instances, police mentioned.

Authorities mentioned Wednesday the motive force of the sedan might have been intoxicated.

Data offered by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) reveals in 2021, simply 5 of town of Dallas’ 227 crash fatalities concerned wrong-way driving on one-way roads.

So far in 2022, wrong-way driving has been a contributing issue in 4 of the 12 months’s 152 crash fatalities in Dallas.

According to AAA Texas, the state leads the nation in wrong-way driving crashes. From 2015-2018, 309 fatalities got here from wrong-way crashes, in accordance with analysis.

Cooner mentioned wrong-way crashes generally happen at intersections and on frontage roads in metropolitan areas, in addition to on one-way streets in downtown areas. Because Texas has so many main cities, the state is a “leader” in these kinds of crashes in the United States, but additionally a chief in prevention analysis.

Prevention and detection

Problem areas like these intersections have been the main target of analysis, Cooner mentioned, for the reason that early 2000s when a variety of excessive profile fatalities got here from wrong-way driving.

Basic prevention of wrong-way fatalities goes again to driving 101. The yellow stripe needs to be on the drivers left and the write stripes on their proper.

Another widespread prevention methodology is raised pavement markers that replicate crimson in the lights of a automobile driving the improper manner down a street. These are the plastic markers sometimes positioned on the stipes in the middle of roads.

“Basically if you’re seeing red on those pavement markers, you know you’re going the wrong way,” TxDOT Northeast Texas communications director Tony Hartzel mentioned.

Cooner mentioned different fundamental measures have included reducing wrong-way and “Do Not Enter” indicators to face a few toes off the bottom. Research has proven intoxicated drivers are inclined to deal with the street straight in entrance of them and proper over their hood, as a substitute of correctly checking their environment.

“They’re trying to quote unquote, be safe,” he mentioned.

Lowering signage to eye stage catches the eye of a drunk driver.

The second arm of countermeasures, Cooner mentioned, has been detection and alert expertise.

Sensors in the pavement and on indicators and radar tools can detect the actions of a automobile going the improper manner. Alert programs corresponding to flashing lights and even audible warnings can urge the motive force to show round.

These detection and alert programs are extremely efficient Cooner mentioned, and most wrong-way drivers self-correct earlier than getting into a freeway or freeway.

Michael Rey, a spokesperson with the North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA) mentioned loops, or sensors in the street used to detect vehicles getting into or present the tollway will also be used to sense and monitor wrong-way drivers.

The NTTA put in a thermal digital camera detection take a look at on the southern finish of the North Tollway two years in the past. The digital camera can sense warmth coming in the direction of it after which activates a sequence of lights to attempt to alert the motive force to their error.

“The overarching message I have is we’re trying to communicate almost always with impaired drivers and that is a very difficult challenge,” he mentioned.

The group has additionally lowered signage in an initiative to discourage improper manner driving, and has a message board alert system to warn different drivers on the tollway.

“But this happens very quickly,” Rey mentioned.

In the long run, Cooner mentioned analysis may result in different drivers being alerted to the presence of close by wrong-way drivers by means of speaking on to their automobile.

TxDOT remains to be “in the review stage” on the timeline of deploying detection expertise in the Dallas district, Hartzel mentioned.

A spokesperson for the City of Dallas mentioned in a written assertion, “In limited scenarios, the City is testing other tools such as reflective tape on sign poles and flashing lights on signs,” to forestall wrong-way accidents.

In 2021, a whole of 4,489 folks died in motorized vehicle visitors accidents all through Texas, a 15.2% enhance from 2020, in accordance with TxDOT.

Twenty-four p.c of these fatalities occurred in crashes the place a driver was inebriated.

“We can’t countermeasure our way out of that,” Cooner mentioned. “No matter how well we’ve designed, the markings, the signs, all of that it’s largely a driver behavior issue.”