During Thursday’s Senate Commerce Committee hearing, Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-DE) pressed witnesses about pedestrian safety on streets in the dark.
00:03Thank you to my fellow freshman and classmate, Senator Curtis, and also thank you to Senator
00:11Cantwell for the opportunity to be ranking member today.
00:15And I also want to thank the witnesses.
00:17You know, this is one of the issues that a lot of times we will get messages from our
00:23constituents.
00:24People have strong opinions.
00:26And I was literally in a meeting before this with a CEO of a company who asked, well, what
00:32do you think?
00:33And so this is something that does touch on so many.
00:36And I want to start my questions with you, Dr. Harky.
00:41Because year-round daylight saving time would mean later sunrises in the mornings, more people
00:48may be commuting to work or to school in the dark.
00:52Some people have raised concerns that this would put their children at greater risk of
00:57being hit by cars while walking to school.
01:00Pedestrians are more likely to be killed in traffic accidents, as you stated, in the dark
01:04because it's harder for the drivers to see them.
01:07And in the 1970s, it was widely reported that mothers raised significant concerns about their
01:12children walking to school in the dark in the winter.
01:15Nationwide, over 70% of fatal accidents involving pedestrians occur at night.
01:21Dr. Harky, no matter what time the sun goes down, what roadway improvements can cities
01:28and states make to reduce pedestrian fatalities?
01:34Thank you for the question, Senator.
01:37That is exactly what our study indicated, is that it's not about the shifting of the time
01:43that we're going to have darkness, regardless of which decision you make, which policy decision
01:49you make.
01:49And so that's what we're looking for, is to try and figure out how do we make pedestrians
01:55and bicyclists in particular safer in those dark hours, whether they're in the morning
01:59or whether they're in the evening.
02:01And for most municipalities and county agencies and state DOTs who are struggling to address
02:08this issue, there's two key things.
02:11One is space.
02:13We have to provide the appropriate space, sidewalks in rural areas that can be separated paths
02:19or possibly paved shoulders even, places for people to walk where they're not in the edge
02:25of the travel lane.
02:27We also have to take care to provide careful crossings.
02:31So we have to pay particular attention to how we're allowing motor vehicles and pedestrians
02:37to interact at crosswalks.
02:40These can be at intersections.
02:42They can be at mid-block locations.
02:43So you have to have appropriate crossings.
02:46Pedestrians aren't going to walk too far.
02:48They're going to make those decisions to cross in the middle of the road sometimes.
02:51And so you want to make sure that you're providing adequate crossings where they want to cross.
02:55And then you've got to do all you can to provide the kinds of traffic control devices
03:00that will increase motor shielding behavior.
03:03So this includes things like rapid flash beacons, which have been shown to increase motor shielding
03:09behavior sixfold.
03:11You can build on that, adding simple things like lights that are triggered when a pedestrian
03:16hits the crosswalk area.
03:18It will light up that crosswalk.
03:20You can double the amount of motor shielding behavior.
03:23So these are interventions that have been proven over time.
03:27And it's important for state agencies and local agencies to take advantage of those kinds
03:32of interventions and get those implemented anywhere that they have pedestrians.
03:37Following along on the safety theme, what vehicle technologies can help protect pedestrians
03:43when it's difficult for drivers to see them?
03:46Yeah.
03:47And so this is another important aspect.
03:49And this is what builds on the safe system approach, right?
03:51Building that redundancy into the systems.
03:54You don't just rely on the infrastructure.
03:56You also build technology into vehicles that can help with this.
03:59Two big things that we've studied.
04:02One is better headlights.
04:03We're the only group in the world that tests headlights the way that we do on our track.
04:10And so we've seen improvements in headlights over the years that increase visibility and provide
04:14drivers with additional time.
04:16They can see that pedestrian further down the roadway.
04:19And so that's a big change.
04:21And we'll continue to push for that.
04:23The other is automatic emergency braking with pedestrian detection.
04:27That also has been shown to work and be very effective at reducing pedestrian crashes in the daytime.
04:33And now our testing is really focused on getting automakers to improve those systems to work even better at nighttime.
04:39So that's an example of two technologies in the vehicle that can be really, really beneficial.
04:44You know, one of the things that I've noticed is that our safety efforts are siloed.
04:50You have the Federal Highway Administration, which builds and maintains highways.
04:56You have the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which regulates vehicle safety standards and investigates defects.
05:04Then you've got the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, which oversees commercial motor vehicles and trucking industry safety, all kind of working separately.
05:14And I think back to what you were talking about, about kind of how can we better layer safety measures to help stop deadly crashes?
05:25Yeah, you're absolutely right.
05:28And so build on top of the separation and the federal agencies that you just discussed.
05:32Along with them, you have state DOTs, you have county DOTs, you have city DOTs.
05:37And so it becomes quite the web of how you make decisions when it comes to road safety.
05:43One of the things that we have to do a better job of is communicating between those agencies deliberately.
05:51And so there is no single authority of the ones that you mentioned that has complete authority over every decision on our roadway system when it comes to safety.
06:00And so these agencies have to do a better job of communicating together deliberately, and not just at the executive level, but at the staff level.
06:09Because it's at the staff level where people know what interventions work best and how to apply those in a way that you create that redundancy in the system that we were talking about.
06:20So whether it's infrastructure, whether it's vehicle, whether it's changing behaviors, that communication amongst the staff is absolutely critical.
06:29Great.
06:30And I was really interested to hear about your 30 by 30.
06:34So in the interest of time, I will yield back to the chairman.
