Can Highway Accidents be Reduced?

I am not sure who suggested that I address myself to the question, “ Can highway accidents be reduced?” The question seems fair enough, but discussing it with state-city-county highway officials, contractors, and others close to the problem is quite a challenge. The explosive growth in numbers of vehicles and their use has raised radically the exposure to traffic accident hazards. After a generation of encouraging decline, the nation’s traffic death rate leveled off in 1961, when 5.2 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles of travel were recorded. In 1962 the 40,800 lives lost in highway accidents topped the 21-year-old high of 39,969 fatalities recorded in 1941, and the fatality rate turned upward to 5.3. Again in 1963 deaths on the highway were still diming, even faster than highway travel, and 43,400 occurred, with the corresponding higher rate of 5.4 deaths per 100 million miles of travel. Traffic deaths are of great significance, but we must also remember that current estimates of annual traffic injuries total approximately 1.6 million persons. Dollar losses are rarely if ever fully evaluated, but $7.7 billion is the accepted estimate for 1963. This exceeds the total amount expended last year for highway con­ struction by all levels of government.