NHTSA Targets Speeding With New Campaign
Speeding has quickly become one of the leading causes of car accidents in Pennsylvania and nationwide. That’s why the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) recently announced an educational campaign about the dangers of speeding.
“Much like impaired driving, speeding can steal the lives of everyone using our roads: drivers, passengers, pedestrians, and cyclists,” Steven Cliff, NHTSA’s administrator, said in an interview with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “We cannot accept the status quo. Speed-related deaths aren’t inevitable. They’re preventable, and everyone has a role in addressing this crisis on our nation’s roadways.”
Speeding Wrecks Lives
The NHTSA recently launched an educational campaign named “Speeding Wrecks Lives.” The three-week-long, $8 million ad campaign is geared toward drivers ages 18 to 44, who the NHTSA said “are most likely to drive too fast,” according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
“Speeding is short-sighted, selfish, and dangerous to everyone on the road,” Barbara Rooney, chairwoman of the Governors Highway Safety Association, said in an interview with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “It’s time to change the social norm so that speeding is just as unacceptable as driving drunk or not wearing a seat belt.”
Speed-related crashes are spiking.
Speed-related accidents have increased significantly in recent years. In 2020, an estimated 29 percent of fatal car accidents nationwide involved speeding, resulting in 11,258 fatalities, according to NHTSA statistics. That figure is 17 percent higher than the speeding death toll in 2019.
As for Pennsylvania, speed-related accident fatalities have also increased in recent years. For example, in 2020, there were 415 roadway deaths involving speeding, an increase of 7.7 percent compared to 2019. Those statistics are according to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT).
It’s also worth noting that speeding-related fatalities in Pennsylvania increased in 2020, even though there were fewer speeding accidents that year statewide. Overall, speeding caused 25,021 Pennsylvania car accidents in 2020 compared to 29,978 in 2019.
Common causes of high-speed accidents
While accidents can happen anywhere, crashes involving speeding often occur in certain places and involve certain circumstances. For example, according to the NHTSA, highways are not where most speed-related accidents happen. Instead, 87 percent of speed-related crashes occur on non-interstate roads.
Another place where speeding-related accidents are common is in road construction zones. Of the fatal car accidents in work zones, 37 percent involve speeding drivers, according to the NHTSA.
And when drivers speed, they also often engage in other dangerous driving habits, such as drinking and driving. According to the NHTSA, 37 percent of speeding-related car accidents involve drunk drivers.
Let a Pittsburgh car accident lawyer fight for you.
Car accidents involving speeding often turn into complicated legal cases. Sometimes, it’s because the at-fault driver denies doing anything wrong. Other times, the at-fault driver’s insurance company does everything possible to reduce or deny your compensation.
At the Romanow Law Group, our Pittsburgh car accident lawyers have years of experience dealing with insurance companies and know how to build strong legal cases to succeed.
Put your trust in a law firm that aggressively fights for the injured and knows what it takes to get real results. Contact us today and schedule a free consultation with an experienced Pittsburgh car accident attorney.