Florida's wrong-way crashes are on the rise, according to Florida Highway Patrol Major Roger Reyes. On Thursday, Major Reyes reported that there were more than 3,850 wrong-way crashes, including more than 1,900 with injuries and almost 130 fatalities.
According to Major Reyes, head-on collisions are some of the most dangerous and deadly.
“I encourage my family and friends when you’re traveling highways at night to stay in the right lanes and it also gives you an avenue for escape if you do happen to see a vehicle coming at you,” Reyes said.
In April, to combat roadway crashes, the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) will install a new system with a detection and alert platform, beginning with 11 ramps in Miami-Dade.
“Right now we have ‘Do Not Enter,’ ‘Wrong Way Driving’ dual-posted mounted signs on the side of the ramp,” Omar Meitin, a traffic operations engineer for FDOT, said adding the new signs have LED lights. “As soon as a vehicle gets, starts approaching, there’s a detector, starts to flash the LED lights and it’s supposed to alert the driver, ‘Hey! You’re going the wrong way!’ time to autocorrect.”
According to Meitin, researchers hope that about 80% of wrong-way drivers will stop after the censor’s first alert.
“We put messages on the dynamic message boards that are on the highway advising motorists to be on the lookout for someone driving the wrong way,” Meitin said.
The construction will begin next month and is expected to go through the fall, according to Meitin.
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Source: Local10.com
