PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION
Between 1995 and 1996, there were 5,140 vehicles involved in motor vehicle crashes in construction zones throughout Tennessee. Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) construction worker fatalities increased 35 percent from 19 to 29 during this period. Construction zone crashes increase congestion and place construction workers at greater risk than normal. Tennessee has extensive roadway renovations underway around Nashville, Chattanooga, Memphis, and Knoxville. Several of these sites and others throughout the state are experiencing problems with hazardous driving through these zones.

GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
Project Construction Accident Reduction (C.A.R.) was developed in 1998 to target traffic enforcement toward speeding motorists and other traffic violations in construction work zones. The Tennessee Department of Safety and TDOT identified a number of construction work zones experiencing the most problems with speeding and other hazardous driving behaviors and devised a plan to curb hazardous driving behaviors through those zones.

Specific objectives for Project C.A.R. are to:

• Reduce construction zone fatalities by 5 percent in 1999
• Encourage state troopers to maintain a goal of two hazardous moving violations for each hour worked
• Have troopers expeditiously remove disabled vehicles in work zones
• Assist TDOT workers, on request, in routing and directing traffic

STRATEGIES AND ACTIVITIES
In coordination with the TDOT's Construction Division, the Tennessee Department of Safety assigned state troopers to construction zones experiencing the most hazardous driver behavior. One trooper was assigned for four hours, in a marked patrol unit, with a project goal of two hazardous moving violations per hour of service.

RESULTS
Initial results of Project C.A.R. indicate that construction work zone crash fatalities in Tennessee during 1999 were reduced 47 percent, a 42 percent increase over the project's goal of 5 percent reduction. State troopers were also successful in writing a minimum of two hazardous moving violations per hour in the high-risk construction zones. A secondary outcome to the increased visibility of troopers in the construction zones was a heightened awareness of, and compliance with construction zone speed limits and driving laws.

The University of Memphis will conduct a formal evaluation of Project C.A.R. in 2000, to determine its overall effectiveness.

FALL 1999