Support the Surface Transportation Safety Act of 2009

Background:

• AGC strongly supports enhancing the safety of highway construction work zones, increasing the visibility of highway signs and pavement marking, making both highway-rail grade crossings and rural road safety, and improving safety for emergency workers responding to crashes. Each year, more than 100 workers are killed and over 20,000 are injured in the highway and street construction industry. Congress should direct the Department of Transportation to update current rules and regulations to facilitate implementation of these important reforms and improve highway safety now. Congress can enact cost-effective consensus solutions that will enhance highway safety programs in a comprehensive manner with H.R.2125 and S. 791

The Surface Transportation Safety Act Would:

• Increase Require the Secretary of Transportation to modify certain federal regulations to: (1) allow fire services personnel to wear high visibility apparel meeting certain requirements; and (2) ensure that positive protective measures (including temporary longitudinal traffic barriers) are used to separate workers on highway construction projects from motorized traffic.
• Direct the Secretary to approve the use of federal-aid highway funds for patented or proprietary items that further the goals of state strategic highway safety plans.
• Direct the Secretary of Transportation to revise the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices to include a standard for a minimum level of retro-reflectivity that must be maintained for pavement markings, which shall apply to all roads open to public travel.
• Revise requirements for the highway safety improvement program to count installation, replacement, and upgrade of highway signs and pavement markings as a highway safety improvement project. Authorizes: (1) states to obligate highway safety improvement program funds apportioned to them for projects to maintain minimum levels of retroreflectivity in highway signs or pavement markings on public roads, whether or not such projects are included in state plans; and (2) a federal share of costs of 100% for such projects.
• Direct the Secretary to: (1) carry out a program to improve traffic signs and pavement markings for older drivers and pedestrians in all states; (2) review the safety of all highway-rail grade crossings in the United States and, based on such review, compile a list of the ten highway-rail grade crossings having the greatest need for safety improvements; (3) establish a national database of information on the safety of highway-rail grade crossings in the United States; and (4) allocate $20 million to each state with a population density of less than 20 persons per square mile for each fiscal year beginning with FY2010 for rural highway safety improvement projects.

AGC Supported Legislation:

• H.R. 2125 - Surface Transportation Safety Act of 2009
  • Introduced in House April 27, 2009
• S. 791 - Surface Transportation Safety Act of 2009
  • Introduced in Senate April 2, 2009