THE PEDESTRIAN LIFE

As our WSU ALIVE! Summer Resource Fair driver safety awareness booth comes to a successful end--thanks to committed drivers who pledged to drive safely--we also received much valid feedback on what they felt was necessary to improve driver safety in our region, questions including insurance requirements, the Distracted Driving Law passed in July 2017, to, "Where is the DMV?" We met drivers of all ages and sized from Washington state to international countries. Although we talked with quite a few students who would be driving their first year, we also met a more than equal, opposite number who chose not to drive their first year (or whose parents didn't want them to!) and opted for public transportation or to walk.



Interestingly, most individuals were confident that because they would be walking to most of their destinations, that driver safety awareness didn't apply to them. When we pointed out that it actually impacts everyone using streets, highways, roads, paths, and sidewalks! Yes, that would be pedestrians. Why pedestrians?? With the rampant numbers of distracted drivers driving behind the wheel due to cell phone texting, the numbers of youthful drivers, in fatal car crashes alone, reached 31% by 2016 in southeastern Washington state. So, walkers, runners, cyclist, mothers with strollers, pedestrians walking their dogs, anyone really, have become moving targets! We feel pedestrian safety awareness is as crucial as distracted driving awareness, the two go hand-in-hand. Albeit, for whatever reasons, we applauded those drivers who made the choice to utilize alternative transportation or just by walking, an official mode of transportation.

Through our campaign, since 2016, we've been able to slowly lower the number of fatal car crashes, but, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the number of cyclist and pedestrian deaths have steadily increased since 2009:

PEDESTRIANS                                                 CYCLISTS

2009                          4,109                                                                                   628

2018                          6,216                                                                                   861

Regulators also estimated that while overall traffic deaths had decreased in 2018 (1%) compared to 2017, that pedestrian (4%) and cyclist (10%) deaths had increased.

(Citation: USA Today, NHTSA percentage estimates for 2018)

It has become an alarming trend! While driving inside a vehicle with all the new high-tech safety measures installed has become safer, the people outside of the car are now in danger. It has also caught the attention of a handful--20--auto makers who, in the last 3 years, are arduously attempting to make transportation safer for pedestrians which has not always been at the top of their list, by installing automatic emergency braking systems for pedestrians, bicycle safety detection systems, engineering hoods and fenders to become more pliable in the event of an accident. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) will require automakers to install high functioning pedestrian detection systems making them standard equipment on vehicles starting in 2020 as an incentive for top safety ratings. High technology would ultimately allow vehicles to interact with each other to avoid road hazard, accidents and pedestrians!

Until we have developed and perfected such preventative, pedestrian safe advanced technology, and in order to keep the general public safe out on the road, we'll have to continue with campaigns such as ours, that informs and keeps everyone aware, one driver, one pedestrian, one person at a time. So we all arrive home safely.

For more information on safe driving, walking, tips, goto: www.safepalousedrivers.com

or visit us on: FB, IG, TWITTER and SNAP CHAT.

July Begins with Old Traditions and New Faces

July began with old traditions and new faces.

We started the month of July with celebrating our nation's Independence Day on the Palouse and welcoming new WSU students and their families to our community.

The 44th annual Pullman 4th of July Celebration began at Sunnyside Park at 5pm. This event featured live music by the Community Band of the Palouse, Dan Maher, and the Fabulous Kingpins. The event also hosted BBQ and fun activities for the kids. The evening ended with a great fireworks show at 10 p.m. All money spent in the park that night helps to make the event happen each year. Pullman City Transit also offered free transportation from park and ride locations.

In another tradition, July 4th kicked off with a pancake feed and parade in the small community of Johnson, WA just south of Pullman. Both sides of the street that runs through Johnson gets visitors all around the Palouse. Among parade participants were Whitman County's Sheriff's, Whitman County Fire District 12 with the Color Guard leading the parade. Area businesses, sports teams, community groups and more participate in this parade each year.

Next up on the 4th of July festivities is the Albion parade and community lunch. Many of the Johnson Parade participants head directly to Albion march in the parade all over again. Additional events were the sidewalk chalk contest in Endicott, and various other small events held at rural towns of Whitman County. Many of these events have fun activities for kids to participate in, creating wonderful community events on the Palouse.


The week ended with welcoming new WSU students and their families at the WSU Resource Fair held at the CUB. We had many new students and their parents stop by our booth to sign the safe driver pledge. We gained more than 20 new signatures, pledging to be a safe driver. Some of those signatures included those who pledged to be a safe passenger as well by not causing distractions for their driver.

One main topic that parents were interested in discussing was their concern for safe travel on State Route 26 which is the main route for many students. The topic of working to add passing lanes to this highway was a popular one. One parent said he won't even drive that route and takes I-90 to Spokane and down US195 to get to Pullman from Western Washington. Parents were happy about the Passing Lanes Project.

We also spoke with parents whose children have never driven in snow before. They were happy to hear that there are resources such as our website and social media to offer tips and information about our roadways and conditions. We spoke with a mother from Missouri and another mother from California who said knowing that there are resources such as Palouse Driver Safety Campaign helped relieve some of their worries as they know it will be a challenge for their children to drive in new weather conditions.

Sunday marked the first WSU Resource Fair for the month of July, and we had more than 20 students and parents who took the safe driving pledges. There are several more coming up this month and our campaign will keep on working to inform and educate drivers on safe driving behavior.


You can keep up to date on future events on our website, Facebook page, Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat. Our social media is a great resource for local road updates such as weather and road conditions, road construction, road closures, driving tips and more. We look forward to more events this July where we can meet more students and community members.

WSU Community Safety Fair a Success!

(and that includes driver safety awareness)

This past weekend Pullmanites enjoyed for the fourth year in a row, the WSU Community Safety Fair, held at the Breslford Visitor Center in beautiful downtown Pullman. The usual suspects were there, but the fair was anything but usual. From the fire extinguisher event, to the bike rodeo to our very own driver simulator, families were "schooled," top to bottom, on the importance of safety in our everyday lives. The WSU/Fair facilitators made sure everyone attended each booth by utilizing a stamp card system allowing direct interaction between the presenters and the community, so that everyone was sure to have a full experience.

At our booth, we were both grateful and amazed at the number of drivers who signed our pledge for our campaign to drive aware and non-distracted while driving in our community. Several passengers and pedestrians also made the oath to be mindful of the driver in their own car and drivers in general. Our driver simulator got some use as people lined up to take a test drive and discovered it wasn't as easy as it looked! In addition, we supplied information on summer safety tips--do not leave children and/or pets in hot vehicles--went LIVE! on Instagram and Facebook, and ran a small distracted driving contest with candy prizes for the winners. The contest proved what astute drivers we have here on the Palouse, however, the main focus of our campaign is making sure everyone gets to their destination safely and the group that showed up was dedicated and committed to making a difference for themselves and their families. We applaud those drivers, new and old, and appreciate their support for our campaign. It is you, one by one, who make the difference! Which brings us to the next event...

 

WSU ALIVE Resource Fair

The next day we visited the Alive Resource Fair at the CUB on the WSU campus. This was our 4th out of the 11 sessions we will be present for at this year's ALIVE event. Each time is a new experience as each time a new group of freshman or returning students and parents are in attendance. Although we've been to several events, it never ceases to amaze us the number of people who are concerned about driver safety awareness and who want to take active participation in our campaign. Particularly, the college students themselves, are apprehensive about driving in a new area, driving distracted or driving in the winter. It seems, most are choosing other alternatives, like walking. Whether walking or driving, awareness is the key and these drivers have it and are appreciative of our program. From this feedback, we feel our campaign is impacting the youth in our community and we will continue to attend the ALIVE Resource Fair along with other safety events in order to keep our message of ending distracted driving moving throughout the Palouse and Washington state. Again, thank you to the all wonderful participants and, especially, the support staff at WSU who make this event so successful! 

Where's My Flying Car?

Forty years back you could buy an airplane in a box and build it in your garage. Called then and today, "homebuilts," it came with a VHS tape, plus step-by-step instructions on how to make your very own aircraft in your very own home. It was more like a one-place or two-seat tandem, Ultra-Light, with an open cockpit and frame. If you had an Airframe and Power plant Certificate, all the better. How cool was that, I thought, for a couple of thousand bucks, I could mechanically piece together my own aircraft, style a, sort of, landing pad on the roof of my rental--sure, my landlord wouldn't mind a small design change to her roof line--and, I could take off every morning and avoid all the traffic along the 405/I-5 corridor, as long as I registered my craft and had a license, I didn't see a problem. Wow, what a dream that would be! I could roll out of bed, grab my coffee and toast, start up my engine, advise the tower--flight plan already logged--and I could be at the office in 15 minutes, as opposed to 55-90 minutes stuck in traffic. Dream was right, building an aircraft takes full time dedication--it could take years--and is more complex and expensive than I eventually realized. Literally, shelving the idea, it came upon me, a flying car!




How about a hybrid of a car and an airplane, someone must be working on it. Was there technology that existed in the 80's that could support a flying car? Surely, the government had some sort of cutting-edge, reverse-technology and it was in the works. The military had jet packs in the early sixties, somewhat like the movie, the Rocketeer, 1991, but those were highly dangerous and highly combustible, unless they had installed state-of-the-art safety features since then. I was fortunate enough, as a child, to witness someone flying a jet pack and it embedded in my memory. I became fascinated with flying and the idea of a flying car. After all, Henry Ford had his "Flivver," designed in 1927 as an "everyman's" aircraft, his version of a flying car. With many designs in-between, the incredible Moulton Taylor Aerocar was designed and built by Moulton Taylor in 1949 and six prototypes were built. The design was brilliant in it's concept, a compact vehicle hitched to a fuselage with fold out wings, ready for takeoff  in a matter of minutes, but it never entered production.

There wasn't much information available on the Internet in the early nineties, however, fast forward through the nineties with technological advancements, and you could find a few articles here and there on flying cars. The bottom line in the challenges and developments of making flying vehicles was money. It seems, that is why it has taken so long in mass producing them for commercial use.

Okay, so here we are almost 20 years in the 21st Century, and beyond the Space Age, and you ask, "Where's my flying car?" Well, come to find out, there are now many intrepid, dedicated, national and international, entrepreneurial companies who have designed an developed models for flying cars; such as, the European, AeroMobil, developing its version--AeroMobil 5.0 VTOL--of an air taxi ferrying four passengers for daily commuting with a potential range of 100 miles. We should see this version on the market in 5-7 years the company estimates; Terrafugia of Woburn, MA is developing a transformational model, converting into an airplane from a car and vice versa. Other companies, along with major airplane manufacturers, have similar models in the works. Uber wants a fleet of flying cars by 2020. Many issues still exist, however, if we're to finally have our futuristic flying dreams come true, like traffic vectors overhead and sharing the sky ways with other aircraft, plus weights and balances issues that exist for comparable aircraft, you know, "will your carry on bag fit in the overhead compartment?" If our flying cars are to operate similar to a helicopter, by taking off and landing vertically, the details must be streamlined, designed and redesigned, the balance of forces--aerodynamics--are crucial for takeoffs and landings.

Which brings us to our motive of wanting flying cars in the first place, our reasons now are quite different from back then. It may have been a dream or space fantasy to have a flying car, but now, we'll turn to this technology in order to improve our transport and transportation systems by facilitating congestion, decreasing pollution, an increasing safety factors to save lives working towards a better future. Also, to save the environment, the earth, by alleviating the negative global changes currently taking place.

The next level? Where are my pneumatic roadways? Well, that's another blog...

For more information on flying cars: www.abcnews.go/Business/flyingcars;
www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-incredible-flying-car-of-the-1950s.

Visit us at www.safepalousedriver.com and on
Twitter, Facebook and catch our post on flying cars
                                                     on Instagram.

Summer is Almost Here, and Driver Safety is in the Air!!

Along with our many community partners, Palouse Regional Transportation Planning Organization will be in attendance for the second consecutive year at the fourth annual Pullman Community Safety Fair organized by the WSU, to promote our Palouse Driver Safety Campaign to the community. The campaign is currently in its third year, which serves as the public awareness campaign for the region with the sole purpose of instilling good driving behaviors amongst our local and regional drivers. Improve driver awareness amongst Young, distracted, and drowsy drivers, and reduce fatal and serious injury crashes for the Palouse region.

The safety fair will take place on Saturday, June 22nd, 10am-2pm at the Brelsford Visitor Center. This is a family-oriented fair, with emphasis on various safety awareness, including direct safety education, and is free to the community.

Our booth will be located inside the center with the other informational booths, and the display will contain driver safety awareness material, distracted driving stats, safe driving pledges, and our popular driving simulator--make sure to take a spin, bring your kids along. Our driving simulator will be located next to our booth (just like last year). Besides us, there will be plenty of interactive activities: Bike Rodeo/Drone Activity (SBC/PPD); Burning House/Fire Hose Activity, Extinguisher Demo, Agility Training Course (PFD), and the first-responder vehicles.

The fair will also have a grand raffle and prizes throughout the day, including delicious refreshments. The Center is also providing various snacks and drinks, including Cougar Gold Cheese!

We invite you to join us to participate and learn about driver safety in the summer through our Campaign. Don't forget to visit and follow us on our social media "Palouse Driver Safety" and our wayfinding website with live tweets, live cameras and various safety tips and materials for Pullman travelers at www.safepalousedrivers. com.

We hope many local and regional community partners will make this day fun for you and your family.

See You at the Fair!

Evolution of Safety and Driving

Following last month's Driver Safety Awareness Campaign, the PRTPO can't stress enough the fundamentals of safety and automobiles. As a driving culture, we have made developmental leaps in both, since the advent of the "driving machine" in the nineteenth century. It seems one was born from the other out of necessity. If we look back through the history of the automobile, we find safety became paramount:

• 1885, First seat belt patent filed. Compulsory, some of those early vehicles had no doors!
• 1901, Connecticut was the first state to enact speed limits, in the city and county. They learned quickly, no matter how exhilarating it was to feel the wind in your hair, that "Speed Kills."
• 1910, New York City was first on the books with drunk driving laws. Again, realizing the two don't mix and, unfortunately, to this day, like texting-considered the modern-day drunk driving-and driving, we have trouble, psychologically, permanently dividing the two.
• 1930, 3-way traffic signals were introduced in the United States.
• 1951, Airbags are invented, most people are under the impression airbags came much later, it took a while to perfect the technology which mechanically evolved in 1968.
• Department of Transportation is created in 1966 by Congress to ensure the efficiency, safety, accessibility and convenience of a national transportation system vital to US interests.
• 1970, the National Highway Traffic Safety Act (NHTSA) is established and responsible for reducing deaths, injuries, and economic losses resulting from motor vehicle collisions, including promoting consumer safety awareness, vehicle safety standards, enforcing fuel economy standards and anti-theft regulations among many other functions.

The list goes on and on: 1985, Vince and Larry Ad Campaign, "You Can Learn A Lot From a Dummy," 1996, Side impact testing, 2003, the Click It or Ticket seat belt campaign, 2008, 5-star safety ratings standards are elevated for consumer awareness. Which brings us to the Distracted Driving Campaign in 2009 where President Obama signed an Executive Order directing Federal employees, while, basically, using company equipment/vehicles on company time to cease texting, it started the proverbial ball rolling. 

(Ref:Resource material retrieved from: https://one.nhtsa/timeline/index.html)

Even with these consistent efforts throughout the years, the numbers of needless deaths continue to rise due to distracted driving. If there is anything we have learned from this history or rather, driving lesson, is that when we step anywhere close to a moving vehicle, it's important to remember, safety first! In a pre-flight safety check on an airplane, one must carefully check off each task to make sure the aircraft is in proper working order before takeoff. It is requisite. The NTSB statistics show it is safer to fly than to drive. Perhaps it is time to implement such a list before entering an automobile, a list that includes, at the very top: Cell phone OFF, cell phone in the glove box, cell phone locked in the trunk! We are all aware; there are plenty of other distractions while driving, let's make using a device, talking on the phone one less distraction, the one distraction that can, literally, save your life and the lives of others. It is a point we'll continue to drive home long after Driver Safety Awareness Month, because, we want you to get home, safely. 

For additional life-saving information, please visit us on social media and our website, www.safepalousedrivers.com, Distracted, Drowsy & Inexperienced Drivers.

Spring 2019 Graduation Commencement around the corner...

The school year is almost to an end for most Cougs and Vandals on the Palouse. The Palouse RTPO and Palouse Driver Safety Campaign wishes all students, families, and local/regional drivers a safe journey to their destinations, while in town visiting, and back home to their destination.

As we are coming closer to Washington State University’s (WSU) and University of Idaho’s (U of I) Graduation Commencement, WSU on Saturday, May 4^th and U of I on Saturday, May 11^th, more families and friends will be in the town of both graduation commencement date weekends. It is essential to think ahead and look for the road hazards and give yourself ample time to get to your destination. Our region usually expects heavy traffic before and after all commencement time frames.

Some critical announcements to take note on during WSU’s Graduation Commencement this weekend is that starting on Friday, May 3^rd, North Fairway Road from Stadium Way to Fairway Lane will be blocked off to accommodate setup for Commencement. Parking along the road South of Beasley Coliseum will be unavailable all day.

If you were wondering about parking during WSU’s Graduation Commencement day, there would be no parking permit required. However, there are designated general parking highlighted in yellow available for families and friends, in the map provided to the left. Disability parking spaces are located North and East of Beasley Coliseum. Attendants will be available to help direct traffic to available parking.

For more information about Spring Commencement parking at WSU, click here or contact the WSU Transportation Office in advance.

To all Cougs and Vandals from the Class of 2019, congratulations on graduating!

Our team here at the Palouse Driver Safety Campaign wishes you all the best in your future endeavors. We hope we can continue to make impacts beyond this chapter of your lives, to help keep drivers safe and attentive, and to instill a change in driver behaviors. Again, please drive safe as we approach busy times of the year and different weather conditions. Think ahead, leave early, and arrive at your destination safely.

PS: Don’t forget to like, share and follow us on social media “Palouse Driver Safety” for important traffic and driver safety updates.