The National Transportation Safety Board said in a recent report that poor work-zone design is the probable cause of an increasing number of accidents in those areas, including a 2001 Nebraska bus crash that killed three high school students and a chaperone.
Construction zones have become more common as many cities and towns adapt to growing populations and upgrade outdated roads. As the zones proliferate, so do accidents. The number of motorists and workers killed in construction zones rose to a record 1,181 in 2002 from 693 in 1997, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The NTSB unanimously asked the Federal Highway Administration to consider requiring concrete barriers or orange barrels to separate two-way traffic, and to order regular monitoring of the zones. It also told the agency to require contractors to maintain safety features like bridge railings for work projects.
While drivers cause many accidents by excessive speed or inattention, the safety board said, state highway departments also bear some responsibility. Too often, work zones have lanes that are too narrow, inadequate barriers separating oncoming traffic and design flaws, the board said.
"It is the responsibility of government to secure the highways for safety for experienced and inexperienced drivers," the board chairwoman, Ellen Engleman Conners, said. "We don't have an inexperienced-driver lane."
On major highways, state governments are usually responsible for designing construction zones and ensuring that the work is done correctly, whether by public employees or private contractors.
The Nebraska crash occurred in October 2001 along a stretch of Route 6 in Omaha. Normally a six-lane divided highway, the road had been narrowed to two lanes separated only by a double-yellow line as it neared a work zone. The bus carried 27 high school band members and three adults. The driver swerved to avoid an oncoming bus, went off the road, broke through a guardrail and came to rest on its side in the creek below the bridge.
