“If a worker is killed by a drunk driver at 9 a.m. while cleaning trash from car windows, we have a much bigger crisis on our hands.” — Garrett Eucalitto, Commissioner of the Department of Transportation (DOT)
SHARON — An agitated driver recently ignored a city Highway Department official’s orders to stop during a roadwork project. Instead, the motorist maneuvered around the work zone.
“He got mad and drove off the road and blew out two tires,” said Casey Flanagan, Sharon’s First Selectman. “I’ve heard stories of people driving through our work zones, or they get impatient or agitated because they have to stop,” he said.
Just recently, Flanagan noted, a road crew worker reported that “someone gave the guys the finger” as they drove through the work zone. “It’s really unfair. They’re just doing their job and they want to keep traffic moving.”
With road construction and paving projects in full swing and following the recent deaths of three workers on Connecticut roads in the past two months, state and local officials are pleading with drivers to slow down and pay attention when approaching work zones. Bad driving habits such as speeding, inattention and operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated are not only dangerous, they noted, but can have deadly consequences for both the worker and the driver.
On Wednesday, July 3, there was a dicey situation on Route 8 in Litchfield when a motorist in the northbound lane left the road and struck an unmanned Department of Transportation (DOT) vehicle while workers were mowing. The driver suffered minor injuries and was issued a citation for failing to stay in the proper lane, according to the Connecticut State Police.
The crash came less than 24 hours after Gov. Ned Lamont and state DOT Commissioner Garrett Eucalitto held a press conference on work zone safety, and two weeks after a state DOT worker was fatally struck by a suspected drunk driver while cleaning up litter in a driveway in Wallingford.
According to state public safety officials, there were 14 work crew strikes involving vehicles in June and 71 crew strikes so far this year through July 2. In 2023, DOT reported 141 collisions involving work trucks, despite improved signage and warnings.
According to state officials, more than 2,500 accidents and 10 fatalities occurred in work zones between 2020 and 2022.
“This crisis needs everyone’s attention,” Eucalitto said. “If a worker is killed by a drunk driver at 9 a.m. while cleaning litter from car windows, we have a much bigger crisis on our hands.”
To combat speeding in work zones, DOT ran a pilot program of speed cameras in work zones from April to December 2023. During that period, 541,920 vehicles were caught speeding in work zones, according to DOT spokesperson Samaia Hernandez. Written warnings were mailed to 24,875 drivers, and repeat violation tickets were issued to 724 drivers.
The program, Lamont said during the press conference, will be permanent in work zones across the state. “We’ll see how fast you pull into that work zone and what you do when you leave. We’ll take a picture of your license plate and you’ll be held accountable.”
Speed on rural roads is a major problem
Road workers in the rural Northwest Corner are also aware of the dangers of the work zone.
According to highway department employees, speed is their biggest concern, followed by distractions in traffic and aggressive behavior.
“We definitely see a lot of speeding,” and drivers on their cell phones, said Russell Hoage, a shift leader for the Salisbury Highway Department. “They just don’t slow down.” Most roads have a speed limit of 30 to 35, he said, and it’s not uncommon to see drivers speeding through work zones at 40 to 45 mph.
To protect road workers from oncoming traffic, the city’s Highways and Traffic Department often uses dump trucks as protective barriers, the road crew chief said.
Hoage said he doesn’t understand why some drivers don’t see the danger they pose to themselves and to road crews. “I don’t know if people are just not aware of the danger, or if they just don’t care.”
Highway manager Rick Osborne, who has worked for the Kent Highway Department for 27 years, said electric vehicles often catch road crews by surprise. “You don’t hear them coming, so they sneak up on you. And depending on the equipment they’re operating, it can be hard to hear oncoming traffic.”
He also noted that the suspensions of newer cars can make higher speeds less noticeable to drivers.
Osborne said the department has stepped up safety measures, including placing warning signs and reflective cones as far from the road as possible, especially where there are curves in roads leading to work zones.
“When the cleaning crew is gone, we park a truck between them and oncoming traffic, and we never work behind the truck” to prevent a worker from becoming trapped between vehicles, Kent’s road foreman explained.
Then there are the drivers who are just plain rude. “Just a couple of days ago, one of our guys waved at a driver to slow down,” Osborne recalls. “The driver pulled over and said, ‘You can’t tell me to slow down or not!’”
‘Always expect the unexpected’
Stanley Morby said he’s seen drivers with the North Canaan Public Works Department go a long way to get through a construction zone. “We recently closed North Elm and drivers were driving past the barriers thinking maybe a tree had fallen or something and they had to turn around and go back.”
His advice to drivers is to “drive slowly and pay attention to your surroundings, just as you would if you saw a couple of kids walking along the side of the road. Always expect the unexpected.”
Sharon’s First Selectman said the increased dangers for road workers will prompt future conversations about what the city can do to improve worker safety.
“It’s also unsafe for motorists,” Flanagan noted. “Sometimes there’s tree work going on, branches falling 50 feet high, and someone runs through the traffic control guys’ stop sign. Someone can get really seriously hurt. We need people to be patient.”
Flanagan suggested that drivers factor in some extra time if they’re driving to work or an appointment and expect to drive through a work zone. “Unfortunately,” he noted, “a lot of the work we do happens between work hours, when people are traveling to work.”
Lamont had this message for motorists: “We have thousands of people working on the side of the road right now. I want people to look out for each other. I want you to tell someone who’s driving a car that shouldn’t be driving a car to stop. I want you to tell someone who’s texting and not paying attention to stop. We’re doing everything we can as a state to lead the way on this, but the rest is really up to you.”
