The Highway Patrol is stepping up its crash reduciton efforts but says Missouri motorists have to do their job to reverse a big increase in traffic fatalities. Traffic deaths for the first half of the year are up 19 percent from the 2011 half-year totals, a reversal that concerns the Highway patrol after seven years of declines that work out to a 40 percent drop from 2005.
The patrol is trying to understand what has caused the big turnaround. Spokesman Tim Hull says the mild winter might have been a factor becuase it put more people on the roads at a time when travel is sometimes reduced….
AUDIO: Capt. Hull :23sixmo2] :23 “quickly”
–especially when drivers and passengesr have been not been using seat belts or child safety seats in two-thirds of those multiple-fatality crashes.
Hull says the Highway Patrol will keep working on its public education efforts and also will continue its increased enforcement programs. The first test will come in the 30-hour July 4th crash counting period that starts at 6 o-clock tonight
