WASHINGTON — The infrastructure bill passed by Congress will advance more than a dozen priorities of the National Transportation Safety Board, according to NTSB’s chair.
“This is a very big win for transportation safety,” NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy said in a Monday press release. “From protecting vulnerable road users to equipping vehicles with advanced drunk driving prevention technology, this legislation will save lives.”
The legislation incorporates recommendations from the NTSB’s investigation of the fatal 2017 Amtrak Cascades derailment in Dupont, Wash. [See “Agencies react to criticism …,” Trains News Wire, May 22, 2019, and the final NTSB report.] These include calls for emergency lighting and speed-limit action plans. It also requires substance-abuse testing for employees in rail-safety sensitive employees, which stems from a fatal accident involving a Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority train and a maintenance vehicle in 2007, and a requirement for railroads to inform state and local officials about hazardous materials moving through their communities, recommended following a 2012 Conrail derailment and release of Vinyl Chloride in Paulsboro, N.J.
Non-rail topics addressed include a requirement for a review of state school-bus safety laws; a requirement for new passenger vehicles to include forward collision warning and automatic emergency braking systems, and an allowance for vehicles to include adaptive headlight systems.
I am thankful for the safety regulations. In ’56 my brother & I installed seatbelts in our dads ’52 ford before they were standard. I have worn seatbelts ever since. My wife fell asleep while driving on the interstate (I was dozing in the passenger seat) and we crashed into the guard rail. Air bags and seat belts and crumple zones in the car allowed us to walk away from the accident. Too many people don’t think about the people who have to care for those who are injured or those who loose loved ones.
Because no one cares about safety except for our ever-expanding, ever more tyrannical socialist government.
Want a car with all those safety systems? Go buy one. I did. If people choose a car without all that tech, then the insurance company can raise their premium.
Is the free market perfect? No but it beats an un-free government by a million miles.