Today, Cindy Williams, president of Time Striping, president of the Arkansas ATSSA Chapter, and a member of the ATSSA Board of Directors, testified before the Highways and Transit Subcommittee in the House of Representatives on Capitol Hill.

The hearing, entitled “Addressing the Roadway Safety Crisis: Building Safer Roads for All,” focused on the recently released 2021 traffic fatality statistics, and countermeasures that can combat that increase.

“The Highway Safety Improvement Program (HSIP) is a critical component to achieving the goal of Towards Zero Deaths,” Williams said in her testimony. “Having a dedicated funding stream for roadway safety has been critical to addressing safety needs and continuing this program was a bipartisan priority for Congress and ATSSA.”

Discussion during the hearing also focused on rural road safety, something Williams said she understands well from her experience in Arkansas.

The Spring Issue of Roadway Safety magazine is online now and explores Ohio’s Smart Mobility Corridor along Interstate 33 between Dublin and East Liberty.

This 35-mile stretch of roadway in Northeast Ohio is a living laboratory where multiple organizations are testing automated and connected vehicle technology including ways to protect pedestrians. The project is a partnership between private industry and government entities as well as residents in those communities and has been dubbed “the world’s most connected highway.”

Convention Extra is also online and provides a commemorative of the 2022 Convention & Traffic Expo in Tampa, Fla., and an opportunity to see what you missed if you didn't attend this reunion of the roadway safety industry.

ATSSA’s 2022 Convention & Traffic Expo brought together more than 3,200 roadway safety advocates over five days in Tampa, Fla.

They collaborated, networked, learned about the latest innovations and even cheered on their favorite team at the Chairman’s Big Game Watch Party on Sunday evening.

Keynote speaker Scott Moore kept the packed crowd in the Ballroom of the Tampa Convention Center spellbound as he shared leadership and teamwork tips gleaned from his decades leading the elite Navy SEALs on “no fail” missions.

And Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg talked about the USDOT commitment to zero deaths on the nation's roadways while acknowledging that may not be achieved during his tenure but that ATSSA's members are needed to achieve that goal.

It's not too early to start planning now for next  year. The 2023 Convention & Traffic Expo takes place in Phoenix, Feb. 17-21 at the Phoenix Convention Center with the theme of “where roadway safety and Innovation intersect.”

Executives with Ford and Audi emphasized the importance of collaboration among key stakeholders as connected and autonomous vehicle technology advances.

Tony Reinhart, director of Government Relations for Ford Motor Company, and Brad Stertz, director of Audi Government Affairs and co-founder and chairman of Partners for Automated Vehicle Education (PAVE), spoke at this morning’s general session at ATSSA’s Midyear Meeting, which runs through Friday.

After opening remarks, Reinhart and Stertz were joined by ATSSA Board Chair Greg Driskell and ATSSA Vice President of Engagement Nate Smith for a panel that took questions from the group assembled in Kansas City, Mo., for the Midyear Meeting.

Luke Neurauter, senior research associate in the Division of Vehicle, Driver and Safety Systems at the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI), is asking ATSSA members and others in the roadway safety industry to take part in a survey on the impact of connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) on work zones.

The purpose is to “better understand how CAV technologies will behave when they encounter typical work zone scenarios and what can be done (from the perspectives of both the CAVs and work zone operations) to ensure ultimate compatibility between all available technologies,” according to information from VTTI Senior Research Associate Tammy Trimble.

The research is sponsored by the Transportation Research Board (TRB).