Talking Michigan Transportation

How safety cameras slow down drivers in school zones

• Season 7 • Episode 231

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On this week’s Talking Michigan Transportation podcast, Garrett Dawe, engineer of traffic and safety for the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT), talks about a pilot project to study the use of safety cameras for automated enforcement in school zones. 

An appropriation in the Fiscal Year 2025 state budget called for MDOT to conduct a pilot project on automated speed enforcement in school zones. Dawe explains that his team has been studying proposals and will make an announcement soon of a vendor to conduct the pilot. 

According to the Insurance Institute of Highway Safety (IIHS) and the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL), at least 12 states (Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Missouri, New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia and Washington) conduct school-zone automated speed enforcement. In Georgia and Rhode Island, school zones are the only locations where automated speed enforcement is allowed in the state. 

According to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) statistics, between 2011 and 2020,  218 school-age children (ages 18 and younger) died in school transportation-related crashes; 44 were occupants of school transportation vehicles, 83 were occupants of other vehicles, 85 were pedestrians, five were bicyclists and one was an “other” nonoccupant. 

Jeff Cranson:

Hello, welcome to the Talking Michigan Transportation Podcast. I'm Jeff Cranson.

Jeff Cranson:

A number of states have added safety cameras that monitor speeds in school zones across the country. In Michigan, an appropriation in the fiscal year 25 budget suggested that the Michigan Department of Transportation should conduct a pilot. So in other words, study this, the technology and how it works, and the folks working on that are very close to awarding a bid to a vendor to try it out in a school zone in the state. We'll be eager to see how it goes, but in the states that have done this, they've noticed that it works to reduce speeding through school zones, which is a huge concern of everybody's, obviously, who care about students walking, crossing the street.

Jeff Cranson:

A study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety in Montgomery County, Maryland, these cameras used in school zones and residential streets with speed limits of 35 miles per hour or lower found that on roadways with the cameras, the likelihood of a driver exceeding the speed limit by more than 10 miles per hour decreased by almost 60% compared with similar roads in other counties. So that alone says this has some potential. So, I spoke to Garrett Dawe, who is the engineer of traffic and safety for MDOT and he's been working with his team on scoring the bids and will ultimately be involved in the announcement of the award for this pilot project. And you'll be interested, I think, in what he has to say about this process and what it will ultimately mean, so I hope you enjoy the conversation.

Jeff Cranson:

So, Garrett Dawe, engineer of Traffic and Safety for the Michigan Department of Transportation, thank you for returning to the podcast to talk about this topic.

Garrett Dawe:

Thank you for having me, Jeff, my pleasure.

Jeff Cranson:

So, let's talk a little bit first about the genesis for this in Michigan. There was an appropriation in the fiscal year 25 budget, meaning it was agreed to in 2024 and was sponsored by our then APPROP's subcommittee chair, Representative Puri. Could you talk about what that exactly called for in the appropriation and what it set you on a path to do?

Garrett Dawe:

Sure, yeah.

Garrett Dawe:

So it was interesting.

Garrett Dawe:

I think probably October, maybe November of last year I kind of became aware of this and that our department, the Department of Transportation, had been assigned with this task, so got looking into it further.

Garrett Dawe:

But essentially, what the appropriation asks for, or requires of us, is that we develop and implement an automated school zone speed enforcement pilot project, the purpose of that project being to determine, you know, the effectiveness of that type of technology as well as combined with kind of a public education information campaign, most likely just to kind of, you know, feel the desire for this type of a system amongst the public as well. So, there were a few specifics, although they're slightly vague, which can be good and bad from our perspective, as far as how the pilot project would look. It does require that MDOT partner with a private industry consultant to do the pilot project and it requires that consultant to then partner with a local police agency and local municipality. As well as adhere to criminal justice information services guidelines as well as national law enforcement telecommunication systems, and that's to do with the type of technology that's used. Ultimately, what the legislature is looking for from MDOT is a report on the pilot project. It would include our project methodology, any findings and recommendations within 60 days of completion of that project.

Jeff Cranson:

You've been working on this. Your team has been working on this getting the RFPs out, scoring them. You're very close to making a decision and making an award.

Jeff Cranson:

Once that happens, then what?

Garrett Dawe:

Well, in our request for proposal, RFP, we kind of took this and said well, let's see how we would do this as a department, and we came up with four different tasks that would be associated with this type of a pilot project.

Garrett Dawe:

The first task being and this would be for our consultant to do would be to ultimately determine what locations we're going to do the pilot at. We probably would desire for the pilots to be relatively close to one another in geographical proximity, but we also want to make sure that any school zone that is part of this pilot project first of all meets the definition of a school zone in our Michigan vehicle code and, second of all, is signed and marked properly, so that we're not bumping into any situations where we're studying a location that may not meet our guidelines or our requirements for how a school zone should look in the first place. So that's kind of, the first step is where do we want to do this and what do we need to do to those existing school zones to bring them into compliance before we would even begin a study?

Jeff Cranson:

The study, I guess, remind me, did the language specify that it had to be on a state trunk line?

Garrett Dawe:

It did not, no, it was silent on that.

Garrett Dawe:

So, what I think what we'd really like to see here is kind of a good cross-section of different types of school zones and different types of roads.

Garrett Dawe:

So maybe some are on state trunk lines, some are on local roads, maybe in urban, more residential areas as compared to an urban arterial, as compared to maybe a more of a rural location.

Garrett Dawe:

We'd like to get a good spectrum of different types of school zones to include in a pilot like this.

Garrett Dawe:

And then I would say, once we identify where and get those up into shape, then we would need to collect our baseline data meaning we put traffic counters out there, we measure speeds in the existing condition, without any special safety cameras or signing indicating that this is part of a pilot enforcement project just to get that baseline and understand where we're starting from. Then we would implement the actual pilot meaning cameras would be out there, signs would be out there alerting traffic that a pilot is underway and that their speeds are being monitored through the school zone and compare that information then to our baseline data just to see what kind of speed reductions do we see, what kind of behavior changes do we see.

Garrett Dawe:

And then ultimately, a part of this pilot too is to make sure that whatever system is in place is able then to communicate back to local law enforcement and they're able to use that information, uh to issue citations to folks. Citations will not be a part of this pilot. I want to make that clear. I'm not authorized to do that, but we want to prove that that would be a possibility.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, and do you have time to learn a little bit about the technology and how it works?

Garrett Dawe:

Well, yeah, essentially these are cameras, that are LiDAR units, from what I understand, that measure both the speeds of vehicles and also have the capability of taking pictures of license plates, their license plate readers as well. So, if someone is detected going, let's say, there's a threshold of 10 miles an hour over the speed limit, a snapshot of that license plate is taken and then the system essentially alerts local law enforcement, who then would have to review that information and ultimately issue a citation to the owner of that vehicle.

Jeff Cranson:

And I think this is in your wheelhouse. Talk about what a difference 10 miles an hour can make when it comes to the ability for a driver to react.

Garrett Dawe:

Oh, it makes a huge difference. Every mile an hour, quite frankly, can make the difference between a crash not occurring or occurring. And then when we're talking about susceptible areas such as school zones or such as work zones, places where there are people outside of vehicles, pedestrians, bicyclists, vulnerable road users using the roadway, that speed starts to matter even more. So, it's one thing for two cars to crash into one another with a speed differential of, say, 20 to 30 miles per hour, it's a totally different thing for a vehicle to crash into a person at that same speed differential. The severity can be catastrophic, quite frankly. So that's the idea behind doing these types of technology deployments in these vulnerable areas is that if you can reduce speeds here, you can potentially reduce the severity of outcomes resulting from higher speeds.

Jeff Cranson:

So, as an example, as of a couple of years ago anyway, there were 12 states that employed this in one way or another, and you know they really represent a variance states with some big urban centers but also vast areas that are rural. Those include Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Missouri, New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia and Washington. They use school zone automated speed enforcement. Georgia and Rhode Island the school zones are the only locations where that kind of enforcement is allowed, so Michigan wouldn't be an outlier by any means. This follows already on legislation that was adopted last year. That's got Michigan, it's got folks at MDOT working on setting up a program to do automated enforcement in work zones, and we'll learn some things and I know you'll be watching that closely too. But overall, I guess what would be the best case scenario coming out of this? What would you really kind of hope to find out?

Garrett Dawe:

Well, I'd like to, that you know, when this pilot project is over, we've demonstrated that the presence of a system like this is successful lowering speeds, entering and exiting and driving through school zones, especially during those arrival and dismissal periods.

Garrett Dawe:

You know we would also, through this pilot, in the best case scenario, determine what the ideal setup is for our physical field devices, such as the cameras and license plate readers, to ensure those optimum results, and that we confirm and understand the demand that would exist on local law enforcement resulting from such a system like this.

Garrett Dawe:

Are they just likely to be completely inundated with information and citations to issue, or is it kind of an initial time period where that may be the case and then it settles out beyond that, which is really what you would hope for, in that you know violations go significantly down as a system ages. You know that we successfully also that we gain public feedback and some lessons learned on that side of things. What's the public reaction to a system like this? You know, maybe what fears do we have that don't come to fruition, or what fears exist that we weren't thinking about to begin with. And then, ultimately in my mind, I would love to see us gain a tool in the highway safety arena that helps us move Michigan towards zero deaths and I think you know, if all goes well and in a best case scenario on this project, we gain that tool and we give the legislature good information to help them make an optimum decision regarding any future legislation on this topic.

Jeff Cranson:

Yeah, I think you're right and I know that legislation stalled last year, as a lot of legislation did in the Michigan House. But Representative John Fitzgerald of Wyoming had sponsored a bill that would allow for school zone enforcement. This pilot was on a separate track and it's a good thing that it's moving forward. So far nobody's reintroduced that bill, but I know there's still interest among a number of lawmakers. Representative Fitzgerald has, you know, like six school districts in his house district, just because Wyoming, which is a suburb on the southwest side of Grand Rapids, has like five school districts alone that touch the city. So, he has big concerns about the number of students, you know, making their way by foot or bike to school and crossing these streets. What do you hear as you talk to people about this? If you just do like informal polling, you know, and take people's temperature, do you hear mixed thoughts on whether this would be a good thing, or do you think that there's at least, I guess, in your circle wide support?

Garrett Dawe:

In my circle I would say there's wide support for this kind of a system. You know in my circle as traffic engineers, to be quite frank.

Jeff Cranson:

Well, true, I guess I was thinking maybe beyond that.

Garrett Dawe:

But you know, a big frustration amongst us is the inability to really influence driver behavior. We can do our best to mitigate for some things through road designs, through traffic control device placement you know things to try to calm traffic as best we can. But ultimately, I think a very large driver behind the way that people drive is the threat of enforcement, and of course enforcement cannot be everywhere. So a system like this that automates it to me has a lot of potential for traffic safety improvements and I'm excited to see a system like this piloted, and I know the folks in my circle are also interested to hear the results and certainly optimistic about it. I'll acknowledge I'm sure there's a faction of society that would have concerns over this, with cameras out on the roadway system. But while that can be a concern, I would say that the safety of our school children and others that are using these areas, I would think would trump that concern.

Jeff Cranson:

I was thinking that on occasion you might talk to somebody who's not a traffic safety engineer.

Garrett Dawe:

Oh, I do yeah, occasionally, maybe you might be one of them, Jeff, but yeah, no, I would say you know, for the most part, anytime I have a conversation surrounding this topic with anyone, whether it's work zones at schools, in general, I would say it's a pretty positive outlook on the capabilities and potential of this type of technology.

Jeff Cranson:

We will continue the conversation right after a quick break.

MDOT Message:

Even with the best planning, backups and traffic congestion can occur during road construction. This can pose hazardous situations for both motorists and construction workers, particularly when drivers are distracted. Motorists are more likely than workers to be killed or injured in work zone-related incidents. Additionally, the leading causes of all work zone-related crashes are distracted driving and speeding. So it's crucial to do your part in ensuring the safety of both drivers and focusing on your most important task safe driving. Slow down and stay focused.

Jeff Cranson:

You were dealing with this at the region level for a while and then took on this statewide role a year and a half ago or so. Talk about, I guess in the context of what you just said, driver behavior and there's only so much that a DOT can do, and this isn't unique to Michigan. This is a frustration across the country and at the DOT level, at the city level, at the county level, that people's first reaction after a horrific event is you know what are you guys going to do about it? And you and your colleagues dutifully assess it and think what can we do about it. But how do you balance the frustration of that, knowing that there's only so much you can do to human proof the system?

Garrett Dawe:

Yeah, it can be very frustrating and you're right I think the majority of traffic engineers, myself included that when a crash does happen, a bad situation happens and we get that pressure. But what are we going to do? We take that on personally and think, well, what can we do? What could we have had in place potentially that may have prevented this from happening? I don't think we'll ever get away from that, but I do think it's important to acknowledge sometimes that just acknowledging that we want to make it better, that maybe we could do something to prevent that from happening in the future, doesn't necessarily mean it was our fault that the crash happened.

Garrett Dawe:

There's likely some sort of driver behavior aspect that can be applied to that crash happening. But what can we do, maybe to help mitigate for those behaviors? We know they're going to happen. Humans make mistakes. People do it all the time. I do it myself probably every time I drive. Should that mistake result in a death or a serious injury? No, so I think if we focus on well, what are the roadway attributes associated here with this crash? Focus less on the driver behavior aspect, more on the road itself. We can start to find ways to help mitigate for these as best we can. But sometimes we just have to acknowledge that maybe there wasn't anything that could have been done in that specific situation. But often there is usually something that we can do to at least mitigate.

Jeff Cranson:

What's your level of cringe when you hear somebody use the term dangerous road or dangerous intersection?

Garrett Dawe:

I wouldn't say I cringe. I mean I get a little annoyed by it, especially if it's a location that I know is, you know, based on our standards and everything. It is, or should be, safe. It's designed properly. We've got the site distance that we need. But I wouldn't say I cringe at all, J eff. I think sometimes I interpret hearing that from the public or from a local official meaning they just feel uncomfortable, for whatever reason, at that intersection or on this segment of road and I try to dive into it and figure out well, why is that? Are there near misses that we don't know about? You know, is there something that we're not seeing, at least on the surface, that's going on here that we could potentially solve? So I don't maybe I'm unique, I don't cringe that much towards that. I usually try to think of it proactively and think about what we could do to address it.

Jeff Cranson:

You know that's a very positive attitude. I think, real quickly, while we're on that topic and I've got you talk a little bit about what's going on and strides that are being made, I guess, with technology toward trying to limit wrong-way driving.

Garrett Dawe:

Well, there's a lot of stuff out there, I mean anything from traditional traffic control device deployments, such as more signs, brighter signs, paint in the roadway with an arrow perhaps indicating which way to go or which way not to go, turning guidelines to direct folks into the correct ramp, especially at those locations where an on and off ramp entrance might be right next to each other, that's, you know. There's a lot of potential out there in just those simple things. But there's also some new technologies coming. There are signs that can flash either through a flash or above a sign or flashes around the border of a sign a wrong way sign or a do not enter sign, for example that some of them flash all the time. Some may only flash when a wrong way vehicle is detected.

Garrett Dawe:

So there's that type of technology. And then there's even technology out there and we've deployed it at a few locations that has the ability to not only flash at a driver and try to alert them to the fact that they're going the wrong way or about to go the wrong way, but it can also alert our traffic operation centers and thus police agencies that there's a potential wrong way driver out on the roadway. There are also camera technologies out there now too that can detect wrong way movements and alert our operation centers. So certainly a lot in that arena, in my opinion. I mean, it's kind of an expensive option in many cases, so you have to be selective as far as where you would put it, based on your risk of wrong-way driving.

Jeff Cranson:

Right, right, well said. Well. Thanks, Garrett, for talking first and foremost about the automated enforcement in school zones, but some of these other things that I know definitely feed your passions and make your work worthwhile. I appreciate you taking the time to do this. Thanks, Jeff, my pleasure. I'd like to thank you once more for tuning in to Talking Michigan Transportation. You can find show notes and more on Apple Podcasts or Buzzsprout. I also want to acknowledge the talented people who help make this a reality each week, starting with Randy Debler, who skillfully edits the audio, Jesse Ball, who proofs the content, Courtney Bates, who posts the podcast to various platforms, and Jackie Salinas, who transcribes the audio to make it accessible to all.