Baltimore and Maryland-Wide crackdown on Aggressive Driving

Ride-along and Experience Aggressive Driving Behaviors First-Hand

What: The Smooth Operator Program, in participation with the Maryland Public Safety Driver Training Facility, is hosting a media event, giving reporters an opportunity to see aggressive driving behaviors in action. Experience what it feels like to be in a car traveling at high speeds, weaving in between lanes, and running red lights. See law enforcement initiate traffic stops and experience the true dangers of aggressive driving!

The 2005 Smooth Operator campaign features more than 80 state and local law enforcement from the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia. According to NHTSA, the months of summer have a dramatic increase of aggressive driving, speeding injuries and fatalities. It consists of four separate law enforcement waves concentrating on aggressive driving beginning in May and ending in September. To enhance the annual law enforcement efforts, a public education and awareness campaign runs simultaneously with the law enforcement waves.

The Maryland Public Safety Driver Training Facility offers both a highway and urban driving course. The facility has been designed to reduce the incidence of police involved in motor vehicle collisions, the resulting operational costs, and most significantly, deaths and personal injuries of police officers and citizens.

Why: The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) estimates that aggressive driving behaviors - speeding, tailgating, running red lights and stop signs, improper passing and other dangerous driving maneuvers - have cost billions of dollars and may be responsible for over 2 million injury crashes and over 28,400 highway fatalities. In the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia alone, more than 1,000 regional highway fatalities annually are projected to be associated with aggressive driving behaviors.

Speeding is a factor in 31 percent of all fatal crashes, killing an average of 1,000 Americans every month. NHTSA estimates the economic cost to society of speed-related crashes to be more than $40 billion each year.

Baltimore Traffic Woes - Congestion often feeds aggression on the road. Baltimore's congestion has markedly worsened over the past two decades.

    * Time wasted in Baltimore congestion more than quadrupled to 22 hours
      per person per year from 1982 to 2001, according to the Texas
      Transportation Institute.
    * Congestion saps the Baltimore region of more than $1 billion every
      year.

  When:  Thursday, July 21, 2005 10:30 a.m.

  Where:  DRIVER TRAINING FACILITY
          7310 Slacks Road
          Sykesville, Maryland 21784

Directions: From Interstate 70: Take Exit 80 (Route 32 North to Sykesville) to 2nd traffic light after exiting I-70. Turn right onto Raincliffe Road and continue to Slacks Road. Turn left on Slacks Road. The facilities are located approximately 1/4 mile on left past American Legion.

For more detailed directions from your location, please feel free to contact Kelly Indrieri at 202-289-2001.