Watch your speed. Drive sober.
Those are a few of the simple, direct messages from Gov. Ned Lamont and state transportation officials on this Thanksgiving travel week.
Put another way by Lamont at a news conference held Monday morning, a few yards away from busy Rte. 8 in Naugatuck, “Don’t be dumb. Be safe.”
They’re especially focused on preventing wrong-way driving, which has killed 13 people in Connecticut this year, according to the state Department of Transportation (DOT). Use of alcohol or drugs by drivers is frequently cited in wrong-way cases.
“It’s drivers under the influence (causing wrong-way crashes), probably up around 90 to 95 percent,” says state highway operations chief Paul Rizzo. “We do see some confused, either elderly or with dementia or just people that aren’t paying attention, but that’s a very small percentage.”
Wrong-way driving detection systems, complete with blinking red lights which activate when a vehicle traveling in the wrong direction approaches, have been installed at 123 highway ramps in the state, with many more in the plans. DOT says they’ve been activated almost 200 times this year, usually resulting in the violating driver turning around safely.
Those activations, however, represent a fraction of overall wrong-way incidents.
“These are just drivers we know about,” says Rizzo. “There’s got to be a lot more going on that are going up ramps that don’t have the system installed as of yet. It’s an epidemic.”
Public safety commissioner Ronnell Higgins cites at least two recent incidents when state troopers were forced to stop wrong-way drivers.
In one case, on Rte. 8 in Harwinton, a trooper used his cruiser to block a driver traveling in the wrong lane. The wayward driver, who was in his eighties, was going about 30 mph when he struck the cruiser. No one was seriously hurt.
The Naugatuck news conference was held near a Rte. 8 ramp that’s been equipped with one of the wrong-way detection systems. According to DOT, Naugatuck is #2 in the state for system activations—meaning encroachments by wrong-way drivers (all drivers at the Naugatuck location safely self-corrected after seeing the blinking red lights). Danbury is #1.
Overall, the DOT says 299 people have been killed on Connecticut roads in 2024, on pace to be the second-worst year since the 1980’s. State police say that troopers will “ramp up” patrols this week, focusing on “aggressive drivers, unsafe drivers and drivers operating under the influence.”