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TRAFFIC CONTROL CONCEPTS FOR INCIDENT CLEARANCE

October 31, 2008

 

Dear Transportation Professionals & Traffic Incident Management (TIM) Partners :       

As part of the mission of the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) to “Keep America Moving,” we need to safeguard the motoring public and those responding to traffic incidents.  Safe, quick clearance of highway incidents—a foundation of both mature and developing TIM programs—depends on strong, coordinated multi-agency operations that are supported by integrated communications. 

With more vehicles on the Nation’s highways, traffic incidents become increasingly life threatening for those involved, including responders dispatched to help.  According to the National Traffic Incident Management Coalition (NTIMC), "struck-by" secondary incidents are on the rise.  In conjunction with the NTIMC partner organizations in the public safety and transportation arenas, FHWA promotes policies that enhance responder safety (such as driver removal and move-over laws); encourages the use of new technologies and gear to protect responders during roadside operations; and promotes improved safety procedures and safety training of traffic incident responders.  In the coming year, FHWA will be launching a new campaign, similar to the highly successful “Click It or Ticket” campaign, to increase driver awareness of their roles and duties in safely addressing traffic incidents or public safety responses on the roads. 

As a part of this campaign and in support of TIM practitioners, FHWA is pleased to introduce a new set of primers, collectively known as the “Safe, Quick Clearance Primer Series.”  This series includes five primers that address various issues associated with roadside clearance operations and provide basic building blocks on:

  • Information Sharing for Traffic Incident Management
  • Traffic Incident Management in Construction and Maintenance Work Zones
  • Traffic Incident Management in Hazardous Materials Spills in Incident Clearance
  • Traffic Incident Management Resource Management, and
  • Traffic Control Concepts for Incident Clearance

We encourage comments and contributions to these primers and other FHWA Traffic Incident Management documents.  Please feel free to contact our Emergency Transportation Operations Team at ETO@dot.gov with suggestions for future revisions.

Sincerely,

 

Jeffrey A. Lindley signature

 

Jeffrey A. Lindley
Associate Administrator for Operations