Work Zone Awareness Week: NYC DOT Encourages Drivers to Slow Down in Work Zones on City Streets and Highways

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

April 17, 2024

Contact: (212) 839-4850, press@dot.nyc.gov

Work Zone Awareness Week: NYC DOT Encourages Drivers to Slow Down in Work Zones on City Streets and Highways

With the start of construction season, crews are working day and night across the city, often at busy intersections and on highways

Each year, over 900 people lose their lives and an estimated 42,000 are injured in work zone incidents across the country

NEW YORK – NYC Department of Transportation (NYC DOT) Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez today joined NYC Department of Design and Construction, the NYC Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), the New York State Department of Transportation, and other entities working on city streets and highways to promote National Work Zone Awareness Week, observed this year from April 15-19. As the annual construction season gets under way, NYC DOT is calling on all New Yorkers to slow down and protect the safety of road crews. Today's event was held at the site of a NYC DOT resurfacing operation in a residential section of Bushwick, Brooklyn.

"Just as our crews work hard to make our roads and bridges safe, we ask all New Yorkers to help keep our crews safe by exercising caution when driving through work zones," said NYC DOT Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez. "Treat our workers as if they are members of your own family by slowing down, driving carefully, and being courteous."

"The individual members of our DOT Team are the lifeblood of everything we do at the New York State Department of Transportation and their dedication inspires me to do everything in my power to protect them," said New York State Department of Transportation Commissioner Marie Therese Dominguez. "With the support of Governor Hochul, NYSDOT has initiated a number of new policies over the past few years to better protect our workers, but the traveling public has a role to play as well—during National Work Zone Awareness Week and throughout the year - put down your phones, slow down, and pay attention, especially in work zones. Lives are literally at stake."

"Every single day of the year DEP crews are working in roadways across our city to maintain the roughly 15,000 miles of water mains and sewers that are the lifeblood of the Big Apple," said DEP Commissioner Rohit T. Aggarwala. "Our crews work to serve the public and we hope all roadway users will operate with care and patience around work zones."

NYC DOT experienced 12 work zone intrusions last year, six of which resulted in an injury. Overall, 51 NYC DOT workers have been injured in work zone incidents since 2009 and five have died from work zone-related events during the past 21 years. This year alone, NYC DOT has experienced three work zone intrusions, including two on Richmond Hill Road on Staten Island just in the last week.

NYC DOT crews keep the city's roads, highways, bridges, street lights, traffic signals, signage, and other infrastructure in a state of good repair throughout the year. While full resurfacing of roads has proven to result in fewer potholes over the years, NYC DOT has repaired 61,374 potholes in 2024 to date. On average, pothole requests from 311 are repaired in under two days.

Today's resurfacing work along Evergreen Avenue, which includes a bike lane, is part of over 1,150 lane miles NYC DOT resurfaces each year. NYC DOT last resurfaced this corridor in 2015, and for this project the agency coordinated with DEP and ConEd to conduct repairs to their respective infrastructure while the road was milled.

Throughout the year, NYC DOT maintains its commitment to workers through comprehensive work zone training provided by the American Traffic Safety Services Association (ATSSA) and E-PRO Safety Solutions, ongoing safety assessments of job sites, and improvements to fleet equipment such as back-up cameras and retro-reflective markings.

In addition to its internal education and training efforts for employees, NYC DOT places a strong emphasis on its external public awareness campaigns. This season, the campaign will focus on digital and social media ads to highlight the importance of work zone safety.

Today, NYC DOT also announced the introduction of a pilot for citywide concrete crews to set up ADA compliant walls when constructing pedestrian ramps. These walls provide extra protection for the work crews and, combined with barrels, make the area passable for pedestrians with disabilities. These are used as an alternative to Strongwall barricades, that are currently used at our high pedestrian foot traffic work zones.

For information about work zone safety, Vision Zero and other efforts, visit nyc.gov/dot or nyc.gov/visionzero.

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