I-75 Not at Fault, Georgia Officials Say

By Jill Riepenhoff, The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio

Mar. 3–Even seasoned drivers in Atlanta struggle to find their way on some stretches of I-75.

The fatal bus crash yesterday involving the Bluffton University baseball team has some wondering whether the interstate itself shoulders any of the blame.

Highway-safety advocates say freeway design across the country lacks federal oversight and uniformity. That leads to unsafe roads, they say.

The Georgia Department of Transportation, which built the Northside Drive ramp from I-75, said the exit was well-built, marked and lit and has a “very, very” low accident rate.

Federal, state and local investigators now are trying to determine what caused the Executive Coach Luxury Travel bus to veer onto the I-75 southbound exit ramp, crash through a concrete barrier and fence, then careen off an overpass.

Nine investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board arrived in Atlanta yesterday. During the next five days or so, the investigators will examine the bus for mechanical failures, interview witnesses and survivors and survey the ramp.

The investigation likely will take months.

Executive Coach Luxury Travel, based in Ottawa in Putnam County, received a satisfactory rating from the federal agency that oversees motorcoaches. It has not reported an accident in the past 24 months. Company officials said yesterday that they are “deeply saddened” by the tragedy, and that they are cooperating with investigators in Atlanta. “Our thoughts and prayers are with all of the victims and their families,” the company said on its Web site.

Georgia transportation officials examined the ramp yesterday.

“It’s marked beyond what the federal highway standards are,” said spokeswoman Crystal Paulk-Buchanan.

Overhead signs placed 1 mile, a half-mile and a quarter-mile from the ramp warn motorists that the far-left lane is for exiting traffic only.

Signs on both sides of the 1,120-foot ramp warn, “Stop Ahead.”

There are also a lot of distractions.

Picture the I-70/71 splits on steroids, said Sue Briss, an Atlanta resident who grew up in the northeastern Ohio city of Orrville and later lived in Columbus.

Approaching the Northside Drive ramp, I-75 stretches across five lanes in each direction, including one highoccupancy lane, a lane reserved for vehicles with more than a driver on board.

Exits jut from the right and the left.

Signs direct drivers to I-75 south, I-85 south, the high-occupancy lane and exit ramps. Signs rise from the shoulder, hang on bridges, are bolted to the concrete divider and are painted on the freeway.

“There are a lot of things going on,” Briss said. “That stretch of I-75 is very busy.”

The Northside ramp was built in 1986. In 1996, it became an exit only for travelers in the high-occupancy lane.

Since then, motorists have been in 70 accidents on that ramp. Until yesterday, only one resulted in a death. A motorist ran the stop sign and slammed into the concrete barrier on the bridge.

“That’s six incidents per year, which is very, very low for an urban intersection,” Paulk-Buchanan said.

Safety advocate Gerald Donaldson is not surprised that the barrier held a car, but not a bus.

“The barriers we have as standard installations are only built for a medium-sized vehicle,” said Donaldson, senior researcher and director of Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety in Washington, D.C. “These large vehicles are disenfranchised. Nothing is out there to stop them from leaving the highway.”

Vehicles that leave their lanes or road account for 30 percent of all fatal crashes, said Greg Cohen, executive director of the Roadway Safety Foundation in Washington, D.C.

But building one tall enough to stop a large commercial vehicle would require a lot of money, he said.

Donaldson also criticized the federal government for not banning left-side exits.

“Left-hand exits have been known for 50 years to be a design no-no,” he said. “They’re there because they’re cheaper.”

Since 1998, the National Transportation Safety Board has investigated 11 crashes involving motorcoaches. In nine cases, the bus driver was found at fault.

But the agency also determined that road design flaws, lax federal oversight of the bus industry or both played a role in about half the crashes.

jriepenhoff@dispatch.com

—–

Copyright (c) 2007, The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.