House bill would double traffic fines on dangerous sections of Kansas highways

If you’ve ever been passed by some moron going 100 mph on Kellogg and thought to yourself, “I really hope they bust that guy good,” then the Kansas Department of Transportation has a proposed law for you.

KDOT went before a House committee in Topeka last week pushing for a bill to allow the department to establish “safety corridors,” that would double traffic fines on particularly dangerous stretches of highway around the state.

The higher fines – and plenty of signs warning of enhanced penalties for speeding and other moving violations – would change behavior, said Mike Stringer, a KDOT engineer who testified in favor of the bill to the House Transportation Committee last week.

“That will encourage drivers to pay attention, slow down and drive safely through the area,” he said. “Safety corridors in other states have been successful in reducing fatalities, serious injuries and alcohol-related crashes.

In addition to higher fines, the bill would also mean:

▪ Speeding more than 5 mph over the posted limit in a corridor would go on a driver’s license and insurance record, possibly leading to higher insurance rates. Ordinarily, speeding violations under 10 mph aren’t reported.

▪ Tickets issued in safety corridors would be ineligible for diversion, the program in which drivers can get a ticket dismissed if they pay a fee and keep a clean record for a year.

KDOT has tried to get a safety corridor bill twice before, in 2009 and 2012, Stringer said.

It passed the Senate in 2102 but foundered in the House.

It’s come up again as a recommendation from a study group that’s looked at updated traffic and accident statistics, Stringer said.

Under House Bill 2194, KDOT would be empowered to decide where to establish safety corridors.

“Criteria used to designate safety corridors would include accident rate, number of collisions and traffic volume,” Scott Wells, senior assistant reviser of statutes, told the committee.

Kellogg, K-96

Kellogg and the K-96 loop in Wichita were identified in previous bills as candidates for safety corridors and would likely meet any criteria KDOT establishes if the bill passes, said Rep. Richard Proehl, R-Parsons, chairman of the Transportation committee.

According to KDOT records, there were 6,558 accidents on Kellogg in the Wichita city limits from 2004 to 2014.

Forty people died in those accidents and 2,862 were injured.

Last year, one person died in a Kellogg crash, but 277 were injured.

K-96 was the site of 1,774 accidents over the 10-year-period, including eight deaths and 531 injuries. Last year, it was the scene of one death and 55 injuries.

Neither Wichita highway had as many fatalities as the notoriously dangerous U.S. 50 between Hutchinson and Emporia, where 54 people have died in accidents over the past 10 years.

City Council approval

Safety corridors could not be established within a city unless the City Council passed a resolution approving it, Wells said.

Wichita and the state are both taking action to improve Kellogg’s three main trouble spots, the interchange between it and I-235, and the spots where the freeway portion through the city transitions to surface streets at Webb Road on the east and 111th Street on the west.

Those projects either have been let for bid or will be by the end of the summer, said Mike Armour, special projects engineer for Wichita public works.

But road design can only go so far, he said.

“You can design a road with all the safety you want,” he said. But you’ll still have a lot of accidents if people “don’t drive at a safe speed and cut each other off.”

KDOT would be allowed to seek grants to pay for operating the corridors, but proceeds from the enhanced fines would go to a safety corridor fund until the cost of additional signage was paid off, he said.

The bill has gotten a somewhat chilled reception among south-central Kansas lawmakers.

Rep. Kasha Kelley, R-Arkansas City, a member of the Transportation committee, said she drove through a safety corridor in New Mexico and it didn’t seem to change her behavior or anyone else’s.

“It’s just a revenue generator,” she said.

Rep. Jim Ward, D-Wichita, whose district includes a stretch of Kellogg, said he also thinks the idea is more geared to money than safety.

“I haven’t been a fan of that increased fine thing,” Ward said. “I don’t want traffic laws used as revenue-producing things in stressful times economically.”

Rep. Ponka-We Victors, D-Wichita, who is on the Transportation committee, said she’d like more information on where the money from increased fines would go.

“We all know Kellogg is a mess right now,” she said. “It can get congested and a lot of people seem to be in a hurry. I’m not sure what doubling the fines is going to do about that.”

But she said if the money from increased fines went directly to safety improvement of the road, “maybe that’s something I could support.”

Stringer of KDOT said the money isn’t the issue from the department’s perspective.

The real priority is “to make Kansas a safer place to travel and do business,” he said.

This story was originally published February 16, 2015 at 11:07 AM with the headline "House bill would double traffic fines on dangerous sections of Kansas highways."