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Officers to step up patrols for aggressive drivers

Speeding, tailgating, illegal passing and running stop signs or lights are poor choices some people make so law enforcement agencies throughout Idaho will be targeting these aggressive driving behaviors beginning today and continuing through July 27.

ITD’s Office of Highway Operations and Safety is funding law enforcement overtime patrol efforts for the 10-day period. The increased patrols statewide are an effort to stop aggressive driving on Idaho highways and save lives.

"Aggressive driving is a serious problem in Idaho," said Pat Beale with ITD. "More than half of all traffic crashes are caused by aggressive driving. Running late, speeding, racing through yellow lights - all lead to traffic crashes."

Drivers must recognize aggressive driving, understand the risk, and know that they will be ticketed if they choose to drive aggressively, he explained.

Examples of aggressive driving include speeding, not signaling, tailgating, cutting in, not giving room for others, stop sign violations, and disregarding signals and other signs.

Aggressive driving contributed to 14,364 crashes in Idaho during 2007 - 54 percent of all crashes in the state. Speeding was the primary aggressive driving behavior, responsible for one out of 10 crashes, while "following too closely" came in second.

"Law enforcement officers will stop and ticket drivers caught speeding and driving aggressively - especially on our back roads and in rural areas where most of our speed-related crashes occur," Beale said.

More than three quarters of Idaho's fatal aggressive driving crashes occurred in rural locations where higher speed limits are often in place. Most of these rural crashes involved a single vehicle.

A crash on a road with a speed limit of 65 mph or greater is more than twice as likely to result in a fatality than a crash on a road with a speed limit of 45 mph or 50 mph, and nearly five times as likely as a crash on a road with a speed limit of 40 mph or slower