The arrival of spring also marks the unofficial start of construction season for the Connecticut Department of Transportation (CTDOT). Soon, the public will start seeing more work occurring on and around Connecticut roadways.
Our staff of more than 3,200 live and work in communities across the state, and our friends and family members travel on the roads we maintain. We take the responsibility of safety seriously, and it is at the heart of everything we do.
Our actions, from roadway reconstruction, safety improvements, bridge repairs, and trail projects are planned, designed, and constructed with this mindset of serving our communities. These projects and maintaining our roadways also oftentimes must include selectively cutting down trees. The ongoing challenges created by invasive species, plant diseases, and a changing climate pose a potential life safety risk to anyone traveling in Connecticut.
I read the emails and listen to the voicemails from residents who are unhappy that we remove trees. However, every year dozens of lives are lost because a tree fell onto the roadway, or a vehicle left the road and crashed into a tree. This is why we are addressing safety hazards, like trees, that have the potential to cause serious injury and death on our roadways.
CTDOT employs Connecticut licensed arborists, as well as certified tree wardens, who are extensively trained in identifying hazardous trees, including those that are dead, dying, decaying, or structurally compromised. They are an integral part of establishing and prioritizing vegetation management strategies along our state roadways. This includes clearing away of trees that have intruded into the clear zones of our highways and grown over the years.
Our roadway infrastructure was originally built with ample safe space between roads and trees, but due to a lack of sustained funding these areas became overgrown and hazardous. However, in 2018, the legislature increased funding to the CTDOT specifically to perform this much needed work. These investments enabled us to increase our vegetation management program, and the data suggests a clear downward trend in the numbers of fatalities and crashes resulting from a fallen tree or standing trees on the side of the road. Since investing in improved vegetation management programs, crashes involving trees on state-managed roads have plummeted by more than 17%.
Fatalities resulting from tree-related crashes have also seen a significant decline. Before this investment, an average of 22 lives were tragically lost annually on state roads due to these crashes. Post-investment, that number has dropped to an average of 14, a 36% reduction in fatalities. Clearly what we have been doing the past six years is working.
While I share these stats, I promise you that all of us at the CTDOT never lose sight that each number represents a person. We work every day to prevent crashes because we don’t want to lose any member of the Connecticut community.
Safety and environmental sustainability are not in conflict. While we are strategically addressing unsafe trees, we are also planting smaller native and healthy trees, bushes, and shrubs that beautify the landscape in areas where they do not pose a threat to the traveler. We’re also investing in pollinator habitats along the highways. Our Pollinator Program launched in 2017 with eight conservation areas, and now we have 126 areas spanning more than 208 acres of state property.
CTDOT is hard at work ensuring EV infrastructure is accessible along highways and state routes so there is convenient charging access no matter where someone is traveling. We also partnered with the Department of Motor Vehicles to develop a map of the nearly 400 charging stations so residents know exactly where they are.
Connecticut is committed to doing its part to improve air quality and reduce emissions with investments that improve multimodal choices. Expanding the public transportation network by offering super-express trains, adding weekend and evening bus routes, launching new on-demand microtransit services, and commuter shuttles to major employers, are just some ways to achieve those goals. CTDOT is continuing to provide grants to cities and towns to build bike lanes, sidewalks, and crosswalks so people can ditch their cars and feel safe walking and cycling in their communities.
Connecticut stands at the forefront of safeguarding motorists and travelers from both natural and man-made hazards, while also maintaining a strong commitment to environmental sustainability. CTDOT will continue a balanced, informed approach to save lives affected both by climate change and unsafe roadways.
Garrett Eucalitto is Commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Transportation.