(Seguin) — The City of Seguin is raising awareness about the increased number of major accidents that have been occurring in construction zones along Interstate 10.
City officials this week met with representatives from the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) and the contractor hired by TxDOT to complete the highway improvements in the Seguin area.
Seguin Police Chief Jason Brady says they pulled the data, and it became crystal clear that since early fall, accidents have been occurring at a significant rate in the construction zones along I-10.
“We’ve noticed a lot of increased activity with accidents in the construction zone, particularly over the holiday season. And so, we did run a study from the beginning of October, and we found that we had, I think it was 74 accidents. Sixty-nine of those were in the construction area, obviously. I think you’re going to expect some level of increased accidents in construction because people are confused and there’s a lot of chaos there, but we thought that was an extraordinary amount,” said Brady.
Those 69 crashes have included fatal accidents and numerous incidents in which the highway was forced to be closed — often in both directions.
Brady says it’s all taking a toll on his department and the community.
“It taxes our resources. Even though it’s TxDOT’s road, we’re the ones working the wreck. So that’s taken our manpower. And when we shut I-10 down or we have to work it for safety, we have to roll the Fire Department. They have their fire trucks blocking for us for our safety. We’re having multiple officers directing traffic and rerouting. So every one of those accidents, even if it’s a minor fender bender, represents a lot of staffing. But of course, more importantly, is the potential loss of life or the injuries to the folks that these accidents are causing,” said Brady.
Brady says the PD’s Special Operations Unit helped provide some insight into what motorists face each day in the construction zones.
He says that information was presented to TxDOT during the meeting in hopes that it would spark ideas on how things could be made safer along the highway.
“We took our cameras and we rolled from one end of the construction zone to the other, both day and night, at the same speed — 55 miles per hour — and we kind of made everybody watch that. We looked at some things we could do immediately in terms of lighting and striping and maybe some placement of barricades and cones, and just having a better design, if you will. And of course, we’re going to do what we can with increased enforcement. But again, we’re very limited in terms of the staffing we have, but we’ll come up with some creative solutions. We’re also going to reach out to our partners at the county, reach out to the sheriff, reach out to DPS, and see if we were to do some enforcement prior to the construction zone, because we really can’t do much in it because of the narrow confines and the dangerous situation there. But if you see an officer, you see some presence, it will help to slow it down,” said Brady.
The expansion of I-10 is a major project in the area. Chief Brady says while city departments aren’t responsible for that work, they want to do all they can to keep people safe.
“Even though it’s not our highway and we have zero to do with the design and the construction, it’s our community and it goes through our community. All of us — the PD, fire, city manager’s office, engineering — we’re all doing whatever we can to try to help give suggestions and let TxDOT know that we’re taking this very seriously,” said Brady.
The expansion of Interstate 10 and its access roads is a big deal for Seguin, but the increase in the number of major crashes appears to be an unintended consequence.
Chief Brady says speed is a factor and that they will do what they can to get people to slow down, but they also encourage motorists to do all they can to keep themselves safe while traveling through the area.