May 2022

Minnesota Toward Zero Deaths (TZD), an organization that was designed to study the causes of traffic fatalities and serious injuries, and work to pursue public support of traffic safety as a priority, hosted a seminar at Prairie’s Edge Casino and Resort in Granite Falls last week. Among those in attendance at the event were over 60 regional traffic safety stakeholders from law enforcement, engineering, education, trauma and emergency medical services, and more. The workshop was held to discuss strategies for addressing the increase in traffic deaths in 2021. That year, 488 lives were lost in traffic-related deaths in Minnesota, making it the highest number of fatalities since 2007. Eric Devoe, a senior research analyst with the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s Office of Traffic Engineering presented information on the increase in fatalities in 2001, which totaled a 26 percent increase. “Largely over the last three years, in the Southwest region it’s been pretty rock solid,” said Devoe speaking about traffic related fatalities. “We haven’t necessarily made the huge spikes that we’ve seen in the rest of the state, but we have not seen those drops and reduces in the region as well. Meanwhile, our serious injuries are going up.”