Wisconsin Traffic Safety Reporter - January 1959

              JANUARY 1959
Published b9
Safehj Division
Motor Vehicle Department
Madison 2, Wisconsin
Safety Inventory Report Forms Thoroughly
Revised; Two New Sections Are lncluc/ec/
Report forms fo r the 1958 Annual Inventory of T raf-fic Safety Activities, which all
Wisconsin cities over 5,000 population have recently received , have undergone a
thorough revision. The changes should make the fo rms clearer and easier to complete
and yet should provide a more thorough picture of safety activities being m nducted
in a community, according to the National Safety Counci·l.
Report Biggest Drop
In Deaths Since '43
One of the things for which the past
year will be remembered is the fact that
it bw ught the State_ of Wi\Consin its
greatest reduction in motor vehicle traffic
deaths since the year 1943- when gaso­line
was being rationed and when a large
proportion of American-made mileage
was being used up in battle areas on for­eign
soil.
Preliminary tabulations show that 822
persons lost their lives in Wisconsin traffic
accidents last year, compared with 919
during the previous year, and an all-time
high of 955 in 1956. Thus the state death
toll was reduced by more than te n per
cent in a single year.
Message Received
In mid -December, when state traffic
deaths were running exactly 100 behind
the corresponding record for the previous
year, Wisconsin's outgoing governor,
Vernon W. Thomson, received the fol­lowing
message from General George C.
Stewart, executive vice president of the
Nati onal Safety Council :
"The National Safety Council is de­lighted
to learn that as of today the Wis­consin
traffic death toll is one hundred
below the toll at this time last year. We
realize that this saving of human l ife could
only have been achieved through relent­less
and energetic effort by you, your offi­cial
family, by traffic enforcement agen­cies
and officers of Wisconsin, by every­one
concern ed with traffic safety, and
most of all, the drivers and pedestri ans
themselves . ... We hope and pray that
this record continues and even improves
in the days to come and that you will per­mit
us to help in every way we can."
Besides showing the largest reduction
in t raffic deaths since 1943, the past year
reco rded the lowest annual death toll
since 1951 , when 789 lives were lost in
W isconsin t raffic.
'f wo new sections have been added to
the NSC inventory- Transportation of
the Injured, whi ch will be used for in­format
ion onl y, and Traffic Ordinances,
which will be evaluated and used in com­put
ing a city 's overall score.
The purpose of the first new section is
to obtain data on which to base future
recommendations for the improvement of
the quali ty of first aid rendered to traffic
casualties at the scene of accidents and of
the ways and means of their transporta­tion
to hospi ta ls in order to minimize the
serious effects of t rauma.
Accompanying the new T raffic Ordi­nances
section is a reprint from the
August issue of "Traffic Safety" entitled,
'Traffic Laws." The article deals with the
need fo r uni fo rmi ty of traffic laws and
ordinances throughout the nation and ex­plains
how ind ividual communities can
take action to bring about this uni fo rmity.
This new section, des igned to determine
the extent to which a city is carrying out
a modern traffic ordinance program,
should be completed by the city atto rn ey.
Probabl y the most thorough revision
was made in the Police Traffic Supervision
(See SAFETY INVENTORY, Page 2)
New Manual Contains
Revised Stopping Distances
Wisconsin's revised Manual for Motor­ists
carries a new stopping distance chart
cleveloped by the Traffic and Transporta­tion
Conference, National Safety Coun­cil,
which generally shows an increase in
the di stances requi red to bring a vehicle
to a sa fe stop at various speeds.
Driver education teachers are advised
by the Motor Vehi cle Department Safety
Division that the new chart may be at
variance with the charts contained in
driver education textbooks, and allowance
should be made for this fact in both
teaching and testi ng.
Although the new chart has been pre­pared
for educational purposes only- not
fo r !Jega:l or eng ineering use- it is aubhen­t
ic, based on actual experience, and recom­mended
to the attention of all Wisconsin
dri vers.