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Good day, and welcome to the Federal Highway Administration Traffic
Incident Management or "TIM" workshop.
I'm Lt. Colonel Jack Hegarty of the Highway Patrol Division, Arizona
Department of Public Safety, and I'd like to describe briefly what the workshop and
the TIM concept has done for Arizona
in the hope you make glean something from our experience to further TIM programs in
your area.
Our number one priority in Arizona, and I'm confident elsewhere, is first
responder safety.
To ensure this goal is achieved, coordination between law enforcement,
fire, emergency medical services, towing services, and transportation departments
is critical.
If you gain nothing else from your workshop, ensure all these critical
first responders
are aware of each other's procedures responding to and managing scenes.
Our experience clearly demonstrates that communication is the single most
significant factor in achieving this priority,
and ensuring safe operations.
At the Arizona Highway Patrol, managing traffic incidents on a major freeway is
one of the most dangerous things we do
every day.
Nine of 13 of our officers
killed in the line of duty in the past twenty years
were killed in traffic crashes.
Six of those were killed while managing a traffic incident that had previously
occurred.
The TIM workshop you are attending is not just to satisfy an agency strategic plan,
or the latest public safety trend.
It's one of the most significant programs any community with a major
freeway system
that's interested in keeping their first responders safe
while maintaining an effective transportation system.
Secondary goals of quick and safe clearance of traffic lanes and roadways
are significant to maintaining an effective and efficient interstate
and local transportation system,
but cannot interfere with the primary focus: first responder safety.
Our experience demonstrates ensuring this fact is communicated to all partners
is critical to effective operations.
It's also our experience that these goals can coexist and support each other.
They should not conflict.
The more exposure first responders have on a mainline freeway
or even on emergency shoulders, the higher the risk.
Reducing this exposure keeps first responders safe, and
improves the overall effectiveness of the transportation system.
It's likely you have a variety of traffic incident management partners
sitting with you today.
A unified approach to managing traffic incidents is crucial to effective and
safe response, and clearance of incidents.
Please ensure everyone at your workshop understands the priorities and goals of your
community's traffic incident management strategies.
Continue to maintain these partnerships with regular partnering meetings.
Thanks for your time, and good luck.