House District 6 covers the suburban communities immediately north of Wilmington from Foulk Road in the west to the Delaware River. (If you are not 100% sure whether you live in House District 6, you can search here using your address.) If you live in this district your choice on November 8 to represent you in the Delaware House of Representatives is between the incumbent Representative Debra Heffernan and her challenger Michael Krawczuk. Using a multiple choice format, we asked these two candidates to share their views on four questions related to traffic safety in Delaware. Here’s how they answered:
1) In May the 151st Delaware General Assembly voted unanimously to approve the Everyone Gets Home resolution (SCR 94). SCR94 called for reducing traffic fatalities in Delaware to no more than 100 people each year and tasked state agencies to meet that goal by 2025.
Heffernan: “Progress in reducing traffic fatalities is possible and elected state officials have an important role to play in holding state agencies accountable for meeting traffic safety goals.“
Krawczuk: “Progress in reducing traffic fatalities is possible and elected state officials have an important role to play in holding state agencies accountable for meeting traffic safety goals.“
2) There is significant disagreement among transportation professionals about how limited resources for government traffic safety efforts should be allocated.
Heffernan: “All types of crashes need to be addressed but greater resources should be allocated to reducing fatal crash types compared to property damage and injury crashes.”
Krawczuk: All types of crashes need to be addressed but greater resources should be allocated to reducing fatal crash types compared to property damage and injury crashes.”
3) Traffic safety professionals often describe their work in terms of the ‘3 Es’ (education, enforcement and engineering).
Heffernan: “Everyone makes mistakes but in a well-engineered system good infrastructure both encourages safer behavior and also prevents human fallibility from turning into human fatalities.“
Krawczuk: “All 3 “E”s – education, enforcement and engineering – are indispensable and we need to do more of each in order to make progress in solving Delaware’s traffic safety crisis.”
4) Many of Delaware’s deadliest roads – including Dupont Highway, Coastal Highway, Kirkwood Highway and Pulaski Highway – have become deadlier over time as commercial development along those roads has increased the number of potential conflicts between vehicles, and between vehicles and pedestrians, entering and exiting driveways and changing lanes either to enter or after exiting driveways.
Heffernan: “DelDOT should partner with counties to consolidate driveway entrances and exits onto busy, high-speed, multi-lane highways.”
Krawczuk: “DelDOT should partner with counties to consolidate driveway entrances and exits onto busy, high-speed, multi-lane highways.”