While most states across the country continue to experience increases in motorcycle accidents and fatalities in the wake of increasing motorcycle usage, the state of Texas has reported a significant decrease in rider deaths due largely to safety and awareness programs initiated by motorcyclists and the Texas Department of Transportation.

According to TxDOT, fatalities declined more than 23% over the same time period from 2008, with 264 deaths reported from January 1 – August 24, 2009, versus 344 deaths the previous year.

“I would say this is a direct result of the Texas Transportation Institute put together to cut down on Traffic fatalities, especially for motorcyclist,’ explained Sputnik, State Chairman of the Texas Motorcycle Rights Association (TMRA-II) and Chairman of the National Coalition of Motorcyclists Legislative Task Force (NCOM-LTF). “Several of our members sit on the Board of that newly formed Institute.”

Sputnik gave further credit to the Motorcycle Awareness Program put together by TxDOT at riders’ insistence and added; “We have very high hopes that SB 1967 (a multi-faceted motorcycle safety bill enacted earlier this year) and the year round airing of Public Service Announcements, increased penalties for negligence and Rider Training will bring that number down even farther.”

Texas is one of the largest motorcycling states in the nation in terms of motorcycle registrations and year-round riding weather, and largely through the efforts of TMRA-II under Sputnik’s leadership repealed their mandatory helmet law in 1997.
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