Recommendation: The Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration should recommend to the expert panel of the Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria to update the Criteria to provide a standardized definition of underride crashes and to include underride as a recommended data field. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: In the 180-day letter GAO received on July 15, 2019, DOT concurred with this recommendation. DOT also noted that NHTSA will recommend a crash underride data element for inclusion in the Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria 6th Edition, tentatively scheduled for issuance in the summer of 2020.

Recommendation: The Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration should provide information to state and local police departments on how to identify and record underride crashes. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: In the 180-day letter GAO received on July 15, 2019, DOT concurred with this recommendation. DOT also noted that NHTSA--as well as FMCSA--will develop informational materials for state and local police departments that educate end users, such as police officers, on how to identify and record underride crashes. DOT plans to post the training materials on NHTSA's and FMCSA's public websites by the fall of 2021.

Recommendation: The Administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration should revise Appendix G of the agency's regulations to require that rear guards are inspected during commercial vehicle annual inspections. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: In the 180-day letter GAO received on July 15, 2019, DOT concurred with this recommendation. DOT noted that FMCSA initiated a rulemaking to include rear impact guards on the list of items that must be examined as part of the required annual inspection of commercial motor vehicles. DOT added that the rulemaking would ensure that vehicles with missing or damaged rear guards would not satisfy the annual inspection criteria. FMCSA expects to publish a notice of proposed rulemaking in February 2020.

Recommendation: The Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration should conduct additional research on side underride guards to better understand the overall effectiveness and cost associated with these guards and, if warranted, develop standards for their implementation. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: In the 180-day letter GAO received on July 15, 2019, DOT concurred with this recommendation. DOT noted that NHTSA is conducting a review of police accident reports of light vehicle crashes into the side of trailers in order to (1) estimate the number of fatalities from side underride crashes and (2) understand the effectiveness of side underride guards in preventing and mitigating the severity of side underride crashes. NHTSA then plans to conduct an analysis of the impacts of requiring side underride guards on trucks and trailers. NHTSA plans to complete these analyses by September 2020.

Recommendation: In order to develop an approach to decision making and the development of evidence on high-clockspeed trends affecting highway safety that are characterized by uncertainty, the Secretary of Transportation should consider and evaluate practices and principles for making decisions under conditions of uncertainty and for using data in such decision making and, on that basis, develop an approach to guide decision making on high-clockspeed trends that, although somewhat uncertain, may affect highway safety.

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: In GAO-09-56, GAO recommended the Secretary of Transportation consider and evaluate practices and principles for making conditions under uncertainty and for using data in light of issues encountered in developing evidence on high-clockspeed trends affecting highway safety that are characterized by uncertainty. GAO had studied driver distraction involving electronic devices, in particular cell phones with texting capability and identified these evolving electronic devices as a high clockspeed trend. DOT reports several actions on distracted driving, specifically: (1) an Executive Order to federal employees not to engage in text messaging while driving government-owned vehicles; when using electronic equipment supplied by the government while driving; or while driving privately owned vehicles when they are on official business; (2) the Secretary called on state and local governments to (a) make distracted driving part of their state highway plans, (b) pass state and local laws against distracted driving in all types of vehicles, (c) back up public awareness campaigns with high-visibility enforcement actions; (3) the Secretary directed the Department to establish an on-line clearinghouse on the risks of distracted driving and also (4) pledged to continue the Department's research on how to best combat distracted driving. DOT also notes that the Department's www.distraction.gov website provides information on the latest data on distracted driving and that 34 states have passed laws against texting and driving since the 2009 announcement by the Secretary of DOT.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Transportation should evaluate whether or not new approaches to data collection are needed to better track new trends related to highway safety.

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: DOT has not responded to this recommendation.

Recommendation: In order to improve the information available to the Congress for reauthorization, the Secretary of Transportation should analyze and report on trends currently anticipated to affect highway safety through 2020 and beyond in a systematic fashion--including information on high-clockspeed trends, discussion of evidence about these and other individual trends, their implications and potential interactions, and DOT responses.

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: DOT has not responded to this recommendation, but DOT announced a distracted driving summit September 30-October 1, 2009, with a limited number of invitees, and invited the GAO Assistant Director on this report to participate. U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood stated that the purpose of the summit is to "to address the dangers of text-messaging and other distractions behind the wheel." The summit will include "senior transportation officials, elected officials, safety advocates, law enforcement representatives and academics" who will convene in Washington, DC "to discuss ideas about how to combat distracted driving."

Recommendation: In order to improve the information available to the Congress for reauthorization, the Secretary of Transportation should determine, in consultation with relevant congressional committees, schedules for periodic reporting that will be sufficiently frequent to update the Congress on fast-changing trends.

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: DOT has not responded to this recommendation.