Orange barricades and cones may seem like a nuisance to motorists, but transportation officials say they serve as a reminder that reckless driving in a work zone can have serious consequences.

The local Texas Department of Transportation office was the latest stop for a memorial listing 1,336 drivers, law enforcement personnel, children and transportation workers killed nationally in highway work zones, 293 of them Texas residents.

The state’s transportation agency’s Waco district had 13 deaths and 965 crashes in work zone areas in 2008.

“In a state the size of Texas, especially when we’re talking as many as 1,000 different work zones in one day, there’s always the potential for that danger,” said Ken Roberts, spokesman for the Waco district.

“There’s speeding, and people doing things like talking on the phone, texting, eating. People just need to learn to slow down and pay more attention to what’s going on on the road,” he said.

The memorial includes one of TxDOT’s own, Ross resident Gregory Jares, who was killed in October 2001 when a van struck the parked pickup truck Jares had been driving, and the truck rolled over onto Jares, killing him.

Jares’ parents, Melvin and Gladys Jares, and sister Alisa Polansky, a TxDOT engineer, attended a ceremony Tuesday displaying the memorial.

The family said it is a painful reminder of the tragedy, but they are hopeful it will encourage drivers to remember to put safety first.

“I pray every time I pass by workers along the highways,” said a teary-eyed Gladys Jares. “I pray that no one else has to go through this same pain.”

TxDOT Executive Director Amadeo Saenz stressed that as the department begins work on dozens of projects along the Interstate 35 corridor in the next few years, safety in work zones will become even more important.

“We have a responsibility as a department to provide work zones that are safe, easily manageable and easily understandable for the traveling public to get through safely,” Saenz said.

“The traveling public has the responsibility to go through work zones and follow the signs, speed limits and go through the barricades in a safe manner to avoid crashes.”

rdennis@wacotrib.com

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