Operation Aims to Improve Route 130 Safety

In a move to improve Route 130's notorious reputation, state, county and local law enforcement agencies—including Cinnaminson and Delran police departments—have joined forces to make the corridor safer for pedestrians. 

The joint effort—dubbed "Operation 130 Safe Passage"—is made possible through a $225,000 grant from the Division of Highway Traffic Safety. Burlington County Sheriff Jean Stanfield said the program, which her office is coordinating, will fund 14,500 hours of patrol time "dedicated solely to traffic enforcement" along the highway, with 11 municipal police departments participating. 

Attorney General Jeffrey Chiesa, who spoke during a press conference in Delran announcing the program Monday, said the operation would involve "high-visibility police details"—during peak rush hours—along the 22.5-mile stretch of highway in Burlington County, cracking down on, among other things: speeding, distracted and aggressive driving, and motorists who don’t stop for pedestrians at crossings. The agencies all signed shared services agreements, which will allow them to cross jurisdictions to enforcement traffic laws. 

"This is an amazing opportunity for us to actually change driving and pedestrian behavior on the Route 130 corridor," Stanfield said.

She emphasized the unsafe driving habits evident along the highway by referencing two recent studies done by the sheriff's department—one of which showed that drivers at a school safety crossing in Burlington City failed to comply with the 25 mph speed limit, and another in Delran in which sheriff's officers found that most drivers were speeding along the highway during rush hour anywhere between 60-plus to 70-plus mph, many of them on their cell phones.

Even without such studies, Route 130's notoriety as one of the state's most dangerous roads is already fairly well-documented. It's been named one of the state's deadliest roads for pedestrians five years in a row by the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, with nine fatalities on the highway from 2009-2011, .

Attorney General Jeffrey Chiesa, who opened the press conference, said 13 pedestrians were killed in accidents between 2007 and 2011, and 40 were seriously injured in that same span. 

Gary Poedubicky, acting director for the Division of Highway Traffic Safety, said pedestrian fatalities usually represent 25-30 percent of all traffic fatalities in the state annually. So far this year, the number is 35 percent, which is double the national average.

"This number is certainly one that is unacceptable and one that we need to do something about," he said. "I've been in highway safety a long time, and I'll tell you, I’ve never seen numbers like this."

While Operation 130 Safe Passage will focus on enforcement activities, Burlington County Freeholder Director Joe Donnelly said the county is pursuing a traffic safety study for the corridor—prepared by the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission—in order to make improvements along the highway.

"Once we have this plan, it will help us obtain funding for the necessary structural improvements," said Donnelly, a former mayor in Cinnaminson. "There are real dollars available for the improvements that will get Route 130 off this most dangerous list."