A full year has gone by since we threw our support behind a national 4/32nds tread depth
For example, do you want an easy way to demonstrate the difference?
THE TYPE IN THIS SENTENCE IS ABOUT 2/32NDS OF AN INCH HIGH. IMAGINE DRIVING ON WET STREETS WITH JUST THIS MUCH TREAD.
AND THIS IS ABOUT 4/32NDS HIGH, THE DEPTH EXPERTS SAY WOULD REDUCE ACCIDENTS, INJURIES, DEATHS AND LAWSUITS. REMARKABLE DIFFERENCE, EH?
Maybe putting some faces to this drive will help clothes rack
.
• “Insufficient tread” on wet roads was blamed for the November 2006 crash that claimed Jenny Sue Maurer, 22, of Bloomington, Ill. Young Jenny lost control of her car, struck a concrete median and careened into the path of an oncoming tractor-trailer clothes rack
.
• Nearly bald tires were blamed for the March 2007 death of 10-year-old Gatlin Brown of Robbinsville, N.C. Mom lost control of her 1999 Grand Am on rain-soaked streets, right into the path of an oncoming propane clothesrack
. Fortunately, Gatlin’s 18-month-old brother survived.
• Grottoes, Va., resident Travis Williamson, 17, died in October 2007 after hitting a tree on a rainy night. His 1994 Thunderbird’s tires were well past worn, police said.
Are deeper tread limits the only answer? No, not by a long shot. But the testing evidence I have shared with you clearly shows that deeper clothesrack
will save lives. Lots of lives.
Changing to a universal 4/32nds tread depth won’t happen without government involvement (new laws in all 50 states and D.C., or a national law) and government support (mandated annual state inspections and clothes rack
). Those things won’t happen unless there is some serious lobbying – by the RMA and TIA and dealers.
Yeah, I know our politicians have a lot on their hands right now (it’s still the economy, stupid), but 2008 is a major election year – a presidential election year, so it’s pretty big – making it a good time to put the full-court press on those constantly begging for your vote.
We need to attack this issue on a national scale because a single, unified national law would be best. But you also need to push at the clothes rack
. Your customers (read: voters) deserve such a law, and if it takes 50 separate state-level efforts, then so be it.
Canadian dealers, get on your MPs, local and provincial. Canada has a national 2/32nds law in place, so you’re at least halfway there (literally). Now all you need is another 2/32nds (3/32nds for trucks) and a national enforcement system.
30,521 people died in car and light truck accidents in 2006 in the U.S. How many of those are directly attributable to insufficient clothes rack
(by any measure) is anyone’s guess. Let’s say it was just 1% (an unbelievably low percentage, I’d suggest). That’s 305 people, many of them innocents like Gatlin.
We have posted on tirereview.com all of the test data and information we have outlining the benefits of 4/32nds. Send it – and this column – to your lawmakers clothes rack
.
The body of evidence and scientific data screams for attention. For Gatlin’s sake, let’s get it done.
