Regarding the April 22
news story "Bus Safety
Rules Are Long Overdue,
Transportation Board Says": In the article,
officials from the
National Highway Traffic
Safety Administration
were quoted as saying
that the process of
enacting regulations to
make motor coaches safer
should not be rushed. I
find this comment
remarkably frustrating,
as this was the same
response I received from
the NHTSA when the 1999
study I commissioned as
chairman of the National
Transportation Safety
Board showed that bus
safety regulations were
inadequate. In fact, the
reason I commissioned
the study in the first
place was that
throughout the 1990s,
the NHTSA dragged its
feet on nearly every
recommendation we at
NTSB made regarding
motor coach safety.
Had the NHTSA taken
our recommendations
seriously,
crash-protection systems
to keep passengers in
their seats would have
been required on all
motor coaches years ago,
as well as strengthened
windows. As NTSB
chairman, I personally
called for requiring
seat belts on all buses.
But again and again, the
NHTSA has balked, and
decades later the
studies continue, with
no rule-making to show
for them. Surely this
response seems woefully
inadequate to those who
have lost loved ones
because of this
continued inaction.
JIM HALL
Signal Mountain,
Tenn.
