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Safety in action :

ATV NEWS January 1985

By Rex Reese

Making safer ' Tracks ' on Alaskan ATVs

used in the rural communities as basic transportation for years , " says Halbert . " But the three - and four wheelers can be used in both winter and summer , and people are using them more . "

The crisis which coincided with the release of the Tracks program began , says Halbert , in the summer of 1983 . " The local hospitals in An chorage began receiving a tremen dous number of accidents then . And in September one of the hospitals held a forum , because it was becom . ing such a big problem . One hospital alone was reporting . 10 to 12 acci

tion ' s would be applicable to ATVs .

Before anything could be finalized , the Tracks program had to be tested to see that its concepts and instruc . tion methods were sound . We had the program materials tested by vol . unteers at several places , " explains Halbert . At the Polar ATV Cham pionship Races , we put on a demon . stration on the event and received good responses to it . Since the pro gram had been designed for youth audiences , we had teenagers serve as instructors . Those who attended - including the parents were glad that somebody had finally come up with something so they could learn how to operate their ATVs more ! safely . " :

Halbert adds that more test runs of the program were made by commun . ity health aides in some of the state ' s rural villages , and at shopping malls in Anchorage .

The video portion of the program , which explains basic riding skills ,

dents a week . Here , you know an accident ' s serious if they have to go to Anchorage , because it ' s too far and 100 expensive for most injuries to be

Over a year ago the state of Alaska was in the middle of a crisis An ATV accident cri sis . Not a day or week would pass without the news that an ATV rider had been injured or killed in some type of accident . The circum stances varied : Riders would be cross ing or riding down roads . ( many of which are unpaved in Alaska ) only to collide with a tanker truck or car . Or they would be riding after dark with their lights off . And , of course , many riders could have avoided injury if . they had just worn a helmet . Hospi tal emergency rooms were kept busy by a constant flow of broken bodies ; citizens were irate with the situation .

Al about the same tiine , Susan Halbert . Program Coordinator of 1 - H Youth Development for the Univer sity of Alaska ' s Cooperative Extension Service , had just released an ATV safety program , which was the pro duct of two years ' development . Named " Making Tracks Safely With Your All Terrain Vehicles , " the pro gram is aimed at instructing ATV riders primarily young riders the proper care and operation and safety equipment needed to ride their vehicles . And because ATV accidents have occured while riding on roads and private lands , emphasis is placed on knowing the laws governing vehi cle operation .

According to Halbert , " Tracks " ( as it ' s also called ) began its devel opment in 1982 when research showed that there was a serious need in the state for an ATV safety program . Halbert says that there was nothing being offered by ATV manufacturers , no community safety programs exist ed , and there were no state programs addressing the problem . Halbert dis covered the seriousness of the situa tion herself . A staff member from the University of Alaska had just returned from a horticultural study near a vil lage on one of the Aleutian Islands , Hålbert recalls . " And he said , ' I don ' t care what you do , something ' s got to be done about those three - wheelers ! ' "

Even though Alaska keeps records of ATV ownership , it is suspected that the state ' s per capita use of ATV ' s ( based on a population of about 450 , 000 ) could be the highest in the U . S . ' Snowmobiles have always been

Aransported from distant rural com munities . "

Halbert adds that solid statistics " on Alaska ' s ATV accident rate are unavailable due to a lack of proper record - keeping . They ( ATV acci dents ) are , in some cases , lumped together with automobile accidents , or sometimes with motorcycles , which is not appropriate either . "

With assistance from Honda of Anchorage , the University of Alaska ' s Cooperative Extension Service and several community organizations , Halbert began working on her ATV safety program in late 1982 . The con cept of the program was to instruct riders with a combination of printed materials , video taped instruction , and an audio / visual slide show . Since there were no previous safety pro grams to work from , Halbert had to start from scratch . The months that followed involved researching riding habits , hazards on the trail , and deter mining which state laws and regula

trail hazards , and vehicle laws , was completed in April 1983 and added to the te ' st demonstrations . A few months later . Making Tracks Safely With Yorir All Terrain Vehicles " was com plete and ready to go .

But Halbert hita ' snag . To get all of the printed material produced through the formal channels of the stille university would have required lots of paperwork and months of waiting as it worked its way to the top of the priority list . But since the acci dent crisis " was in full swing at the time , it was important to get the pro gram released much sooner . With private funding , Halbert made an and - run around the bureaucracy and hired an outside printer and had the project done in just a few weeks . By November , requests for 5 , 000 copies of the printed materials had been received from agencies across the state .

" We sent copies of Tracks to the governor , state legislators and village public safety officers ( VPSO ) , says