County, township officials plan to resuscitate emergency traffic light systems

March 23--EMT Mike Deck was riding shotgun in a Millcreek Paramedic Service ambulance when it was hit by a car at West 26th Street and Peninsula Drive.

The ambulance had been heading west on West 26th Street with its lights and siren on, responding to a call for chest pains. It stopped at a red light at Peninsula Drive and then started into the intersection after traffic on Peninsula stopped for it. The ambulance was hit by a car that came around the stopped southbound traffic.

Deck wasn't hurt. His paramedic partner was taken to the hospital with back and neck injuries. Their ambulance was towed, and another ambulance was dispatched from the MPS Kearsarge station to answer their original emergency call.

A radio-controlled system that might have prevented the accident wasn't working.

The ambulance crew wasn't able to switch the Peninsula Drive traffic light to green on West 26th Street as they approached.

The emergency traffic-light pre-emption equipment at the intersection is part of an aging system that no longer works at most of the Erie County intersections that have it. The receivers are either broken, only work in certain directions or can be activated only at very close range, according to a 2011 report by the Erie Metropolitan Planning Organization.

That could change in parts of Erie County this summer.

Millcreek, Summit, Harborcreek, Fairview and Lawrence Park townships are working together to upgrade the system, which was installed in the 1960s. Township supervisors have unanimously agreed to buy and maintain modern receivers to replace old vacuum-tube receivers at 57 intersections along major roads into and out of Erie, including Peach Street, Interchange Road, Routes 5 and 20, and Iroquois Avenue.

Emergency crews will be able to use existing in-vehicle transmitters to activate the system and change traffic lights ahead to green.

"We are working with the system that we have to improve safety and do it economically. We don't need a brand-new Lamborghini system," Erie County Councilman Phil Fatica said. Fatica, former Erie County Councilman Ronald "Whitey" Cleaver and former Millcreek Township Supervisor Joe Kujawa helped launch the joint municipal effort to resuscitate the broken emergency systems.

Erie County Council unanimously voted to pay $100,000 of the project cost. Municipal costs range from $1,000 for Lawrence Park Township, which is buying new receivers for four intersections, to $45,000 for Millcreek Township, for receivers at 32 intersections.

Together, the five municipalities will spend a total of $101,000.

The new parts for the system will come from Emergency Traffic Systems Inc., a local startup company owned by Deck. Deck bought the designs and prototypes from a Fairview company that developed and tested the components but opted not to manufacture and sell them.

"It was personal to me," Deck said. "I wanted to know why these systems weren't working and how to get them working again."

Functioning emergency traffic-light pre-emption systems significantly reduce the number of emergency vehicle accidents, Millcreek Paramedic Service Operations Director Jeff Benson said.

"Will they take away all of the risk of an accident at these intersections? Absolutely not. But they will probably take 80 percent of the risk away, and not just for us, for police, firetrucks and other drivers," he said.

Benson was off work for almost a year after an accident at West 12th and Peach streets in Erie in 1994. Then an EmergyCare paramedic, Benson was driving an ambulance north on Peach Street when a car eastbound on West 12th Street came around stopped traffic, into the intersection and hit it, knocking the ambulance 30 feet. Benson suffered back and neck injuries and a fractured right shoulder. His partner EMT sustained serious back injuries.

The traffic light pre-emption system at the intersection wasn't functioning then and isn't functioning two decades later, Benson said.

The systems must be made operational, Fatica said.

"We're talking about people, many of them volunteers, riding in these emergency trucks and being injured or facing death on their way to help somebody else because a simple, economic solution is not in place," Fatica said.

The pre-emption systems also cut emergency response time by 14 to 23 percent in some communities, according to a 2006 National Highway Transportation Safety Administration report. By switching lights ahead to green and others in the area to red, ambulances, firetrucks and police cars can avoid stops and slowdowns and keep moving.

"This project will help so many people, including some that may not even live in Erie County but are driving I-90, maybe, when all of a sudden their lives depend on quick, safe transport to the hospital," Millcreek Township Engineer Rick Morris said.

Morris has been overseeing logistics of the joint municipal project and estimates that only about 35 percent of the region's old emergency traffic-light pre-emption systems still work.

The Radion Emergency Light Co. that developed and installed the region's original RELCO emergency pre-emption systems went out of business decades ago, and replacement parts have not been readily available, Morris said. Municipalities for years have been "cannibalizing" parts to keep the systems operating at as many intersections as possible, he said.

"New solid state equipment just was not available, until now," Morris said.

The city of Erie is not participating in what county and other local officials hope will be a first phase of upgrades to the emergency traffic-light pre-emption system. The city requested and received proposals to upgrade or replace pre-emption systems at local intersections, including 64 in the city, in 2011. But there was no funding in place for the project.

"It would certainly be helpful if the city can install the new receivers at key intersections," Fatica said, "for seamless routes to and from all three hospitals."

It will take some time for local companies contracted by Emergency Traffic Systems to manufacture components for the new emergency receivers once Erie County places its order on behalf of the participating municipalities. But work should be completed in time for installation this summer, Deck said.

The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation and Federal Communications Commission will have to sign off on the upgraded system for it to become operational.

"Our hearts are in this," Morris said. "There are people who foresaw the importance of this and tried to work through all of the hoops and hurdles for years. We're inside the 10-yard line now, and it's exciting. But we're not there yet."

VALERIE MYERS can be reached at 878-1913 or by e-mail. Follow her on Twitter at twitter.com/ETNmyers.

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