State troopers gave out 2,218 seatbelt tickets in the Capital/Saratoga region between May 24 and June 6 as part of Buckle Up New York, Click it or Ticket campaign, according to results announced Wednesday, June 9, by State Police.
Of the total number of tickets, 338 were issued at seatbelt checkpoints throughout the 10 county region and eight were issued for violations of the child restraint laws. There were also 17 arrests made for criminal offenses and one arrest for aggravated DWI where the motorist was caught driving at 3:30 p.m. with a BAC of .18, according to reports.
Buckle Up New York, Click it or Ticket campaign is an ongoing traffic safety enforcement and public awareness campaign that incorporates a two week enforcement blitz in May and November each year, coinciding with the Memorial Day and Thanksgiving Day holiday periods. The objective of Buckle Up New York is to increase seatbelt use, which in turn saves lives.
State Police reports said that while increased enforcement occurred in every county in the area known as Troop G, special emphasis was given to areas where crash statistics indicate lower seatbelt usage, including Fulton, Hamilton, Montgomery, Saratoga, Schoharie and Washington Counties.
Reports say Buckle Up New York, Click it or Ticket campaign has resulted in record high seatbelt usage and record low highway fatalities here in New York. The most recent observational survey of seatbelt use in New York State showed that 88 percent of front seat occupants of passenger vehicles were properly restrained, up from 75 percent in 1998, before the campaign began. In 1998, 1,505 people died on New York’s highways compared to 1,224 in 2008, the latest year for which data is available. This is even more noteworthy because this reduction in fatalities occurred during a time period when the number of vehicle miles traveled increased by approximately 8 percent.`