IDOT

It’s the time of year the Illinois Department of Transportation reminds us to wear our seatbelts and drive sober.
Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over, Click it or Ticket, Turn around Don’t Drown. We hear the phrases all the time, some of us might even be annoyed. But Shannon Alderman, IDOT’s State Alcohol Coordinator, says the results speak for themselves.

“We’ve seen about a 40 percent drop in drunk driving deaths in Illinois in the last ten years,” Alderman says. “It moves slow, but it’s a life-saving effort and it really is paying off out there.”

In 2000 fatalities on Illinois roads numbered between 1,400 and 1,500. The state has had fewer than 1,000 fatalities for six years in a row now, which is still in the top 25 percent of states nationwide.