TRIAD — A local state senator wants to address what he sees as a gap in transportation safety that could put people in wheelchairs and others in a motor vehicle at risk in an accident.

Sen. Stan Bingham, R-Davidson, recently introduced Senate Bill 57 in the N.C. General Assembly. The legislation calls for a study of individuals using wheelchairs being transported in vans, buses and other vehicles.

“There haven’t been a lot of studies done about this,” he said. “We want to get some engineers and other people involved who will give us some specifics.”

Bingham envisions the study focusing on vans and buses, though it could include passenger cars as well.

“Anything that would relate to the safety of the transportation of someone in a wheelchair,”he said. “Especially where you have a long space where a wheelchair could travel if someone was in a head-on collision.”

Another issueis what should be done to secure wheelchairs in vehicles if people using them are placed in car seats, Bingham said.

He worries that a wheelchair that isn’t stored properly could turn into a dangerous projectile in an accident.

A spokesman for the N.C. Department of Crime Control and Public Safety in Raleigh

TAG: disability, disabled, Wheel chair wheelchairs, wheelchair, wheelchair safety