New blue-and-white signs will be popping up in highway work zones this summer. The signs are designed to convey an important safety message to motorists as they enter Major Moves work zones.

Over the next ten years, the Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT) will be investing nearly $12 billion in upgrading and constructing new roads. INDOT's top priority during this busy time is emphasizing the safety of workers and motorists. The new signs are one part of an agency-wide effort to increase work zone safety.

The message on the new signs is "Drive Safely... Indiana's Making Major Moves." The Major Moves slogan (Building Roads. Creating Jobs.) appears along the bottom of the new sign. By placing signs prior to Major Moves work zones, INDOT aims to increase motorist awareness of work zones to reduce accidents and injuries.

Since January, 950 crashes have occurred in Indiana work zones - injuring 300 people and killing nine. The latest deaths occurred July 13 when two construction workers were struck and killed on State Road 66 in Spencer County. In 2005, 21 people were killed in work zones - three construction workers and 18 motorists. In nearly all highway work zone accidents, driver inattention is a contributing factor.

The 200 signs are being manufactured by inmates at PEN Products at the Westville Correctional Facility. The project's $10,000 cost is paid through INDOT's sign budget. They are being installed by the department's maintenance crews and will be reused each year at Major Moves construction sites across Indiana. Signs like these are used in other states to inform motorists of upcoming highway projects.

Major Moves is Governor Mitch Daniels' landmark highway program which fully funds more than 200 new construction and 200 major highway preservation projects across Indiana over the next 10 years.