Fatalities recorded in all modes of transportation decreased 3% in 2013 from 2012, declining from 34,678 to 35,796, per preliminary figures released by the National Transportation Safety Board.

Deaths on U.S. roads, which NTSB noted account for about 94% of all transportation-related fatalities, declined 3.15% year over year, from 33,782 in 2012 to 32,719 in 2013.

The drop in highway fatalities included fewer deaths assigned to NTSB’s medium-and-heavy trucks and light-trucks-and-vans subcategories as well as less passenger-car fatalities, but deaths attributed to buses rose sharply:

• Medium/Heavy-Truck fatalities slipped 0.86%, from 691 to 697

• Light-Truck/Van fatalities fell 2.79%, from 9,418 to 9,155

• Passenger-Car fatalities decreased 3.10%, from 12,361 to 11,977

• Bus fatalities climbed 23.0%, from 39 to 48

NTSB Acting Chairman Christopher Hart observed that although the decrease in overall transportation deaths “represents a good trend, much more work needs to done, because 35,000 deaths is very troubling."