Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, Virginia State Police and local law-enforcement representatives will launch the 2008 Checkpoint Strikeforce campaign today, focusing on drunken drivers on rural roads.

Kaine will kick off the project at 1:30 p.m. at Hanover Wayside Park off U.S. 301.

More than one-third of traffic fatalities in Virginia last year were alcohol-related, according to the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles Highway Safety Office. The campaign this year -- its seventh year -- will use DUI checkpoints and an advertising blitz directed at young drivers.

Virginia saw an increase in the number of alcohol-related fatalities in 2006 from 2005, from 322 in 2005 to 374 in 2006 -- the latest figures available. That followed declines for the previous three years.