Spatial Context Transportation Safety Analysis for the Aging Population: An Integrated 3-Dimensional Visualization and Human Factors Simulation Approach

Older drivers are at differential risk for injury/death as a result of a crash compared to younger drivers, partly due to age-related changes in perceptual and cognitive abilities, but also due to age-related increases in fragility. As the population ages in the United States and around the world, we will have more older drivers on the road than ever before, making understanding older driver crash risk and developing effective countermeasures of critical importance. This will serve the goal of protecting aging road users and helping older adults maintain their mobility and independence. Research reported here developed an approach to understanding older adult crash risk at specific intersections. First, crash records were examined for crashes within the Tallahassee region to identify intersections associated with older adult crashes. Then, using 3D modeling software, this intersection was recreated to help identify potential reasons for this crash risk in terms of the intersection’s spatial context. Then, this 3D model was converted to a driving simulator tile to further understand older driver risk in a driving simulator study, which identified potentially risky decisions by older drivers. We propose this process of identifying risky intersections, modeling them, and importing them into the driving simulator as a potentially promising methodology to better understand specific properties of intersections that pose risk to older drivers, the perceptual and cognitive changes related to this differential risk, and countermeasures to reduce older driver risk. The promise and challenges of this approach are discussed.

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Completed
• Funding: $107000.00
• Contract Numbers:

  DTRT13-G-UTC42

  004139-004486

• Sponsor Organizations:

  Research and Innovative Technology Administration

  University Transportation Centers Program
  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Project Managers:

  Tucker-Thomas, Dawn

• Performing Organizations:

  Center for Accessibility and Safety for an Aging Population

  Florida State University
  Tallahassee, FL  United States 
• Principal Investigators:

  Abdelrazig, Yassir

• Start Date: 20140409
• Expected Completion Date: 20142331
• Actual Completion Date: 20161230
• Source Data: RiP Project 36866

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Aged; Aged drivers; Countermeasures; Fatalities; Highway safety; Pedestrians; Traffic crashes
• Geographic Terms: Florida
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Pedestrians and Bicyclists; Safety and Human Factors;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01530638
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Center for Accessibility and Safety for an Aging Population
• Contract Numbers: DTRT13-G-UTC42, 004139-004486
• Files: UTC, RIP
• Created Date: Jul 23 2014 1:01AM