1. Home
  2. RIP
  3. View Record
https://www.nationalacademies.org/trb/events

Development of an arterial-based pedestrian exposure and crash risk model for North Carolina

Pedestrian safety is a significant concern for transportation planners and safety engineers both within North Carolina and across the country. While a relatively small number of trips are made via walking and pedestrians were involved in less than 1% of crashes in North Carolina, pedestrians represented roughly 15% of traffic fatalities or serious injuries; further, pedestrian fatalities have continued to increase in the state, with a peak total of 265 in 2022. More broadly across the United States, pedestrian fatalities are increasing annually; in fact, annual pedestrian fatalities within the U.S. claimed the lives of more than 7,500 people in 2021, the highest in over forty years. To better identify factors that contribute to pedestrian fatalities/injuries and identify the highest risk locations for these crashes, it is critical to understand which locations have the most pedestrian activity so that the most risk-prone locations can be identified. As part of research report 2022-057A: Quantification of Systemic Risk Factors for Pedestrian Safety on North Carolina, the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) discovered several risk factors that were most associated with serious injuries and fatalities among pedestrians involved in a crash on the roadway. However, these risk factors did not include a critical aspect of pedestrian crash risk – pedestrian activity or exposure – due to a lack of available data. The research collected traffic counts from NCDOT and local governments, but many of these counts reflected sites selected for standard motor vehicle turning counts; further, these sites were not selected to understand the dynamics that influence pedestrian activity, but rather as a secondary component of a more traditional traffic study. The overall objective of this project is to identify the most critical locations that pedestrian counts are needed to support the estimation of a more reliable pedestrian exposure model for arterials and obtain pedestrian exposure information from these locations. These counts will then be integrated into an updated pedestrian exposure model that will be used to better quantify pedestrian risk on arterials within NCDOT (both individual roadway segments and intersections) to identify the highest risk locations for pedestrian crashes. Both the exposure and risk models will be built using publicly available data on land use, roadway features, speed limits, as well as bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure locations available through the Pedestrian and Bicycle Infrastructure Network (PBIN) dataset. As a part of this project, specific location types that are underrepresented in terms of available pedestrian counts will be identified so that additional pedestrian counts can be performed to supplement the available data and improve model accuracy/reliability. The final risk factors identified through this effort should be applicable to the highly diverse spectrum of environmental contexts and communities that make up North Carolina. The primary products of this research would be: (1) additional pedestrian exposure counts at critical representative locations along arterials within North Carolina; (2) an updated pedestrian exposure model that can be used to predict the level of pedestrian activity at individual intersections (and applied to adjacent segments) along arterials in North Carolina; and, (3) a suite of models to estimate the level of risk of a pedestrian crash at individual roadway segments and intersections in North Carolina. In addition to the models themselves, the research team will provide a suite of geographic information system (GIS) map layers that have the pedestrian exposure and risk models implemented directly. Specific sites will be identified as discussed with the NCDOT technical panel; e.g., top 1% or 10% risky sites and top 1% or 10% sites with the highest anticipated pedestrian exposure. In addition, the research team will provide guidance on how these models can be used as a part of systemic pedestrian safety analysis in North Carolina, focusing on the identification and use of pedestrian risk factors along arterials in urban areas. This guidance document will be a standalone document, separate from the final research report. The guidance document will include a summary of the process followed to develop the systemic analysis model and possible opportunities for future analysis model updates. Case studies or example corridor profiles will be used to demonstrate how the models can be applied and what to look for outside of what information the models can provide, such as local land uses, pedestrian generators, and evidence of disadvantaged populations.