Integrating Spatial Safety Data into Transportation Planning Processes

One of the key steps that is usually neglected in the transportation planning process is safety evaluation of the proposed alternatives, or safety is assessed as a separate post-process. Integrating safety into the planning process will contribute to safe systems analysis, explicitly including safety outcomes with planning models and alternative planning scenarios. In this project, the research team will use the address of individuals who were involved in traffic crashes (i.e., home-based approach; HBA) instead of the location of the crashes (i.e., location-based approach; LBA) to evaluate road safety. By using HBA and estimating crash frequencies at zonal level, the team can evaluate the association between sociodemographic variables, accessibility, individual exposure, and road safety; by knowing this association the team can evaluate the safety impact of transportation planning alternatives in the future. One contributing factor to that is the lack of information about the residential address of the individuals. In this study, the team has access to such information for Tennessee state for all the crashes that occurred between 2007 and 2016. This study consists of five objectives: Objective 1: Establish a new approach to road safety that attributes road safety outcomes to home-address of the individuals who were involved in traffic crashes, in addition to using infrastructure attributes at the location of the crash. Objective 2: Investigate the relationship between sociodemographic variables and HBA crash frequency. Objective 3: Investigate the relationship between transportation planning and HBA. Objective 4: Benchmark road safety and policy implications. Objective 5: Use safety indicators extracted from police reports to evaluate safety. This project will generate a report that addresses five objectives that the team mentioned above. The team will use the data from Tennessee Integrated Traffic Analysis Network, Knoxville Regional Travel Demand Model, Tennessee State travel demand model (if it is necessary), and Highway Performance Monitoring System to conduct the analysis. All datasets used for Tennessee are standard across states. The team will generalize the method to be applied nationwide. Each objective will be a separate section in the final report. The team anticipates that this research will also generate at least two journal publications. This study will help policymakers and transportation safety professionals communicate in a way to evaluate safety impact of the transportation system and identify neighborhoods with a higher risk of traffic crash involvement. This project will be among the first to perform such analysis based on the true exposure (i.e., individuals’ activity in transportation system at zonal level) and accessibility of the individuals. This work will also generate a dataset that can be shared and open for future researchers.

• Record URL:
  https://www.roadsafety.unc.edu/research/projects/2018r15/
• Supplemental Notes:
  • CSCRS2018R15

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Funding: $69,188
• Contract Numbers:

  69A355174711.3

• Sponsor Organizations:

  Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology

  University Transportation Centers Program
  Department of Transportation
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Managing Organizations:

  Collaborative Sciences Center for Road Safety

  University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
  Chapel Hill, NC  United States  27514
• Project Managers:

  Sandt, Laura

• Performing Organizations:

  University of Tennessee, Knoxville

  Center for Transportation Research
  Conference Center Building
  Knoxville, TN  United States  37996-4133

  Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton

  Boca Raton, FL  United States  33431
• Principal Investigators:

  Cherry, Christopher

  Merlin, Louis

• Start Date: 20180501
• Expected Completion Date: 20190731
• Actual Completion Date: 0
• USDOT Program: University Transportation Centers Program

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Crash analysis; Crash data; Demographics; Geographic information systems; Neighborhoods; Spatial analysis; Traffic safety; Transportation planning
• Geographic Terms: Tennessee
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Planning and Forecasting; Safety and Human Factors;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01667900
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Collaborative Sciences Center for Road Safety
• Contract Numbers: 69A355174711.3
• Files: UTC, RiP
• Created Date: Apr 30 2018 2:19PM