Projects
Local Safety Improvement Decision Support System
| Project Information | |||
Project Status: Starting Date: Ending Date: Duration: |
Description:
Local traffic safety concerns are as important as state highway safety issues. However, the level of support received for safety improvements on Wisconsin local roads and streets is not equal to what is occurring on state maintained highways due to 1) the challenges in local crash location information; 2) the capability and capacity of local agencies to identify the “sites of promises” and perform appropriate engineering investigations; and 3) the difficulties to prepare the grant applications and secure match funding for state safety dollars. Nevertheless, obtain accurate crash location and evaluate site-specific safety performances is the first and the most critical step to implementing any ad hoc engineering, education or enforcement safety countermeasures.
The major recommendations provided through the 2005 State of Wisconsin Traffic Records Assessment stated that Wisconsin: “Expand the scope and use of Wisconsin Local Roads Information System (WISLR) by local governments to be an effective tool in managing the local roads system. (1-B)”; and “Develop a location reference system methodology that will support linkage with state and local traffic records and records management systems. (1-B)”. The proposed Local Safety Improvement Decision Support System would address these recommendations following the success of the pilot project “Demonstration of Automatic Mapping of Local Crash Locations” performed by the UW Traffic Operations and Safety Laboratory.
The pilot project developed and tested an algorithm that can automate the crash location mapping process with respect to Wisconsin Information System for Local Roads (WISLR) and Police Accident Report forms (MV4000). City of Madison 2003 crash data are used as test bed, and the results showed that almost 80 percent of the crashes could be mapped to WISLR automatically using the algorithm. Along the line, a preliminary tool called “Crash Mapping Automation Tool (C-MAT)” has been developed to facilitate the mapping process. This tool automatically translates the location information from a crash report to a pinpoint map for all the historical crash data, and provides an opportunity to link the crash information with the roadway, pavement condition and other data available through the WISLR for a variety of future safety studies. The TOPS Lab is now completing the crash maps for the entire state of Wisconsin local crashes happened between 2002 and 2006, a total of 631,619 crashes. The preliminary results show that 68% crashes can be automatically located on WISLR compared with 75% in pilot study.
Rationale:
The proposed project will address the quality issues in crash data collection which partially attribute to 32% local crashes that can not be mapped, the base map issues in WISLR for geocoding crashes, and current crash data process issues through a number of performance measures such as accuracy/precision, completeness, uniformity, interoperability, and accessibility. The project will also develop a safety improvement decision support system for local agencies by the integration of crash data and WISLR. The project will be of great interests to local agencies, state DOTs and other parties who are interested in improving crash data collection quality and highway safety.
Documents:
| Document Name | Files | Date Posted |
|---|---|---|
| Local Safety Improvement Decision Support System-TRCC Project Summary Report 10/1/2008 |  (895 KB) |
November 14, 2008 |