Analysis of safety impact of paved shoulder width on Czech secondary roads

Abstract

Traffic safety is influenced, among other factors, by characteristics of the roads, which include the width of the shoulder. Shoulder width was noted to have a large effect on crash frequency, as well as on traffic speed. In this paper, we focused on paved shoulders. Previous studies confirmed that increasing the width of the paved shoulder is associated with a decrease in crash frequency. However, wider shoulders may encourage higher driving speed, which is related to an increase of impact speed and crash severity – this issue was hypothesized, but not statistically investigated. Thus, conclusions based on crashes and speeds contradict each other, and there is no simple answer to the question of the safety impact of wide shoulders. To address this gap, we analyzed a sample of two most typical categories of Czech secondary roads, which differ only in the paved shoulder width (S9.5 roads with 0.75m-wide shoulder, and S11.5 roads with 1.75m-wide shoulder) and thus present a suitable example for studying the safety impact of paved shoulder width. We used generalized linear models of crash frequency, and multinomial logistic models of crash severity (separately for single-vehicle and multi-vehicle crashes), as well as a statistical test of differences in speed for the two road categories. The results showed that: Firstly, there were fewer crashes on S11.5 roads compared to S9.5 roads; this was true for both single-vehicle and multi-vehicle crashes. Secondly, single-vehicle crashes on S11.5 roads were more severe compared to S9.5 roads; the change of severity in multi-vehicle crashes was not statistically significant. Thirdly, driving speeds on S11.5 roads were approx. by 7 km/h higher compared to S9.5 roads. These findings support the hypothesis of an association between wider shoulders, higher speeds, and increased crash severity, especially in the case of single-vehicle crashes. As a practical solution, various speed management measures, including widening to a 2+1 road, may be recommended.

Accident black spots identification based on association rule mining

“…This corresponds to the conclusions of [15], which state that a larger number of slopes on a road reduces traffic speed, leading to lower and converging speeds, and therefore lower mortality and accident rates. In regards to the impact of shoulder width on road safety, our findings concur with the results of Ambros et al [6] which demonstrated that shoulder width does have an effect on road safety. They found that wider shoulders were associated with accident severity.…”

Proactive safety assessment of urban through-roads based on GPS data

“…Urban roads are particularly critical for vulnerable road users (VRUs), such as pedestrians or cyclists, who represent more than 70% of road fatalities in cities (Adminaitė-Fodor and Jost, 2019). In Central and Eastern Europe, major roads through built-up areas (through-roads) pose a specific problem (Gaca and Pogodzińska, 2017;Ambros et al, 2021a). Although they carry a dominant share of through traffic (in addition to local traffic) and significant traffic volumes, they often have no hierarchical structure and lack access control, which can cause traffic disruptions and as a result, speed changes.…”