In the Name of Allah

Civil Engineering Department

Soran University

Transportation Engineering
Fall 2021

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Chapter 5 (Highway safety)
Eighteen week
Fall 2021

Chapter Five,
Rizgar A. Omar, MSC
Email:
[email protected]

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Chapter 5 (Highway safety)

• Issues involved in transportation safety

• Strategic highway safety plans

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 Safety: The absence of risk or danger.
Road Safety: The ability of a person to travel freely without injury or death.
Crash Frequency: The number of crashes occurring per year or other unit of time.

1. Issues involved in transportation safety

 Accident & Crash
The word accident Implies (shows) that a car crash happened through the fault of nobody in
particular. This can be seen in the commonly used phrase, “It was just an accident.” On the
other hand, the word crash indicates that someone caused the car wreck to happen, or that
someone is actually at fault. The reality of the situation is that it is very uncommon for a car
crash to be just an accident, usually someone is at fault for the wreck.

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 Transportation Crash Factors
» Driver Error
» Age
» Gender
» Aggressive Driving
» Impaired Driving
» Occupant Protection
» Driver Inattention

» Vehicle Factors
» Mechanical conditions (Faulty brakes)
» Electrical system
» Worn tires
» Vehicle design (Vehicle’s center of gravity)
» Vehicle safety is approached from two perspectives:
» Crash Avoidance (prevention)
» Crash Protection

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» Road Environment Factors
» Access Control
» Speed
» Roadway Cross-Section
» Traffic Volumes
» Pavement Condition
» Surface
» Weather

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2. Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP)
The purpose of this plan is to develop a process through which each state would identify
its key safety needs such that investment decisions can be made that will result in
significant reductions in highway facilities and serious injuries on public roads. Suggested
activities that could be included in this plan are:

• Gain Leadership Support

• Identify a Champion
• Start the Development Process
• Data Analyze
• Data Establish Working Group
• Adopt a Strategic Goal
• Identify Key Areas
• Form Groups
• Identify Strategies and Countermeasures
• Determine Importance for Application

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 Analysis of Crash Data
A careful examination of the crash data will show contributing factors and patterns at sites and
segments. It should result in:

 A list of crashes by crash type;

 A list of contributing crash factors;
 Crash pattern descriptions; and
 Collision diagrams.

Crash Type
In some cases, a single crash type might be
identified, such as rear-end collisions at specific
intersections. Other types of crash types
include side-swipe, run-off-road, head-on,
right-angle, left-turn, etc.
Figure 5.2 demonstrates an example of crash
types for an intersection collision study. It is
obvious turning maneuvers and rear end
crashes are important issues which need to be
addressed at this particular intersection.
Figure 5.2 Crash Types at an Intersection

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Crash Factors
Roadway Factors
Some of the roadway factors which may impact the safety of a particular facility include:
•Access Control – Facility types are commonly classified based on the number of access points.
•Speed – These facilities are associated with higher travel speeds, which may result in more severe injuries.
•Roadway Cross-Section – The lane width, shoulder width, roadside clearance, cross-slopes, etc.,
•Traffic Volumes – The amount of exposure to risk for a given time period.
•Pavement Condition – Pavement resurfacing can improve skid resistance, high percentage of crashes occur on wet
pavements or curves in the roadway.
Human Factors
•Age – Older and younger drivers typically fall into higher crash risk groups.
•Gender – Men are more likely than women to be involved in fatal crashes.
•Aggressive Driving – Various manifestations of aggressive driving include behaviors such as driving too fast ….
•Impaired Driving – Driving while intoxicated, under influence of drugs (illegal, over-counter, and prescription)
Occupant Protection – Drivers and passengers who choose not to use safety restraints and motorcyclists who
choose not to use protective gear are at higher risk for injury and death.
•Driver Inattention – Distracted drivers do not give sufficient attention to the driving task.
Vehicle Factors
Vehicle safety is generally approached from two perspectives:
1.Crash Avoidance – Numerous factors are incorporated into vehicles to avoid crashes.
2.Crash Protection – Once a crash occurs, different vehicle factors become important (e.g., vehicle safety
equipment, ability to absorb energy, etc.).
Environmental Factors
•Rain – Wet pavement has lower friction than dry pavement, so traction is reduced.
•Snow, and Ice – Ice is more hazardous because it cannot be seen. Both hazardous due to extreme loss of traction
•Fog – Fog can reduce visibility to several feet, rendering a driver virtually blind.
•Wind – Windy conditions contribute to crashes, especially for large trucks, motorcycles and other small vehicles.
•Sun – The sun contributes to crashes because of glare and reduced visibility during periods of high glare.
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Collision Diagrams
Collision diagrams present pictorial information on individual crashes at a location. Different
symbols are used to represent different types of movements, types of crashes, and hardness
of crashes. The date and time (day or night) at which the crash occurs are also indicated.
Figure 5.4 shows a typical collision diagram. One advantage of collision diagrams is that they
give information on the location of the crash, which is not available with survey summary.
Collision diagrams may be prepared manually either by retrieving data filed manually or by
computer when data are stored in a computer file. Collision diagrams are used to display and
identify similar accident patterns.

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 Figure 5.4 Collision Diagram
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Chapter 6 (Fundamental Principles of Traffic Flow)

• Traffic Flow Elements

• Flow-density Relationship

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 Traffic stream parameters

Occupancy
While density is difficult to measure directly, roadway
occupancy is frequently used as a surrogate for density
in control systems because it is easier to measure.
k = 5280 *O / (Lv + Ld)
Lv = average length of a vehicle, ft, Ld = length of the detector, ft
O = occupancy over a given detector
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 Primary Elements of Traffic Flow
» Flow
» Density
» Speed
Flow (q) Flow (q) is the equivalent hourly rate at which vehicles pass a point on a highway
during a time period less than 1 hour.

Density
Density (k) is the number of vehicles traveling over a unit length of highway at an instant in time.
The unit length is usually 1 mile (mi) thereby making vehicles per mile (veh/mi) the unit of density.

Occupancy: While density is difficult to measure directly, roadway occupancy is frequently used as
a surrogate for density in control systems because it is easier to measure.
k = 5280 *O / (Lv + Ld)
Lv = average length of a vehicle, ft, Ld = length of the detector, ft, O = occupancy over a given detector
Speed: Speed (u) is the distance traveled by a vehicle during a unit of time. It can be expressed in
miles per hour (mi/h), kilometers per hour (km/h), or feet per second (ft /sec).
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Figure 6.2 Space Mean Speed versus Time Mean Speed
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Time headway
Time headway (h) is the difference between the time the front of a vehicle arrives at a point
on the highway and the time the front of the next vehicle arrives at that same point. Time
headway is usually expressed in seconds.

Space Headways
Space headway (d) is the distance between the front of a vehicle and the front of the
following vehicle and is usually expressed in feet. The space headway between vehicles 3 and
4 at time t5 is d3 – 4 (see Figure 6.1). d =(1/k)

Time gap (g) between vehicles depends on:

•spacing/space headway (s)
•time headway (h)
•vehicle speed (v)

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 1. Flow rate (q)/ veh/mi

A. B.
q
C. SMS(average speed) = k

2. Density (k)/ veh/mi B. Occupancy (Density (k)/ veh/mi

k = 5280 *O / (Lv + Ld)
A. q
C. SMS(average speed) = D. d =(1/k)
k
3. Time Headway (h)/ Seconds

4. Space Headways (d)/ Feet d =(1/k)

5. Speed

It can be expressed in miles per hour (mi/h), kilometers per hour (km/h), or feet per second (ft /sec).

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Example 6.1 Determining Flow, Density, Time Mean Speed, and Space Mean Speed
Figure 6.3 shows vehicles traveling at constant speeds on a two-lane highway between
sections X and Y with their positions and speeds obtained at an instant of time by
photography. An observer located at point X observes the four vehicles passing point X
during a period of T sec. The velocities of the vehicles are measured as 45, 45, 40, and 30
mi/h, respectively. Calculate the flow, density, time mean speed, and space mean speed.

Figure 6.3 Locations and Speeds of Four Vehicles on a Two-Lane Highway at an Instant of Time

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 Or

4
𝑣𝑠 = 1 1 1 1 = 38.92 mi/h
+ + +
30 40 45 45

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Where
ti is the time it takes the ith vehicle to travel
from X to Y at speed ui, and
L (ft) is the distance between X and Y.

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2. Flow-Density Relationships

 Fundamental Diagram of Traffic Flow

1. When the density on the highway is 0, the flow is also 0 because there are no vehicles on the
highway.
2. As the density increases, the flow also increases.
3. However, when the density reaches its maximum, generally referred to as the jam density (kj),
the flow must be 0 because vehicles will tend to line up end to end.
4. It follows that as density increases from 0, the flow will also initially increase from 0 to a
maximum value. Further continuous increase in density will then result in continuous reduction of
the flow, which will eventually be 0 when the density is equal to the jam density. The shape of
the curve therefore takes the form in Figure 6.4a on the next slide.

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Figure 6.4 Fundamental Diagrams of Traffic Flow

Figure 6.4 Fundamental Diagrams of Traffic Flow

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EXAMPLE:
A traffic stream displays average vehicle headways of 2.4s at 55 mph. Compute the density
and rate of flow for this traffic stream.
Solution

𝐪 𝟏𝟓𝟎𝟎
k= = = 27.3 veh/mi
𝐬𝐩𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐦𝐞𝐚𝐧 𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝟓𝟓

𝟏 𝟏 𝟑𝟔𝟎𝟎
q= = 𝟐.𝟒 = = 1500 veh/h
𝐡 𝟐.𝟒
𝟑𝟔𝟎𝟎

EXAMPLE:
A lane on the freeway displays the following characteristics: (a) the average headway
between vehicles is 2.8 s, and (b) the average spacing between vehicles is 235 ft. What is
the rate of flow for the lane? What is the average speed (in mph)?
Solution

𝟏 𝟏 𝟑𝟔𝟎𝟎
q= = 𝟐.𝟖 = = 1286 veh/h
𝐡 𝟐.𝟖
𝟑𝟔𝟎𝟎
𝟏 𝟏 𝟓𝟐𝟖𝟎
k= = 𝟐𝟑𝟓 = = 22.5 veh/mi
𝐋 − 𝐦𝐢 𝟐𝟑𝟓
𝟓𝟐𝟖𝟎
q 1286
Space mean speed(average speed) = = = 57.2 mi/h
k 22.5
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Questions?

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