HIGHWAY SAFETY: STATE OF THE ART AND PROSPECTS FOR THE FUTURE

The magnitude of the highway safety problem (50,000 deaths and 5,000,000 injured persons annually) is addressed, including the continuing rise in traffic fatalities each year and the large discrepancy between the number of highway fatalities and those of other transportation modes. Current highway safety efforts at the Federal, state, and local levels are reviewed, with emphasis on their fragmentation and inadequacy. Concentration on motor vehicles rather than on people is seen as the major drawback in traffic safety engineering, while it is acknowledged that traffic control measures perhaps are the only approach with real safety potential. Major weaknesses in current research are blamed on poor study selection, lack of communication among governmental agencies (e.g. between the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Federal Highway Administration), inadequate transfer of research information, inappropriate attitudes of the highway professionals and general public, and political and economic factors. Candidate areas for future safety improvements are indicated: communication between the driver and the traffic control system (i.e. central controllers) and between drivers (signaling), vehicle crashworthiness, and highway maintenance and removal or treatment of roadside hazards. It is stated that technology exists for eliminating whole classes of accident types, such as grade crossing, brake failure, and pedestrian. The potential of Transportation System Safety (TSS), a concept and body of analytical tools, in improving highway safety is emphasized. TSS is based on probabilistic means of assessing risk of failure (i.e. accident).

• Supplemental Notes:
  • Conference held in Dearborn, Michigan, 15-17 September 1980. Also published in HS-030 396 (IEEE-80CH1601-4; SAE-SP-90), "Convergence 80. IEEE Vehicular Technology Society Annual Conference (30th), International Conference on Transportation Economics Proceedings," Utica, Michigan, 1980.
• Corporate Authors:

  Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

  Operations Center, 445 Hoes Lane, P.O. Box 1331
  Piscataway, NJ  United States  08855-1331

  Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE)

  400 Commonwealth Drive
  Warrendale, PA  United States  15096
• Authors:
  • Cantilli, E J
• Publication Date: 1980

Media Info

• Features: References;
• Pagination: 5 p.

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Federal government; Forecasting; Highway safety; Local government; Motor vehicles; Research; Safety and security; State government; State of the art studies; Traffic control; Transportation safety
• Subject Areas: Operations and Traffic Management; Research; Safety and Human Factors;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00381424
• Record Type: Publication
• Source Agency: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
• Report/Paper Numbers: IEEE-80CH1601-4, HS-030 448, SAE-SP-90
• Files: HSL, USDOT
• Created Date: Feb 29 1984 12:00AM