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https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/27432/critical-issues-in-transportation-for-2024-and-beyond

Traffic behaviour, traffic barometer and the traffic safety situation

Liikennekayttaytyminen, ilmapiiri ja liikenneturvallisuustilanne

The purpose of the study was to evaluate the interactions between variables describing safety developments and traffic behaviour as well as traffic barometer. To determine these interactions a group of other statistical time series influencing safety developments was collected. The gathered information was used to set up linear regression models. The models were used to explain traffic safety developments from January 1992 to December 1999. Three different time series were used as explained variable: 1 all road deaths / total vehicle mileage 2 deaths on roads maintained by Finnra / total vehicle mileage on roads maintained by Finnra 3 deaths on private roads and roads maintained by municipalities / total vehicle mileage on private roads and roads maintained by municipalities. Explanatory variables were divided into three groups: 4 variables describing economy and society 5 variables describing traffic behaviour 6 variables describing traffic barometer. The variation of safety on private roads and roads maintained by municipalities was explained successfully. The best models explained over 80 percent of the variation. The explanation of traffic safety on roads maintained by Finnra was not successful without a trend variable describing the improvement in traffic safety situation overall. It is probable that the time required for first help units to reach the accident place has decreased during the monitoring period. At least the introduction of mobile phones and increased use of helicopters in medical care have helped this. The softening of the road environment, better crash safety of new cars and the implementation of airbags have become more common during this period. All factors mentioned here have had an effect on traffic safety especially outside built-up areas. Traffic safety inside built-up areas has been improved because of lower speed limits introduced during the 1990's. Tere was no variable describing these changes reliably enough but it is possible that bringing these factors as numerical variables into the models would improve the models. The factors describing traffic barometer and traffic behaviour provide possibilities for explaining the variation of traffic safety when documented well. Even if some traffic behaviour variable does not enter the model it does not mean that the variable does not have an effect on traffic safety. In the regression models used in this study different variables compete with each other and only the best variables enter the model. The effects of other variables remain partly in the common trend variable. This report may be found at http://www.liikenneturva.fi/fi/tutkimus/tutkimusmonisteet/liitetiedostot/liikkilmapjatilanne.pdf

Language

  • Finnish

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Filing Info

  • Accession Number: 01024072
  • Record Type: Publication
  • Source Agency: TRL
  • ISBN: 951-560-113-4
  • Files: ITRD
  • Created Date: May 18 2006 8:28AM