presented to

presented by

Cambridge Systematics, Inc.

Transportation leadership you can trust.

SAFETY

PLANNING

Safety Planning Boot Camp Turning Safety Ideas into Reality

Louisiana Transportation Conference Participants

February 19, 2013

Susan Herbel, Nicole Waldheim,

and Pam Beer

● Military training

● Listen to the 1980s band, Bootcamp

● Get inspired by Billy Blanks’ military

exercise program

● Address research findings

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● Define Transportation Safety for the state and regions

● Learn strategies for better incorporating safety into the

planning process, also known as transportation safety

planning (TSP)

3

● Brainstorm and identify methods

for better integrating safety into

transportation planning and

programming documents

● Name

● Agency

● Expectations

4

● Connection to decision-makers

● Analytic skills and tools

● Commitment to the public good

● Holistic perspective of the transportation network

● Ability to prioritize and program regional transportation investments

5

● Defining Safety

● History, Background,

and Challenges

● The Seven Principles

● Implementing the

Seven Principles

● Next Steps and Adjourn

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Current Thinking

Everything We Do

is Safe

End Result

Safety Will Be a

Priority in the Long-

Range Transportation

Planning Process

● Safe Transportation Projects

» Any transportation project inclusive of safety benefits, such as

cost effective mobility solutions – Sidewalks

– Multiuse trails

– Bicycle lanes

– Roadway operational upgrades

● Safety Projects

» A safety project addresses a specific safety need on the

transportation network – Median barriers to reduce head-on collisions

– Shoulders and rumble strips/stripes to prevent running off

the road

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● ISTEA

● TEA-21

» TSP working group – Safety conscious planning forums

– Conference panels and presentations

– Research – NCHRP 08-44, 08-44(2), 08-76, etc.

● SAFETEA-LU

» SHSP

» Safety Conscious Planning Transportation Safety Planning

● MAP-21

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● Highway Safety Improvement Program maintained

» SHSPs remain centerpiece of program

● Safety maintained as planning factor for states/MPOs

● USDOT will establish performance measures and standards

within 18 months of enacting MAP-21

» States/MPOs will establish performance targets

● HSIP – States will track safety PMs for

» Serious injuries and fatalities per vehicle mile traveled

» Number of serious injuries and fatalities

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Newer Concept

Competing Priorities

Safety Initiatives are Reactive

Funding Silos

Limited Staff and Tools

Institutional Resources Lacking

No Ribbon Cutting in Safety

Other Documents Address Safety

Often Takes

the Backseat

● NCHRP 546

Incorporating Safety

into Long-Range

Transportation Planning

● NCHRP 08-76

Institutionalizing Safety

in the Transportation

Planning Processes

● NCHRP B08-76

Implementing

the Framework

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Monitor safety performance and evaluate safety programs and policies

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Collect and analyze safety data

Include safety expertise on transportation planning committees 1

Define and include safety in the vision, goals, and objectives in

transportation planning documents 2

Establish safety performance measures 4

5

Establish safety as a decision factor 6

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Include safety in the context of other transportation goals and objectives

(i.e., bicycle, pedestrian, highway, transit safety) 3

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Traditional Transportation

Planning Process

Engage

Multidisciplinary Committee

Define the Visions,

Goals, and Objectives

Establish System

Performance Measures

Identify Transportation

Improvement Strategies

and Alternatives

Evaluate and Prioritize

the Strategies

How/where to incorporate safety into transportation planning

Invite safety stakeholders to attend meetings and keep them engaged throughout the planning process

Ensure safety is a major goal of the organization, with commitment to it at the highest level

Identify the needed safety improvements in the transportation system and identify performance measures

Collect and analyze safety data

Use the data to identify specific transportation safety issues. If the problem is large enough, a standalone plan addressing the issue could be warranted

Establish safety as a decision factor for the selection of transportation projects by including safety as a goal in the LRTP and considering it in the scoring and ranking process

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Develop the Long-Range

Transportation Plan (S/TIP)

Develop the Transportation

Improvement Program (S/TIP)

Undertake

Project Development

Implement

Projects

Monitor and Evaluate

System Operations

Use safety data and policies from other planning documents to develop a safety goal in the LRTP

Use safety data and performance measures to help prioritize programs and projects identified in the LRTP

Design standalone safety projects or consider safety elements in the analysis (i.e., NEPA) and design (i.e., MUTCD) for TIP projects

Construct standalone safety projects or incorporate safety elements into other TIP projects

Routinely track and monitor safety programs and projects to evaluate successes or identify course corrections, assess progress towards performance targets, and use tracking information to continually revise and refine the entire planning process

● Three Step Process for Each Principle

» What does the research say? (NCHRP 08-76) – Challenges

– Opportunities

– Example

» What are you currently doing? (Open Discussion)

» What else could you be doing? (Action Plan Development)

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● Transportation Committees

» Focus on highways, transit, ITS, bike, pedestrian, and freight

» Safety usually not a primary focus

● Safety Committees

» Working knowledge of safety issues

» Knowledge of SHSP

» Focus on HSIP or 402 planning and funding

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● Identify and meet statewide and regional safety

stakeholders (4 E’s)

● Invite safety representatives to join existing committees or

develop a new safety committee

● Make safety a regular agenda item during meetings

● Collaborate to identify and define the role of safety planners in

the transportation planning process

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Invite safety stakeholders

to join MPO and DOT committees

● Regional Transportation Safety Stakeholders Group

» Federal Highway Administration, Arizona Department of

Transportation, Arizona Department of Public Safety, AAA

Arizona, AARP, Arizona State University, and 17 local agencies

● Provide Guidance on Safety Plan and LRTP

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● Safety is a primary planning factor, but it is not always given

equal consideration in the LRTP vision, goals, and objectives

» It is implied rather than explicitly stated

» SHSP goals are simply adopted,

but not customized

» Objectives are not developed,

which provide the framework

for project selection and performance

measure selection

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● Establish safety as a priority early in the process

● Identify the necessary resources (e.g., data, tools) and partnerships

to comprehensively develop safety as a goal with measurable

objectives

● Demonstrate key safety needs to the public, stakeholders, and

decision-makers (use maps, crash data, etc.)

● Use the SHSP emphasis areas as a guide

● Review the relevant safety goals, policies, and strategies in

standalone transportation plans or safety plans

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Create a vision, goal(s), and accompanying objectives inclusive

of safety to set the stage for identifying safer programs and projects

● Sample Vision – The region’s multimodal transportation

system will be safe, efficient, accessible, and affordable

● Sample Goal – Increase the safety of the transportation

system for motorized and nonmotorized users

● Sample Objectives

» Improve safety on facilities and in operations

» Reduce roadway and multimodal crashes

» Increase safety at transit stops and intermodal stations

and connections

» Implement Safe Routes to School program

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● The SHSP and stand alone safety plans are critical documents but

are:

» Strategic plans with targeted strategies

» Focused on safety specific countermeasures

» Do not identify strategies to better integrate safety into future

transportation projects

● The LRTP often does not identify strategies to better integrate safety

into future transportation projects

» References SHSP or regional stand alone safety plan

» Assumes safety will be considered during design phase

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● Collaborate with stakeholders to identify the key multimodal

safety needs, beyond those established in the SHSP

● Establish transportation safety goals for highways, transit, bicycle

and pedestrian facilities, freight, etc with specific objectives

● Expand upon SHSP strategies and actions

● Consider safety elements, in addition to other factors such as

mobility, accessibility, sustainability, etc., when developing goals,

objectives, strategies, and actions in planning documents

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Consider safety in the context

of ALL transportation issue areas

● Adopted applicable goals

from SHSP and customized

strategies to meet

regional needs

● Developed additional goals

and strategies in LRTP to meet

all safety needs

» Pedestrian safety is not in the

SHSP, but is an important

regional transportation

safety need

● Stand-Alone Pedestrian Plan

has a strong safety focus

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● States and MPOs will generally track one or more of the

following measures

» Number of fatalities/fatal crashes

» Number of serious injuries/serious injury crashes

» Fatality rate (fatalities per 100M VMT)

» Serious injury rate (serious injuries per 100M VMT)

» Crash rate (crashes per 100M VMT)

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● Reach agreement on the issues that need to be measured

(refer to goals and objectives)

● Identify candidate performance measures

● Determine if the data exist to support the candidate

performance measure

● Collect and analyze the data for developing achievable safety

performance measures

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● Determine whether to invest in data collection

● Ensure a strategic data collection plan is in place with

appropriate quality assurance/ quality control procedures

● Assign responsibility for data collection, analysis, and tracking

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Develop and align performance measures based on

the safety elements of the planning goals and objectives

Goal – Increase the safety of the

transportation system for motorized

and nonmotorized users

Measure of

Effectiveness

Objective – Improve safety on facilities

and in operations

Level of investment in safety projects

Objective – Reduce roadway and

multimodal crashes

Number of accidents (highway, bicycle,

and pedestrian)

Objective – Increase safety at transit stops

and intermodal stations and connections

Number of accidents at transit stops

and stations

Objective – Implement Safe Routes to

School program

Implementation of Safe Routes to

School programs

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● Data should be used to inform the goals, objectives,

strategies, and performance measures, but difficulties include

» Data inaccuracies

» It is difficult to convey to the public

» It can deter a proactive approach to safety – shows where the

problems are now

» May differ amongst agencies, lowering level of trust

» Data do not match public preferences

» Analysis tools may be lacking or expertise to use them

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● Identify available data at the state, regional, and local levels

● Identify data gaps, e.g., what are the perceived needs and are

data available to support these needs?

● Develop a data collection strategy

● Develop formats to demonstrate the data in meetings

● Use the data to focus on the top needs to support goal and

objective development

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Collect crash and injury data to

identify the key transportation safety needs

● Determine what safety analysis tools are available and which

are most appropriate for your agency

● Leverage existing analysis capabilities within the state

● Publish the results of the analysis annually to educate

stakeholders, the public, and decision-makers

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Identify and select the data analysis

tool most relevant to your needs

● Highway Safety Manual

» SafetyAnalyst

» Interactive Highway Safety

Design Model (IHSDM)

» Crash Modification Factor

(CMF) Clearinghouse

● Proven Safety

Countermeasures

● Systemic Approach

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FHWA 9 Proven Safety

Countermeasures

● Safety Edge

● Road Safety Audits (RSAs)

● Rumble Strips and

Rumble Stripes

● Median Barriers

● Roundabouts

● Left- and Right-Turn Lanes

● Yellow Change Intervals

● Median and Pedestrian

Refuge Areas

● Walkways

● Bicycle goal – Increase the mobility, accessibility,

and safety of bicycle users in the region/state

● Bicycle objectives – Improve on-road

bicycle facilities

● Short-term bicycle safety strategies –

Install low-cost countermeasures at

high-crash locations

● Long-term bicycle safety strategies – Identify ways to incorporate

bicycle improvements at new developments

● Performance measures – Number of bicycle fatalities

● Prioritization – A bike project has a better opportunity to advance if

it also decreases the number of bicycle crashes

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● The safety goals and objectives are not well defined,

precluding safety from being a strong consideration during project

prioritization

● Safety projects are identified and ranked only against other

safety projects

● Safety factors are not considered in the context of all transportation

projects

● Safety is considered in the design stage, not the planning and

project prioritization stage

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● Ensure the established ranking or scoring system for

transportation projects reflects safety

● Clearly state the goals and objectives of the plan in project

solicitation forms and the ranking criteria for each element

(including safety)

● Explain to the community the purpose and importance of the

safety rating to ensure community buy-in

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Weight safety equally with other planning factors

when prioritizing transportation projects

● Including safety in the decision process for transportation

project selection

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Does the project address or help address a

safety concern?

Project

Scoring

The project clearly addresses a significant

road-safety concern

16 points

The project improves safety 10 points

It is not clear if the project will improve road safety 4 points

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● Technical Selection Criteria

● Highways (25 points)

» Crash Rate/Frequency

» Crash Severity

» Incident Management

● Transit (15 points)

» Points on an integer scale by assigning points for every safety

feature or provision.

● Bike/Ped (25 points)

» Level of Service

» Crash History

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● Tracking progress relies on

» Data collection

» Data quality

» Data management systems

» Staff time

» Well defined performance measures

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● Identify what to track –include the identified performance measures,

as well as general progress on strategies and objectives by

goal area

● Create a tracking document to measure the desired achievements

● Discuss the evaluation results often to determine whether changes

in policies or programs are appropriate

● Regularly (at least annually) report on program and project

effectiveness to the decision-makers, stakeholders, and

partner agencies

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Monitor and evaluate system performance to refine the safety

elements of goals, objectives, and performance measures

● Track progress towards goals and objectives

(implemented strategies)

● Track progress on performance measures

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Susan Herbel

Cambridge Systematics, Inc.

sherbel@camsys.com

(202) 494-5539

Nicole Waldheim

Cambridge Systematics, Inc.

nwaldheim@camsys.com

(301) 347-9132

Pam Beer

Cambridge Systematics, Inc.

pbeer@camsys.com

(301) 347-9145

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Thanks for attending the boot camp

Keep in touch!

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