Now monthly! Streetsmart News. Vol. 9, 2019

Evidence and Insight for Better Transportation

Tools for Safety Those working in the field of transportation may be familiar with the FHWA’s Proven Safety Countermeasures . In 2008, the Federal Highways Administration began promoting certain infrastructure-oriented safety treatments and strategies that were chosen based on proven effectiveness and benefits. They are organized into three categories: road departures, intersections, and pedestrians/bicyclists as well as a crosscutting category that addresses all the above focus areas. Several of these strategies offer co-benefits of increasing physical activity and reducing greenhouse gas emissions—as a result, we will include them the beta version of Streetsmart.   A related tool is the Crash Modification Factors Clearinghouse that is funded by FHWA and maintained by the University of North Carolina Highway Safety Research Center. A crash modification factor (CMF) is a generic measure of how much a roadway treatment increases or decreases crashes after installation. Specifically, the numeric value of the CMF is the percentage of crashes that would still happen with a particular roadway treatment installed, such that 0.95 is not as great an improvement as 0.5. Any given safety countermeasure may have multiple CMFs depending on its site-specific context.   Finally, the International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP) has several tools for evaluating the safety of roads around the world. Safer Road Investment Plans include over 90 safety road improvement options that will improve a road's safety rating. Star Ratings are based on road inspection data and provide an objective measure of the level of safety that is ‘built-in’ to the road for vehicle occupants, motorcyclists, bicyclists and pedestrians. These can be completed without detailed crash data, which is often unavailable. A U.S. version, usRAP , is sponsored by the Road Safety Foundation and builds on the work of iRAP and similar regional efforts in Europe and Australia.   For those working toward zero road deaths—not just reducing serious injuries and fatalities, but eliminating them—the Vision Zero Toolbox created by the Institute of Transportation Engineers and the Vision Zero Network is a great place to look for resources. h/t to board member Dr. Steven Lavrenz for a description of CMFs and alerting us to iRAP

Safety Updates from the Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting From the Pedestrian and Bicycle Standing Committees at the Transportation Research Board (TRB) came this update about research project NCHRP 17-84 to develop pedestrian and bicycle safety performance functions (SPFs) to better inform planning, design, and operations decisions. Safety performance functions are mathematical equations that relate the number of crashes of different types to site characteristics, much like a crash modification factor. The results from this research effort will be used to update the Highway Safety Manual with regard to how it evaluates safety for pedestrians and bicyclists.   The first task of NCHRP 17-84 is to develop pedestrian and bicycle SPFs using existing exposure data—much of it from research on safety countermeasures, such as the CMF Clearinghouse. The second task is to develop an alternative risk-based approach using iRAP which predicts fatalities and serious injuries. The Highway Safety Manual and associated tools will be updated based on one or both approaches.   Another update heard at TRB is that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has recently produced the 9 th edition of Countermeasures that Work: A Highway Safety Countermeasures Guide for State Highway Safety Offices . NHTSA is also working on research related to the “safety in numbers” concept that suggests that the more pedestrians and bicyclists are out on the streets, the lower the risk for any individual pedestrian or bicyclist. Look for it this summer. Another study underway is on the impact of bicycle safety laws, due this fall.

Our proof-of-concept prototype can be found below. Take the survey to give us feedback that we will use to shape the beta version of Streetsmart, coming soon! EXPLORE OUR SITE

Recommendations for Integrating Health into Transportation We asked and you answered: how can health be better integrated into transportation? Thanks to all the participants in Streetsmart’s focus groups for sharing their challenges and lessons learned. We’ve taken feedback from the focus group and written two related articles about what we found. The first can be found in the December edition of the ITE Journal (p. 10) and the second on the online blog of Meeting of the Minds .    If you are interested in this question, watch for a report coming out from the Transportation Association of Canada about this very topic. Due this spring, Strategic Opportunities for Integrating Health and Transportation identifies seven key “integration factors” where health and transportation intersect and provides integration recommendations.

Request for People-First Mobility Case Studies The  Partnership for Active Transportation  has developed five human-centered mobility principles  to guide their work and encourage other organizations and communities to shape mobility and community design choices facing our society by putting people and places first. The five principles are: safety, streets as public space, public engagement and equity, data, and affordability.   Has your community already adopted aspects of people-first mobility? The Partnership wants to hear from you! Fill out the google form  or email the same information to patrick@railstotrails.org , and they’ll feature your community.

WHY STREETSMART? We get it. Civic leaders struggle to find the evidence they need to evaluate and prioritize transportation investments. The research is scattered, time-consuming to find, and difficult to digest. We do all the work of synthesizing the research and presenting in an intuitive and easy-to-use format, without compromising quality or rigor.  Civic leaders need to make the case for solutions that work best for their community, which sometimes requires defending innovation. Streetsmart reduces risk by providing the evidence and examples of what works in other communities. We’ve got your back.  Find success stories with key lessons learned in one easy-to-search place. Why re-invent the wheel? Streetsmart offers insight via case studies and guidebooks relevant to each topic area. Learn from others in the trenches working on issues similar to yours.

Want to help us integrate social equity concerns into Streetsmart? Get in touch to help develop a strategy for funding and developing equity principles, questions, and guidance. Got more feedback about the prototype? Take the survey or drop us a line to give us your insight. Want to collect and summarize resources for Beta? Help us collect resources and case studies on one of the fifteen strategies that will be in Streetsmart Beta. We are always looking for academic and practitioner collaborators to build and refine Streetsmart. Talk to Kelly at  Kelly@thinkstreetsmart.org  to explore the opportunities.

Streetsmart Planning |  Kelly@thinkstreetsmart.org