How To Make Two Lane Rural Roads Safer

When accidents happen, drivers are blamed for the mishap. When drivers consistently fail at certain locations, it then becomes obvious that the problem lies not with them, but with the geometry of the road itself. Because accidents are not evenly distributed throughout the road network, locations with high accident rates are a clear indication that there are other factors involved, besides driver error, which are characterized by the road itself. In most countries, two-lane rural roads make up about 90 percent of rural networks and they account for over 60 percent of highway fatalities worldwide, approximately 500,000 people per year. The methodology described in this book will support the achievement of quantified measures of: design consistency; operating speed consistency; and, driving dynamic consistency. The safety criteria are then combined into an overall safety module for a simplified general overview of the safety evaluation process. The authors also encourage the coordination of safety concerns with important economic, environmental and aesthetic considerations. This book will be an invaluable aid to educators, students, consultants, highway engineers and administrators, as well as scientists in the fields of highway design and traffic safety engineering.

This reference book communicates the basic theoretical knowledge, the practical requirements and experience for designing, mapping, calculating and checking roads and the planning process overall and at the same time reveals important development trends. The book is guided by the current rules and regulations in Germany, it universalizes this knowledge and also integrates important current research results in road design processes. In order to restrict the scope of the book, it only deals with the theoretical principles and knowledge, and the practical experience for designing rural roads, i.e. the special features of urban roads are not mentioned here. This clear separation primarily results from the different principles and rules and regulations. The terms, definitions, abbreviations and formula symbols are based on German usage, but can be transferred to an international framework without any difficulties. The work is particularly designed to be a course book for students of road design. As a reference book, it supports the ongoing training process for road transportation engineers in planning offices and public bodies. Any specialist working in the transportation sector can use it as a reference book.

Rural roads constitute the most dangerous road category with regard to the number of fatal accidents. In order to increase traffic safety on rural roads it is necessary to take into account not only their inherent properties but also their effect on behaviour. Gert Weller develops a psychological model for driving on rural roads which is validated in three empirical steps: laboratory, simulator and driving experiments. His results provide insight into the possibilities of how driving behaviour on rural roads can be influenced and give practical guidance for the enhancement of rural road safety. The book is written for psychologists in the fields of traffic psychology and human factors research, traffic engineers, road planners as well as for political decision makers in traffic planning departments.

Transportation asset management delivers efficient and cost-effective investment decisions to support transportation infrastructure and system usage performance measured in economic, social, health, and environmental terms. It can be applied at national, state, and local levels. This distinctive book addresses asset management for multimodal transportation, taking account of system component interdependency, integration, and risk and uncertainty. It sets out rigorous quantitative and qualitative methods for addressing system goals, performance measures, and needs; data collection and management; performance modeling; project evaluation, selection, and trade-off analysis; innovative financing; and institutional issues. It applies as easily to static traffic and time-dependent or dynamic traffic which exists on a more local level. It is written for transportation planners, engineers, and academia, as well as a growing number of graduate students taking transportation asset management courses.