Performance measures will drive highway safety
The proverb avers: failing to plan is planning to fail." So true. The Federal Highway Adminstration has a new Primer on Safety Performance Measures for the Transportation Planning Process . It's worth a read.
Recently, the American Highway Users Alliance issued an important report on the economic costs caused by the paralysis or congestion caused by failed snowfighting efforts . It mirrors results from earlier studies (1999 and 2004) commissioned by the Salt Institute.
The new FHWA report points out that these economic costs of impaired mobility are overshadowed by the economic savings generated by safe roads. Safety benefits in 85 US metro areas are 1.3 to 4 times greater than congestion costs. Again, the Salt Institute has commissioned the definitive study of the safety benefits of proper winter maintenance, the Marquette Report .
As you read this report, we hope you'll be struck with two facts: 1) performance measures are what drives performance by making possible an understanding of the difference which different interventions produce and 2) that the current crop of performance measures are too blunt an instrument for the delicate operation of timely and effective winter maintenance. The state and federal databases being used may be suitable for many purposes, but their infrequent updating renders then useless for snowfighting planning and operations management. They measure most of the right variables, but an annual figure identifying an at-risk location is inadequate to identify the relationship between, for example, severe winter weather and the consequent snowfighting operations and the safety outcomes.
Special studies like the Marquette Report and a new study underway in Ontario can pinpoint the benefit of applying salt and plowing winter roads, but none of the recommended data sets can produce time- and weather/snowfighting-sensitive data.
A few years ago, a survey of state DOT Safety Management Plans found that none included snowfighting operations among the proven technologies to keep roads safe. That was a travesty then; its even worse today when ever more people depend on highways to deliver safely themselves and the goods and services they demand.
We need every jurisdiction to implement a winter operations component into their community and state/provincial roadway safety plan to identify not only WHERE crashes occur, but WHEN, as in during winter storms on untreated roads.
Comments
Log in or create a user account to comment.