Highway Safety Information System Laboratory
Purpose
The Highway Safety Information System (HSIS) Laboratory
offers value to FHWA's Research and Development program, to other
offices within FHWA and DOT, to the safety research community
in general, and to State and local engineers/planners. The purpose
of the lab is to operate and maintain HSIS, to conduct research
to support FHWA's focus areas, and to provide data to a wide variety
of highway safety researchers. The HSIS lab also supports the
development and use of data collection and analytical tools for
the study of highway safety. Computerized photologs are used to
visually verify existing data and collect supplemental data through
traditional methods and advanced techniques, such as image recognition
algorithms, and GIS-based tools applied to display and analyze
safety data.
Description
HSIS is a database for which eight States (California,
Illinois, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, Utah, and
Washington) provide crash, roadway inventory, traffic, driver,
vehicle, and other information that can be linked to analysis
files for a wide spectrum of safety studies. Research performed
at the HSIS Laboratory is conducted with advanced computer hardware
and software. The laboratory contains the HSIS database, consisting
of data collected by eight States on more than 5 million crashes,
as well as inventory and traffic volume data for approximately
165,000 miles of highway, and videodisc photologs for certain
States and Geographical Information System (GIS) applications.
Lab Value
The Highway Safety Information System (HSIS) is a multi-state
database in which crash, roadway inventory, traffic, driver, vehicle,
and other information can be linked into analysis files for a
wide range of safety studies. HSIS differs significantly from
the Fatal Analysis Reporting System (FARS) and General Estimation
System (GES), the two other DOT national databases. These systems,
based on crash data supplemented by roadway inventory data at
the crash site, are by definition records of "failures"
(crash sites) in the system. HSIS answers questions regarding
the relationships of roadway design and operations with safety
where both roadway and traffic information for the "failures"
and the "successes" (sites with very few or no crashes)
must be present in the database. The lab is unique in the sense
that it contains the only "national" linkable database
that contains common identifiers on crashes, roadway inventory,
and exposure, which allows one to associate the risk of crashes
with roadway and traffic variables. Also, the lab has computerized
photologs for certain states and Geographical Information System
(GIS) applications.
Products and Services
Performed safety evaluation of continuous shoulder rumble strips
installed on freeways.
Analyzed
the effects of airbags on severity indices for roadside objects.
Studied
accident models for rural two-lane roads, segments, and intersections.
Studied
the relationship between safety and the geometric design consistency
measures for rural two-lane highways.
Studied
accidents on secondary roads and countermeasures.
Researched
safety effects of the conversion of two-lane rural highways to
four-lane highways.
Identified
safety effects of cross-section design for rural, four-lane, non-freeway
highways.
Studied
accident models for rural intersections -- four-lane by two-lane,
stop-controlled, and two-lane signalized intersections.
Studied
statistical models of at-grade intersections.
Studied
statistical models of accidents on interchange ramps and speed-change
lanes.
Analyzed
accident causes and potential countermeasures related to large
trucks on two-lane roads.
Evaluated
truck crashes using GIS-based crash referencing and analysis system.
Studied
truck rollover crashes on ramps.
Investigated
injury severity in truck/passenger-car rear-end collisions.
Analyzed
injury and non-injury crashes in California work zones.
Studied
effects of tow-away reporting threshold on crash analysis results.
Investigated
National Highway System roadways in the HSIS States.
Technical Assistance to FHWA Field Offices and State DOTs
Investigated
rollover crashes (former FHWA Region 8 Office, FHWA Utah Division,
Utah DOT).
Identified
highway-related problems on Illinois roadways -- a comparative
analysis (FHWA Illinois Division and Illinois DOT).
Presented
preliminary findings of "Safety Effects of Upgrading Two-Lane
Rural Highways to Four-Lane Rural Non-Freeways" (FHWA Montana
Division and Montana DOT).
Analyzed
technical issues related to upgrading two-lane rural highways
to four-lane rural non-freeways (FHWA Connecticut Division and
Connecticut DOT).
Summarized
statistics of pedestrian/bicycle crashes (Florida DOT).
Created
crash severity tables by roadway class (Caltrans).
Technical Assistance to FHWA's
Core Business Units
Prepared
tables showing statistics for large trucks striking the underside
of bridges.
Prepared
tables showing statistics for vehicle-train collisions.
Studied
large truck rollover crashes on ramps.
Lab Partners
Partners who recently used HSIS include: National Transportation
Safety Board (NTSB), National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
(NHTSA), University of Montana, University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill, Western Transportation Institute, Texas Transportation
Institute, North Carolina State University, URBITRAN, Virginia
Polytechnic Institute and State University, SAIC, Dowling College,
General Motors, Last Resource Inc., University of Iowa, and international
researchers.
Current Projects
Validating
crash-prediction algorithm for
Interactive Highway Safety Design Model.
Studying
the effects of lane reductions/conversions on pedestrian, bicycle,
and motor vehicle crashes.
Studying
the safety effects of narrow lanes/ shoulders on freeways.
Developing
a base model for IHSDM rural multilane non-freeway segments.
Developing
new GIS safety analysis tools.
Expertise
The lab combines the expertise of a relational database
manager, statisticians, and transportation engineers.
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