Roadway Lighting Shows Safety Benefits at Rural Intersections
Publication: Journal of Transportation Engineering
Volume 136, Issue 11
Abstract
Intersection-related crashes account for approximately 31% of fatal crashes in Minnesota and roughly 37% of those occurred at night, dusk, or dawn. Nationally, intersection-related fatal crashes accounted for 21% of all fatal crashes and 40% of those crashes occurred during dark, dusk, or dawn light conditions while only 25–33% of the vehicle miles traveled occur at night. Furthermore, Minnesota experienced 70% of its fatal crashes in rural areas, as compared to 58% nationally. As a result, rural intersections at night are at higher risk for fatal crashes than other locations in Minnesota. This research was part of Research Rep. No. MN/RC-2006-35, “Safety impacts of street lighting at isolated rural intersections—Part II.” This research evaluated the effectiveness of roadway lighting in reducing nighttime crashes at isolated rural intersections. A before-and-after study was used to evaluate the impact of lighting at 33 intersections with 3 years of before data and 3 years of after data. A Poisson regression model evaluated the change in the expected number of crashes after installation of lighting. Crash rate was calculated using this information and used to compare day versus night since volumes are expected to differ. Results indicated that the night crash rate was 37% lower after lighting was installed and was statistically significant. The change in daytime crash rate from the before to after period was 4% but was not statistically significant indicating that there was no overall change in crash rate during the analysis period due to other factors.
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Acknowledgments
The writers gratefully acknowledge the funding and support of the Mn/DOT (Dan Warzala and Loren Hill), the LRRB (Roger Gustafson), and the Midwest Transportation Consortium (MTC) at Iowa State University for partial student support. The writers also wish to thank all of the counties that participated in the survey. Additionally, the writers thank the Iowa State University Department of Statistics for their valuable assistance and insight. The writers would also like to thank Michael Pawlovich of the Iowa DOT for his assistance.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Transportation Engineering
Volume 136 • Issue 11 • November 2010
Pages: 949 - 955
Copyright
© 2010 ASCE.
History
Received: Jun 23, 2009
Accepted: Apr 6, 2010
Published online: Apr 14, 2010
Published in print: Nov 2010
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