Where?
Most wrong-way driving crashes occur on motorways, but that is inherent to the definition that specifies that there must be separated driving directions. Entering the motorway via the exit and turning on the motorway are the two most common scenarios leading to wrong-way driving [2] [3] [14]. In addition Xing [15] also mentions driving away from a parking lot in the wrong direction (12% of the wrong-way driving crashes in Japan). In Germany, however, this percentage is much lower (1.5% [2] ).
Blokpoel & De Niet [3] report that in the years 1983 to 1998 almost 80% of the wrong-way driving crashes in the Netherlands occur on the main roadway, more than 15% on the access and exit, and about 5% on the access lane or exit lane. The wrong-way driving crashes that occur on the main roadway lead to significantly more severe injury than crashes that take place on the access/exit. Doctor [14] reports that in the United States 42% of the wrong-way driving crashes on the main roadway result in fatal or serious injury; for wrong-way driving crashes on the access/exit this is 6%.
When?
Most wrong-way driving crashes occur in the evening, night and early morning. Between 1983 and 1998, this was that the case in the Netherlands in more than 65% of the wrong-way driving crashes [3]. International research also shows that a relatively high number of crashes occur in the evening and at night and especially at weekend nights.
On French motorways 50 to 60% of the wrong-way driving crashes occur at night [5]. In the United States more than three quarters of crashes occur between 6 pm and 6 am [7]. Zhou et al. [9] report that in the State of Illinois 51% of the wrong-way driving crashes occur between midnight and 5 am, and 43% at weekend nights. Also based on data from the United States, Doctor [14] indicates that 31% of the wrong-way driving crashes occur between midnight and 3 am and 57% occur at the weekend. Based on Swiss data, Scaramuzza & Cavegn [6] report that the risk of a wrong-way driving crash is almost two times greater in the dark.
