Abstract
Data on accidents, road characteristics, and traffic for rural, two-lane roads in seven states have been assembled. It was found that, for the same amount of traffic, different states record widely discrepant numbers of accidents. The discrepancy does not disappear even when roads with the same lane width, shoulder type, and terrain are examined. It is concluded that (a) data from different states should not be pooled, (b) warrants and standards based on accidents should be tailored to each state, and (c) the cause of the noted differences should be investigated. This paper appears in transportation research record no. 1238, Application and management of accident data.