The research’s main purpose was to develop a model, known here as the Visionary Research Model, to identify research needs and priorities needed to create safe traffic environments. The car/pedestrian conflict situation was chosen to explore and demonstrate the model’s potential. The structure of the conceptual model has a pedestrian at the centre of five concentric layers of protection. Collectively, these layers aim to manage crash and injury risk so as to avoid death or serious injury to the pedestrian in traffic. The five layers target various forms of threat to the pedestrian. The protective layers seek to: avoid collisions in which the biomechanical limits of humans to violent forces are exceeded; manage the transfer of kinetic energy from car to pedestrian at impact; minimise the amount of kinetic energy at impact; minimise the risk of a crash for a given level of exposure; and minimise the risk of a crash as a function of exposure. Though well developed in its conceptual form, the Visionary Research Model requires further research and development of its mathematical capability to enable changes in risk as a result of countermeasure application to be quantified. (Author/publisher)
Abstract