All too often, engineering strategies aimed at improving road safety are reactions to existing problems that occur after a road has been designed and built. Targeting problem locations and developing plans to reduce collisions are vital and have proven to be very successful. Transportation professionals, however, should also take a proactive approach to address road safety before problems emerge. This paper describes an evolving need of how to deal with road safety in a proactive manner. Although a proactive approach should improve the overall safety performance, there is currently a poor understanding of how to proactively plan for road safety. Several logistical and technical obstacles hinder the effective planning for road safety. Each of these obstacles is presented in detail, followed by a description of the opportunity to overcome each obstacle. The paper also includes the results of a case study used to demonstrate the proposed process. A proactive approach to road safety complements traditional, reactive methods currently in use. Significant progress will be realized once safety professionals shift their focus from fixing existing problems to helping plan roads that attempt to be problem free. The net result should be a safer road system. (Author/publisher)
Abstract