Using a comprehensive database of police-reported accidents in Hawaii, wedescribe the nature of pedestrian accidents over the period 2002-2005 Approximately 36% of the accidents occur in residential areas, while another34% occur in business areas. Only 41.7% of the pedestrian accidents occurat intersections. More pedestrian crashes occur at non-intersection locatin including midblock locations, driveways, parking lots, and other off roadway locations. Approximately 38.2% of the crashes occur at crosswalk locations, while proportionately more (61.8%) of the pedestrian accidents occur at non-crosswalk locations. Using this database the human, temporal, roadway, and environmental factors associated with being at-fault for both pedestrians and drivers are also examined. Using techniques of logisticregression, several different explanatory models are constructed, to identify the factors associated with crashes producing fatalities and serious injuries. Finally, two pedestrian models (drunk males and young boys) and one driver model (male commuters) are developed to provide further understanding of pedestrian accident causation. Drunk male pedestrians who were jaywalking were in excess of 10x more likely than other groups to be at-fault in pedestrian accidents. Young boys in residential areas were also morelikely to be at-fault. Male commuters in business areas in the morning were also found to have higher odds of being classified at-fault when involved in pedestrian accidents. The results of this study indicate that there should be a combination of enforcement and educational programs implemented for both the pedestrian and drivers to show those at-fault the consequences of their actions, and to reduce the overall number of accidents. (A) Reprinted with permission from Elsevier.
Abstract