THE DEVELOPMENT OF A WET WEATHER SAFETY INDEX, WWSIE, IS PRESENTED. WWSIE IS AN EMPIRICAL FORMULATION BASED ON PREDICTION EQUATIONS FOR WET ACCIDENT RATES. THESE EQUATIONS WERE DERIVED BY MULTIPLE REGRESSION TECHNIQUES FROM A SURVEY OF 68 HIGHWAY SEGMENTS IN TEXAS. THESE SEGMENTS COVERED A RANGE OF WET ACCIDENT RATES FROM ZERO TO 40 ACCIDENTS PER YEAR PER MILE. IN GENERAL, MUCH HIGHER VALUES OF WET ACCIDENT RATES ARE OBSERVED IN URBAN AREAS THAN IN RURAL AREAS. ALSO, THE SENSITIVITY TO PAVEMENT SKID RESISTANCE IS MUCH HIGHER IN URBAN THAN IN RURAL AREAS. THE FINDINGS AND DEVELOPMENTS REPORTED WARRANT A RESTRUCTURING OF MANY STATE PROGRAMS TO REDUCE WET WEATHER ACCIDENTS. THE WET WEATHER SAFETY INDEX AND ASSOCIATED EQUATIONS REPRESENT A PRACTICAL METHOD OF PREDICTING WET ACCIDENT RATES AS A FUNCTION OF TRAFFIC, ROAD GEOMETRIC, AND PAVEMENTS SURFACE CHARACTERISTICS. THESE PREDICTIVE EQUATIONS MAY BE CAUTIOUSLY USED TO DETERMINE ACCIDENT REDUCTION DUE TO SPECIFIC REMEDIAL MEASURES. THESE NEW DEVELOPMENTS CAN BE INTEGRATED INTO A COMPREHENSIVE PLAN TO REDUCE WET WEATHER ACCIDENTS, A PLAN WHICH SHOULD GREATLY INCREASE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THOSE RESOURCES DEVOTED TO THIS OBJECTIVE.(Author/publisher).
Abstract