A significant proportion of road crashes occur on urban arterial roads including those that lead to fatalities and serious injuries. Vulnerable road users are particularly at risk on these roads, while intersection crashes are typically high risk locations. Urban arterial roads cover a variety of environments including high speed roads (80 km/h), strip shopping centres and school zones with lower speed limits (e.g. 40 km/h) and have a mix of road users and functions. The key aim of this project was to identify effective measures for speed and crash management on urban arterial roads while taking into account the different road environments, functions and the presence of vulnerable road users. This Compendium of Good Practice provides information on speed and crash effectiveness, indicative costs, applicability, and current uses for 27 engineering-based treatments on urban arterial roads at intersections and midblocks. An inclusive definition has been used for urban arterial roads in this study, with information on treatments provided for ‘higher traffic volume’ roads. While the focus is on engineering (infrastructure) measures, some information on non-engineering-based treatments (e.g. enforcement, in-vehicle systems, road user education, and publicity) is also provided for completeness. Similarly, some information on speed management measures in work and school zones is provided. The Compendium embraces the Safe System approach to road safety, seeking to ensure, wherever practicable, that the measures (either as a stand-alone treatment or in combination) will lower the operating speed at intersections and midblock sections to Safe System speeds. Both the incidence and severity of crashes on urban arterial roads are likely to be reduced as a result. The underlying principles of the treatments types are set out in Section 5. Each treatment is then discussed in more detail in Appendix A, where every effort has been made to provide robust performance data, including on likely speed and crash reduction. However, the list of measures should not be seen as exhaustive and gaps were found in the information on implementation of such measures and their evaluation. Most of the measures are adaptations of successful local area traffic management (LATM) measures put forward for application on busier and faster-flowing roads. Applying any treatment requires professional judgement and local knowledge. Further, where combinations of treatments are considered, recognising that trade-offs and compromises might be required is also important. Commonly applied treatments include roundabouts, horizontal deflection on approach and lower speed limits at intersections; and pedestrian refuges, medians and variable speed limit signs at midblocks. Several emerging treatments were identified as having considerable potential for effective long-term usage, namely signalised roundabouts, turbo roundabouts, and road diets, raised intersections, wombat crossings, and raised platforms at midblocks and dwell-on-red signals. The effectiveness measures for some of the treatments, based on existing literature, were less reliable and so the information provided in the Compendium is supported by evaluations of a number of these treatments (road diets, raised intersections, wombat crossings, raised platforms at midblocks and dwell-on-red signals). This project strengthens the need for on-going robust evaluation of any measures implemented, and particularly for innovative measures. (Author/publisher)
Samenvatting