Methodology for the application of predictive method for road safety analysis in urban areas. The case study of Brescia

n/

Use of eye tracking device to evaluate the driver’s behaviour and the infrastructures quality in relation to road safety

Eye tracking allows to obtain important elements regarding the drivers’ behaviour during their driving activity, by employing a device that monitors the movements of the eye and therefore of the user's observation point. In this paper it will be explained how analysing the behaviour of the drivers through the eye movements permits to evaluate the infrastructures quality in terms of road safety. Driver behaviour analysis have been conducted in urban areas, examining the observation target (cars, pedestrians, road signs, distraction elements) in quantitative terms (time of fixing each singular target). In particular, roundabout intersections and rectilinear segment of urban arterials have been examined and the records related to seven drivers’ behaviour were collected, in order to have a significant statistical variability. Only young people has considered in this study. The analyses carried out have made it possible to assess how different types of infrastructure influence the behaviour of road users, in terms of safety performance given by their design. In particular, quantitative analyzes were carried out on driving times dedicated to observing attention rather than distraction targets. From a statistical point of view, the relationship that exists between the characteristics of the driver, weather conditions and infrastructure, with driving behavior (traveling speed and attention / inattention time) was analyzed by ANOVA method

Battery Electric Buses or Fuel Cell Electric Buses? A Decarbonization Case Study in the City of Brescia, Italy

Nowadays, designing and adopting sustainable and greener transport systems is of upmost interest. The European Commission and different EU countries are developing plans and programs—but also delivering resources—aimed at the decarbonization of cities and transport by 2030. In this paper, the case study of the city of Brescia, a city of about 200,000 inhabitants located in northern Italy, is addressed. Specifically, a preliminary operational and financial feasibility study is performed assuming the replacement of the entire compressed natural gas (CNG) powered bus fleet of a specific line; the two alternatives considered are battery electric buses (BEBs) and fuel cell electric buses (FCEBs). For the comparison and evaluation of the two alternatives, specific economic parameters of the three alternatives (BEB, FCEB and the current solution CNGB) were considered: CAPEX (CAPital EXpenditure) and OPEX (OPerational EXpenditure). This allowed us to determine the TCO (total cost of ownership) and TCRO (total cost and revenues of ownership) along three annuities (2022, 2025 and 2030). For the BEB alternative, the TCO and TCRO values are between EUR 0.58/km and EUR 0.91/km. In the case of the FCEB solution, the values of TCO and TCRO are between EUR 1.75/km and EUR 2.15/km. Considering the current CNGB solution, the TCO and TCRO values range between EUR 1.43/km and EUR 1.51/km

Assessing the Risk of Bus Crashes in Transit Systems

Although public transport buses may be considered a safe transportation mode, bus safety is a crucial issue from the perspectives of operators, passengers and local authorities owing to the relevant implications it generates. Therefore, assessing the risk of crashes on bus routes may help improve the safety performance of transit operators. Much research has identified patterns of bus crashes to understand the effects of many factors on the frequency and the severity of them. Conversely, to the best of our knowledge, the research measuring the risk of crashes in bus transit networks is seldom faced. This paper adjusts existing methods to assess the safety on bus transit networks by the integration of safety factors, prediction models and risk methods. More recisely, first, the methodology identifies several safety factors as well as the exposure risk factors. Second, this methodology specifies the risk components in terms of frequency, severity and exposure factors that may affect bus crashes and models their relationships in a risk function. Third, this methodology computes the risk of crashes for each route and provides a ranking of safety performance. A real case study demonstrates the feasibility of this methodology using 3,457 bus crashes provided by a mid-sized Italian bus operator. This experiment shows that transit managers could adopt this methodology to perform an accurate safety analysis on each route. Moreover, this methodology could be implemented in a road traffic safety management system in order to evaluate the risk of crashes on routes, monitor the safety performance of each route and qualify each route according to recent safety norms

Can Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans be Mega-projects? Evidence from the City of Brescia, Italy

In the field of Transport Engineering, megaprojects are typically major infrastructure works that require a long planning and design phase and significant resources to be realized. However, considering the several definitions of megaprojects available in technical-scientific literature, one may consider mega-projects from another point of view: according to a systemic perspective, a megaproject could also be a master project including several sub-projects that, all together, compose a wider system. Likewise, Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMP) can be associated with the master-project that draws specific strategies to enhance urban mobility efficiency, by implementing and coordinating several transport and infrastructure projects (e.g., Mass Rapid Transits, cycling infrastructure, road infrastructure, etc.). Having this in mind, the aim of the paper is to read Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans as a mega-project. Specifically, the case study of the city of Brescia (Italy) considered and analyzed to provide a comparison among the characteristics of a mega-project and the ones of a SUMP. Indeed, the Plan include several transport interventions (i.e., a tramway line, a Bus Rapid Transit, and others) over a time span of 10–20 years that together require investments of more than 1 billion euros and will have great impact over people, places, and environment

Bus crash risk evaluation: An adjusted framework and its application in a real network

Greater attention to bus safety can lead to relevant benefits for public transport companies in terms of higher service performance, reliability, and lower insurance costs. Therefore, measuring the crash risk on bus routes provides an opportunity to improve the safety performance of transit operators. Previous research has explored the effects of many factors regarding the frequency and severity of bus crashes, whereas only a handful of studies have defined some crash risk indexes. Conversely, to the best of our knowledge, almost no research has been done regarding the crash risk in the bus transit network that integrates frequency, severity, and the exposure factors. This paper proposes a new framework to assess the crash risk for each transit bus route by the integration of safety factors, prediction models and risk methods. More precisely, this framework identifies several safety factors and specifies the risk components in terms of frequency, severity and exposure factors that may affect bus crashes. Then, it models their relationships to build a bus crash risk function. Lastly, according to the values returned by the previous function, the crash risk for each route is computed and a safety performance ranking for each route is provided. The feasibility of this framework is demonstrated in a real case study by using bus crash data provided by a mid-sized Italian bus operator. The findings show that transit managers could implement this framework in a road traffic safety management system to evaluate the risk of crashes on routes, monitor the safety performance of each route and qualify each route according to recent safety norms

Estimating operating speed for county road segments – Evidence from Italy

Vehicle operating speed is a crucial factor for road safety, as it strictly affects occurrence and severity of crashes. Usually, 85th percentile of the operating speed distributions (i.e., V85) in free-flow traffic condition is widely accepted as a base value of consistency evaluation for homogenous portion of existing roads. Although the computation of V85 is simple, many road authorities cannot collect speed data for each road. Therefore, providing prediction models could be a useful tool to investigate the relationship between V85 and road characteristics. The literature proposed several models to account it. However, to the best of our knowledge, the effects of some road geometric characteristics, road markings and signs, traffic data, type of terrain and the simultaneous consideration of different road categories on the V85 prediction were not completely analyzed. This paper fills this gap by isolating key variables that mostly affect V85. In doing so, 60 000+ car spot speed data were collected along the county road network of the province of Brescia (Italy), and then processed by multiple regression models. The main findings show that V85 increases owing to the presence of a wider or paved shoulder, visible road median markings, a higher number of lanes and a higher percentage of cars with respect to the total traffic flow. Conversely, V85 decreases as the road axis curvature, the number of accesses and rate of forbidden overtaking increase. In addition, the presence of visible road external markings and the surrounding mountainous terrain contribute to decreasing V85. The overall findings may support road authorities to verify roads’ operating conditions and, possibly, adjust the speed limits, especially for existing roads