An Overview of System Design Issues Related to Safety Aspects of Bicycle Infrastructure

The purpose of this report is to provide a critical review of the current practices and policies regarding infrastructure design for bicycling. The infrastructure is discussed primarily from a system perspective. The wide range of bicyclists’ physical characteristics (such as size, power, skill, response to road and traffic conditions) makes it challenging for the designer to design bicycle facilities with the same sophistication and safety as facilities for motor vehicles. An attempt should be made to integrate the design standards for motor vehicles and bicycles into common design manuals. Incompatibility of the standards may make it clear when separate facilities for bicyclists should be considered and when bicyclists should not be allowed on a road. Bicycling has been promoted based substantially on health benefits and the reduction of environmental impact without stating the risks of injury and death as well as musculoskeletal injuries resulting from overuse. This has led to an increase in the provision of bike paths and bicycle lanes, including re-designating general traffic lanes to exclusive use by bicyclists. A study1 showed that it is more cost-efficient to remove pollutants by allocating funds to improve traffic flow and public transportation than allocating those funds to some bicycle facilities. Re-designating general-use traffic lanes as bike lanes could also cause congestion, which could increase air pollution. Consideration should be given to promote bicycling for exercise and recreation on trails and to prohibit bicycling in areas where large differences in speed and crossing maneuvers at high speed could occur, such as in the vicinity of busy traffic interchanges. It is the author’s view that the way in which safety improvements for bicyclists is approached should be fundamentally changed. Decreasing fatalities and injuries should be considered for the transportation system as a whole instead of trying to decrease the fatalities and injuries to bicyclists alone by implementing countermeasures

Issues Related to the Emergence of the Information Superhighway and California Societal Changes, IISTPS Report 96-4

The Norman Y. Mineta International Institute for Surface Transportation Policy Studies (IISTPS) at San José State University (SJSU) conducted this project to review the continuing development of the Internet and the Information Superhighway. Emphasis was placed on an examination of the impact on commuting and working patterns in California, and an analysis of how public transportation agencies, including Caltrans, might take advantage of the new communications technologies. The document reviews the technology underlying the current Internet “structure” and examines anticipated developments. It is important to note that much of the research for this limited-scope project was conducted during 1995, and the topic is so rapidly evolving that some information is almost automatically “dated.” The report also examines how transportation agencies are basically similar in structure and function to other business entities, and how they can continue to utilize the emerging technologies to improve internal and external communications. As part of a detailed discussion of specific transportation agency functions, it is noted that the concept of a “Roundtable Forum,” growing out of developments in Concurrent Engineering, can provide an opportunity for representatives from multiple jurisdictions to utilize the Internet for more coordinated decision-making. The report also included an extensive analysis of demographic trends in California in recent years, such as commute and recreational activities, and identifies how the emerging technologies may impact future changes

An Approach for Actions to Prevent Suicides on Commuter and Metro Rail Systems in the United States, MTI Report 12-33

The primary goals of this report are to discuss measures to prevent suicides on commuter and metro rail systems, and to outline an approach for suicide prevention on rail systems. Based on existing literature and analysis of data obtained from the Metrolink system in Southern California, it was found that most suicides occur near station platforms and near access points to the track. Suicides occurred most frequently when relatively more trains were in operation and in areas of high population density. There do not appear to be suicide “hot spots” (e.g., linked to mental hospitals in the proximity, etc.), based on data analyzed for U.S. systems. The suicide prevention measures range from relatively inexpensive signs posting call-for-help suicide hotline information to costly platform barriers that physically prevent people from jumping onto tracks in front of trains. Other prevention measures fall within this range, such as hotlines available at high frequency suicide locations, or surveillance systems that can report possible suicide attempts and provide the opportunity for intervention tactics. Because of the relatively low number of suicides on rail systems, as compared to the overall number of suicides in general, a cost-effective strategy for preventing suicides on rail systems should be approached in a very focused manner. The prevention measures executed by the rail authorities should be focused on the suicides occurring on the rail systems themselves, while the broader problem of suicides should be left to community-based prevention efforts. Moreover, prevention measures, such as surveillance and response, could “piggyback” on surveillance and response systems used for other purposes on the rail systems to make such projects economically feasible

Bikesharing and Bicycle Safety

The growth of bikesharing in the United States has had a transformative impact on urban transportation. Major cities have established large bikesharing systems, including Boston, Chicago, Denver, Minneapolis-Saint Paul, New York City, Salt Lake City, the San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle, Washington DC, and others. These systems began operating as early as 2010, and no fatalities have occurred within the US as of this writing. However, three have happened in North America—two in Canada and one in Mexico. Bikesharing has some qualities that appear inherently unsafe for bicyclists. Most prominently, helmet usage is documented to be quite low in most regions. Bikesharing is also used by irregular bicyclists who are less familiar with the local terrain. In this study, researchers take a closer look at bikesharing safety from qualitative and quantitative perspectives. Through a series of four focus groups, they discussed bikesharing usage and safety with bikesharing members and nonmembers in the Bay Area. They further engaged experts nationwide from a variety of fields to evaluate their opinions and perspectives on bikesharing and safety. Finally, researchers conducted an analysis of bicycle and bikesharing activity data, as well as bicycle and bikesharing collisions to evaluate injury rates associated with bikesharing when compared with benchmarks of personal bicycling. The data analysis found that collision and injury rates for bikesharing are lower than previously computed rates for personal bicycling. Experts and focus group participants independently pointed to bikesharing rider behavior and bikesharing bicycle design as possible factors. In particular, bikesharing bicycles are generally designed in ways that promote stability and limited speeds, which mitigate the conditions that contribute to collisions. Data analysis also explored whether there was evidence of a “safety in numbers benefit” that resulted from bikesharing activity. However, no significant impact from bikesharing activity on broader bicycle collisions could be found within the regions in which they operate. Discussion and recommendations are presented in the conclusion

Suicides on Commuter Rail in California: Possible Patterns — A Case Study, Research Report 10-05

Suicides on rail systems constitute a significant social concern. Reports in local media, whether in newspapers, television, or radio, have brought awareness to this very sensitive and personal subject. This is also true for the San Francisco Bay Area. These events also cause severe trauma for the train operators and staff of the system as well as disruption and cost to society. The overall objective of this project was to conduct a pilot study to identify possible patterns in suicides associated with urban commuter rail systems in California. The Caltrain commuter rail system in the San Francisco Bay Area was used as the subject system for the pilot study. The primary intent of the data analysis was to determine whether suicides along the Caltrain tracks exhibited patterns. Pattern detection in this study was conducted primarily on the basis of time and location. Because the data were readily available, the gender factor was also included in the analysis, although this is not a factor that is connected to the rail system. It was concluded that the data did show some patterns for suicides with respect to time and location. Some of the patterns can be explained while the reasons for some are not immediately obvious. However, the patterns in the latter category did not indicate a particularly attractive location or possible source for suicides

Cost-effective Side-slope Safety Countermeasures for Alaska

1.0 Background and Introduction - 1 2.0 The cost-effective procedure for choosing between guardrails and slope-flattening - 2 2.1 The basic cost-effective procedure - 2 2.2 The severity index - 10 3.0 Literature review - 10 3.1 Methods of determining severity indices - 11 3.2 Definition of physical characteristics of side-slopes - 17 4.0 Data collection - 18 4.1 Data required - 18 4.2 Data collection procedure - 19 4.2.1 Selection of routes - 19 4.2.2 Selection of possible accident locations - 19 4.2.3 Initial elimination of possible accident locations - 21 4.2.4 Further elimination of possible accident locations - 21 4.2.5 Field measurements of physical characteristics of accident sites - 23 5.0 Data analysis - 23 5.1 Analysis - 24 5.2 Glennon and Tamburri's Data - 33 6. Conclusions - 53 7. Recommendation - 53 8. References - 55 Appendix A Appendix B Appendix

Standing sedation with medetomidine and butorphanol in captive African elephants (Loxodonta africana)

Doses for standing sedation allowing for various procedures in otherwise inaccessible, untrained captive African elephant bulls are presented. Thirty-three standing sedations were performed in 12 males aged 8–30 years (one to four sedations per animal). Each bull received a combination of 0.009 ± 0.002 mg/kg medetomidine and 0.03 ± 0.007 mg/kg butorphanol. Full sedation was reached on average 25.5 min after injection. The addition of hyaluronidase (1000–2000 IU) significantly reduced time to full sedation to 16.5 min (paired t test, P = 0.024). Reversal was induced with intramuscular atipamezole 0.008 (±0.002) and naltrexone 0.035 (±0.015) mg/kg. Recovery took on average 7 min (3–18 min). The medetomidine/ butorphanol combination provided safe standing sedation for smaller procedures.U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. (African elephant fund AFE 0705), the International Elephant Foundation (Birmingham Zoo, USA).Technology Innovation Agency (Project number TAHC12 - 00042) (Pretoria, South Africa). The German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD, Grant number D/11/44481).http://www.elsevier.com/locate/tvjl2017-03-31hb2016Production Animal Studie

On the avoidability of breast cancer in industrialized societies: older mean age at first birth as an indicator of excess breast cancer risk

Background Breast cancer incidence continuous to increase. We examined at population level the association between the relative excess risk of breast cancer and previous age of mother at first birth. Method Incidence of breast cancer in 34 industrialized countries was obtained from the GLOBOCAN 2002 and SEER databases. Data on age of mother at first birth was collected through national statistics offices. National relative excess risk (RER) was calculated by subtracting the lowest age-specific incidence rate from the rate in each population, and dividing the difference by the latter. Results The national RER in 2002 correlated closely with a higher average age at first birth in 1972, 1982, 1992 and also 2002, Pearson correlation [r] being 0.83, 0.79, 0.72 and 0.61, respectively; P < 0.0001. RER of breast cancer in 2002 for those aged 15–44 years correlated closely with the mean age at first birth in 1982 and 1992 (r: 0.81 and 0.75; P < 0.0001), whereas RER for those aged 45–54 years correlated strongly with age at first birth in 1972 and 1982 (r: 0.81 and 0.76; P < 0.0001), and for those aged 55–64 years with age at first birth in 1972 (r: 0.77; P < 0.0001). Conclusions The rising age at first childbirth of mothers has been followed by marked increases in breast cancer incidence. Later age at first birth seems to characterize secular diffusion of ‘modern’ lifestyles with a potentially large impact on increased breast cancer risk, and hence should be accompanied by greater opportunities for prevention through modifiable risk factors

Understanding continent-wide variation in vulture ranging behavior to assess feasibility of Vulture Safe Zones in Africa: Challenges and possibilities

Protected areas are intended as tools in reducing threats to wildlife and preserving habitat for their long-term population persistence. Studies on ranging behavior provide insight into the utility of protected areas. Vultures are one of the fastest declining groups of birds globally and are popular subjects for telemetry studies, but continent-wide studies are lacking. To address how vultures use space and identify the areas and location of possible vulture safe zones, we assess home range size and their overlap with protected areas by species, age, breeding status, season, and region using a large continent-wide telemetry datasets that includes 163 individuals of three species of threatened Gyps vulture. Immature vultures of all three species had larger home ranges and used a greater area outside of protected areas than breeding and non-breeding adults. Cape vultures had the smallest home range sizes and the lowest level of overlap with protected areas. Rüppell\u27s vultures had larger home range sizes in the wet season, when poisoning may increase due to human-carnivore conflict. Overall, our study suggests challenges for the creation of Vulture Safe Zones to protect African vultures. At a minimum, areas of 24,000 km2 would be needed to protect the entire range of an adult African White-backed vulture and areas of more than 75,000 km2 for wider-ranging Rüppell\u27s vultures. Vulture Safe Zones in Africa would generally need to be larger than existing protected areas, which would require widespread conservation activities outside of protected areas to be successful