Latest revision as of 17:27, 24 March 2021

Abstract

Deaths and injuries as a result of road accidents are a recognized global problem and authorities are aware of the consequences this global phenomenon might lead to. Because of the rapid development of urbanization and motorization in developing and transitional countries, like Ethiopia, actions to improve traffic safety conditions are urgently needed. Highway intersections are among greatest safety challenges because they are some of the most common highway features. Improving the safety level of the urban intersection is an important way to increase safety. Safety evaluations can help to develop effective safety countermeasures to lower crash rates and reduce crash severity. So how to diagnose safety problems and improve urban road intersection safety effectively become an important issue. Now, there have been quite a number of safety analysis methods and theories in the city intersection, but these methods and theories are formed on the basis of traffic accidents. However, the data of traffic accidents is not accurate enough, these theories are not appropriate for our country. Also, it is impractical and unethical to wait for accidents occur before being able to draw statistically sound conclusions regarding safety improvement. Hence there is a need to develop proactive approach, non-accident based approach, to evaluate urban road Unsignalized intersection safety performance. A proactive approach (indirect and non-accident based approach) was attempted to that of traditional reactive approach (direct and accident based approach) which is purely based on the existing conditions of the that have direct relationships or impacts to traffic safety such as the geometric, traffic control & engineering, road Surface and environment characteristics. The non-accident-based approach is based on field surveys under the conditions mentioned previously, summarizes the intersection safety diagnosis in a safety index to indicate the safety performance of the intersection. The study indicates that the proposed methodology and intersection safety diagnosis technique can be used to perform evaluation of traffic safety and improvement at intersection even when there are few resources available. Also, the use of intersection safety diagnosis is a more resource-efficient and ethically appealing alternative for fast, reliable and effective safety assessment.

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