TRAFFIC

ENGINERING
UNIT IV
ACCIDENT STUDIES &
MASS
TRANSPORTATION
Contents..

■ Causes of accidents
■ accident studies and records
■ condition and collision diagram
■ preventive measures
■ Expressways and freeways
■ problems on mass transportation and remedial measures
■ brief study of mass transportation available in the country.
Introduction
■The traffic engineers have to undertake a big responsibility of providing safe
traffic movements to the road users and ensure their safety.
■Road accidents cannot be totally prevented but by suitable traffic engineering
and management the accident rate can be reduced to a certain extent.
■For this reason systematic study of traffic accidents are required to be carried
out. Proper investigation of the cause of accident will help to propose
preventive measures in terms of design and control.
■The problem of accident is a very acute in highway transportation due to
 complex flow pattern of vehicular traffic
 presence of mixed traffic along with pedestrians.

TULIKA GUPTA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, TRAFFIC ENGINEERING, 6TH SEM , CIVIL

ENGG
Objectives of Accident Studies
■ Some objectives of accident studies are listed below:
1. To study the causes of accidents and suggest corrective measures at
potential location
2. To evaluate existing design
3. To compute the financial losses incurred
4. To support the proposed design and provide economic justification to the
improvement suggested by the traffic engineer
5. To carry out before and after studies and to demonstrate the improvement
in the problem.

TULIKA GUPTA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, TRAFFIC ENGINEERING, 6TH SEM , CIVIL

ENGG
Causes of Accidents
■ The various causes of road accidents are:
1. Road Users - Excessive speed and rash driving, violation of traffic rules, failure to
perceive traffic situation or sign or signal in adequate time, carelessness, fatigue,
alcohol, sleep etc.
2. Vehicle - Defects such as failure of brakes, steering system, tyre burst, lighting system
.
3. Road Condition - Skidding road surface, pot holes, ruts.
4. Road design - Defective geometric design like inadequate sight distance, inadequate
width of shoulders, improper curve design, improper traffic control devices and
improper lighting,.
5. Environmental factors -unfavorable weather conditions like mist, snow, smoke and
heavy rainfall which restrict normal visibility and makes driving unsafe.
6. Other causes -improper location of advertisement boards, gate of level crossing not
closed when required etc..

TULIKA GUPTA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, TRAFFIC ENGINEERING, 6TH SEM , CIVIL

ENGG
Accident data collection
The accident data collection is the first step in the accident study. The data collection of the
accidents is primarily done by the police. Motorist accident reports are secondary data
which are filed by motorists themselves. The data to be collected should comprise all of
these parameters:
1. General Date, time, person involved in accident, classification of accident like fatal,
serious, minor
2. Location Description and detail of location of accident
3. Details of vehicle involved Registration number, description of vehicle, loading detail,
vehicular defects
4. Nature of accident Details of collision, damages, injury and casualty
5. Road and traffic condition Details of road geometry, surface characteristics, type of
traffic, traffic density etc..
6. Primary causes of accident Details of various possible cases (already mentioned) which
are the main causes of accident.
7. Accident cost Financial losses incurred due to property damage, personal injury and
casualty
TULIKA GUPTA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, TRAFFIC ENGINEERING, 6TH SEM , CIVIL
ENGG
Accident investigation
■ The accident data collection involves extensive investigation which involves the
following procedure:
1. Reporting:
■ It involves basic data collection in form of two methods:
(a) Motorist accident report It is filed by the involved motorist involved in all
accidents fatal or injurious.
(b) Police accident report It is filed by the attendant police officer for all accidents
at which an officer is present. This generally includes fatal accidents or mostly
accidents involving serious injury required emergency or hospital treatment or
which have incurred heavy property damage.
2. At Scene Investigation:
■ It involves obtaining information at scene such as measurement of skid marks,
examination of damage of vehicles, photograph of final position of vehicles,
examination of condition and functioning of traffic control devices and other
road equipment's.

TULIKA GUPTA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, TRAFFIC ENGINEERING, 6TH SEM , CIVIL

ENGG
3. Technical Preparation:
■ This data collection step is needed for organization and interpretation of the
study made.
■ In this step measurement of grades, sight distance, preparing drawing of after
accident situation, determination of critical and design speed for curves is
done.
4. Professional Reconstruction:
■ In this step effort is made to determine from whatever data is available how
the accident occurs from the available data.
■ This involves accident reconstruction which has been discussed under Section
No.7 in details.
■ It is professionally referred as determining “behavioral” or “mediate” causes
of accident.
5. Cause Analysis:
■ It is the effort made to determine why the accident occurred from the data
available and the analysis of accident reconstruction studies..
TULIKA GUPTA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, TRAFFIC ENGINEERING, 6TH SEM , CIVIL
ENGG
TULIKA GUPTA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, TRAFFIC ENGINEERING, 6TH SEM , CIVIL
ENGG
TULIKA GUPTA, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, TRAFFIC ENGINEERING, 6TH SEM , CIVIL
ENGG
 Traffic Engineering

1. General- Date, time, person involved in accident,

classification of accident like fatal, serious, minor
2. Location -Description and detail of location of
accident
3. Details of vehicle involved- Registration number,
description of vehicle, loading detail, vehicular
defects
4. Nature of accident- Details of collision, damages,
injury and casualty

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident data collection

5. Road and traffic condition- Details of road
geometry, surface characteristics, type of traffic,
traffic density etc..
6. Accident cost- Financial losses incurred due to
property damage, personal injury and casualty

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Purpose of collection of Accident

data
1. Identification of location of points at which
unusually high number of accident occur.
2. Detailed functional evaluation of critical accident
location to identify the causes of accidents.
3. Development of procedure that allows
identification of hazards before large number of
accidents occurs.
4. Development of different statistical measures of
various accident related factors to give insight
into general trends, common casual factors,
driver profiles, etc.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident investigation
The accident data collection involves extensive

investigation which involves the following procedure:

1. Reporting: It involves basic data collection in form
of two methods:
1. Motorist accident report: it is filed by the involved
motorist involved in all accidents fatal or injurious.
2. Police accident report: It is filed by the attendant
police officer for all accidents at which an officer is
present.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident investigation
2. At Scene Investigation:
It involves obtaining information at scene such as
• measurement of skid marks,
• examination of damage of vehicles,
• photograph of final position of vehicles,
• examination of condition and
• functioning of traffic control devices and other road
equipments.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident investigation
3. Technical Preparation:
This data collection step is needed for organization
and interpretation of the study made.
In this step measurement of grades, sight distance,
preparing drawing of after accident situation,
determination of critical and design speed for curves
is done.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident investigation
4. Professional Reconstruction:
In this step effort is made to determine from
whatever data is available how the accident occurs
from the available data.
It is professionally referred as determining
“behavioral” or “mediate” causes of accident.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident investigation
5. Cause Analysis:
It is the effort made to determine why the accident
occurred from the data available and the analysis of
accident reconstruction studies..

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident data analysis

Accident Rate per Kilometer : On this basis the total
accident hazard is expressed as the number of
accidents of all types per km of each highway and
street classification.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident data analysis

Accident involvement Rate : It is expressed as
numbers of drivers of vehicles with certain
characteristics who were involved in accidents per
100 million vehicle kms of travel.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident data analysis

Death rate based on population : The traffic hazard
to life in a community is expressed as the number of
traffic fatalities per 100,000 populations. This rate
reflects the accident exposure for entire area.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident data analysis

Death rate based on registration : The traffic hazard
to life in a community can also be expressed as the
number of traffic fatalities per 10,000 vehicles
registered.
This rate reflects the accident exposure for entire
area and is similar to death rate based on population.

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering

 Traffic Engineering

Accident data analysis

Accident Rate based on vehicle kms of travel : The
accident hazard is expressed as the number of
accidents per 100 million vehicle km of travel

Prof. Tulika Gupta, 6th Sem, Civil Engg, Traffic Engineering