local road safety report

AP-R359/10

AUSTROADS RESEARCH REPORT

Road Safety on Local Government Roads:

Final Report

Road Safety on Local Government Roads: Final Report


First Published May 2010

© Austroads Ltd. 2010

This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced by any process without the prior written permission of Austroads.

Road Safety on Local Government Roads: Final Report ISBN 978-1-921709-20-3

Austroads Project No. SS1502

Austroads Publication No. AP–R359/10

Project Manager

Phil Allan, DTEI SA

Prepared by

Blair Turner, Victoria Pyta, Jeremy Woolley and Sarah Zhang

Published by Austroads Ltd. Level 9, Robell House 287 Elizabeth Street

Sydney NSW 2000 Australia Phone: +61 2 9264 7088

Fax: +61 2 9264 1657 Email: [email protected]

www.austroads.com.au

Austroads believes this publication to be correct at the time of printing and does not accept responsibility for any consequences arising from the use of information herein. Readers should

rely on their own skill and judgement to apply information to particular issues.

mailto:[email protected]


Sydney 2010

Austroads profile

Austroads‘ purpose is to contribute to improved Australian and New Zealand transport outcomes by:

providing expert advice to SCOT and ATC on road and road transport issues

facilitating collaboration between road agencies

promoting harmonisation, consistency and uniformity in road and related operations

undertaking strategic research on behalf of road agencies and communicating outcomes

promoting improved and consistent practice by road agencies.

Austroads membership

Austroads‘ membership comprises the six state and two territory road transport and traffic authorities, the Commonwealth Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, the Australian Local Government Association, and New Zealand Transport Agency. Austroads is governed by a Board consisting of the chief executive officer (or an alternative senior executive officer) of each of its 11 member organisations:

Roads and Traffic Authority New South Wales

Roads Corporation Victoria

Department of Transport and Main Roads Queensland

Main Roads Western Australia

Department for Transport, Energy and Infrastructure South Australia

Department of Infrastructure, Energy and Resources Tasmania

Department of Lands and Planning Northern Territory

Department of Territory and Municipal Services Australian Capital Territory

Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government

Australian Local Government Association

New Zealand Transport Agency. The success of Austroads is derived from the collaboration of member organisations and others in the road industry. It aims to be the Australasian leader in providing high quality information, advice and fostering research in the road sector.


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CONTENTS

1 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... 1

1.1 Local Government and the Safe System Approach to Road Safety .............................. 1

2 METHODOLOGY ......................................................................................................... 3

2.1 Literature Review .......................................................................................................... 3 2.2 Data Analysis ................................................................................................................ 3

2.2.1 Limitations of the Crash Analysis..................................................................... 4 2.3 Site Inspections ............................................................................................................ 5

2.3.1 Site Selection .................................................................................................. 5 2.3.2 Features Investigated ...................................................................................... 5

2.4 In-depth Crash Analysis ................................................................................................ 6 2.5 Workshop ..................................................................................................................... 7

3 RESULTS – LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................ 8

3.1 Characteristics of the Local Road Network ................................................................... 8 3.1.1 Australia .......................................................................................................... 8 3.1.2 New Zealand ................................................................................................. 13

3.2 Crash Characteristics .................................................................................................. 13 3.3 Challenges for the Local Road Network ...................................................................... 15

3.3.1 Characteristics of Local Roads ...................................................................... 15 3.3.2 Availability and Flow of Information ............................................................... 16 3.3.3 Resource Constraints .................................................................................... 18 3.3.4 Changing Population Demographics and Traffic Volumes ............................. 20

3.4 Addressing Challenges on the Local Road Network.................................................... 21 3.4.1 Road Safety Strategies ................................................................................. 21 3.4.2 Models of Collaboration and Local Road Safety Programs ............................ 26 3.4.3 Key Elements of Successful Collaboration in Community Road Safety ......... 28 3.4.4 Delivering a Successful Road Safety Program .............................................. 29 3.4.5 Evaluation and Review of Road Safety Plans and Activities .......................... 30 3.4.6 Planning and Designing a Safe Local Road Network .................................... 32 3.4.7 Addressing Physical Deficiencies in the Road System .................................. 34 3.4.8 Human Resources ........................................................................................ 37

4 RESULTS – CRASH DATA ANALYSIS ..................................................................... 40

4.1 Crash Data ................................................................................................................. 40 4.1.1 By Severity .................................................................................................... 40 4.1.2 By Year ......................................................................................................... 40 4.1.3 By Time of Day.............................................................................................. 42 4.1.4 By Rural and Urban ....................................................................................... 43 4.1.5 By Speed Limit .............................................................................................. 44 4.1.6 By Horizontal and Vertical Alignment ............................................................ 45 4.1.7 By Light Conditions ....................................................................................... 47 4.1.8 By Weather Conditions .................................................................................. 48 4.1.9 By Road Surface ........................................................................................... 49 4.1.10 By Surface Condition..................................................................................... 50 4.1.11 By Crash Type .............................................................................................. 51 4.1.12 By Intersection/Mid-block .............................................................................. 53 4.1.13 By Intersection Type ..................................................................................... 54 4.1.14 By Traffic Control .......................................................................................... 55 4.1.15 By Object Hit ................................................................................................. 56


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4.1.16 By Crash Causation Factors .......................................................................... 58 4.1.17 By Seatbelt Worn .......................................................................................... 59 4.1.18 By Road User Age ........................................................................................ 60 4.1.19 By Sex of Driver ............................................................................................ 61 4.1.20 By Vehicle Type ............................................................................................ 62

4.2 Crash Rates Analysis .................................................................................................. 62 4.2.1 Crash Rates Based on Previous Research ................................................... 62 4.2.2 Crash Rates Based on Crash Data from this Review .................................... 67

4.3 Summary of Crash Data Analysis ............................................................................... 68

5 RESULTS – SITE INVESTIGATIONS ........................................................................ 70

5.1 Intersection Sites ........................................................................................................ 70 5.2 Mid-block Sites ........................................................................................................... 70

6 RESULTS – IN-DEPTH CRASH ANALYSIS .............................................................. 72

6.1 Metropolitan Crashes .................................................................................................. 72 6.2 Rural Crashes ............................................................................................................. 73 6.3 Summary .................................................................................................................... 75

7 RESULTS – WORKSHOP .......................................................................................... 76

7.1 Crash Trends on Local Government Roads ................................................................ 76 7.1.1 Summary of Presentation .............................................................................. 76 7.1.2 Crash Trends Noted by Workshop Participants ............................................. 76

7.2 Barriers to Improving Road Safety on Local Government Roads ................................ 81 7.2.1 Summary of the Presentation ........................................................................ 81 7.2.2 Barriers Identified During Workshop Discussion ............................................ 82

7.3 Solutions for Improving Road Safety on Local Government Roads ............................. 85 7.3.1 Summary of the Presentation ........................................................................ 85 7.3.2 Solutions Proposed During Workshop Discussion ......................................... 86

8 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS ........................................................... 92

8.1 Key Issues .................................................................................................................. 92 8.2 Recommendations ...................................................................................................... 95

REFERENCES .................................................................................................................... 96

APPENDIX A SITES INVESTIGATED ................................................................. 100

APPENDIX B INSPECTION SHEET .................................................................... 102

APPENDIX C CASR CRASH INVESTIGATION METHODOLOGY ..................... 106

APPENDIX D WORKSHOP ATTENDEES ........................................................... 114

APPENDIX E WORKSHOP AGENDA ................................................................. 115

APPENDIX F STATE ROAD CRASH RATES ..................................................... 116

APPENDIX G GRAPHS OF FINDINGS FROM SITE INVESTIGATIONS ............ 118

APPENDIX H EXAMPLES FROM IN-DEPTH CRASH ANALYSIS ..................... 128


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TABLES

Table 1.1: Contributions of local government road safety to the Safe System approach ......................................................................................................... 2

Table 2.1: Data available for analysis .............................................................................. 3

Table 2.2: Definitions of a local government road ............................................................ 4

Table 3.1: State and local government road length by jurisdiction – Australia .................. 8

Table 3.2: Road length and travel by road type – Australia .............................................. 9

Table 3.3: Road length and travel by road type – New Zealand ..................................... 13

Table 3.4: Mid-block casualty crash rates on local government roads ............................ 14

Table 3.5: Crash and casualty rates for state versus local and urban versus rural roads – New Zealand .................................................................................... 14

Table 3.6: Comparison of crash types on urban versus rural local roads in New Zealand ......................................................................................................... 15

Table 4.1: Annual average fatal and injury crashes in each Australian jurisdiction and New Zealand .......................................................................................... 40

Table 4.2: Local governments for which local road crash rates were derived ................. 63

Table 4.3: Crashes per 100 million VKT for local versus state government roads (road sections) .............................................................................................. 63

Table 4.4: Local road stereotypes in the participating municipalities .............................. 64

Table 4.5: Mid-block stereotypes in the participating municipalities – crash rates (casualty crashes per 100M VKT) ................................................................. 64

Table 4.6: Mid-block stereotypes in the participating municipalities – relative risks ........ 65

Table 4.7: Intersection stereotypes in the participating municipalities – crash rates (casualty crashes per 10M VE) ..................................................................... 65

Table 4.8: Intersection stereotypes in the participating municipalities – relative risks ..... 65

Table 4.9: Salisbury, South Australia – mid-block crash rates ........................................ 66

Table 4.10: Salisbury, South Australia – intersection crash rates ..................................... 67

Table 4.11: Casualty crashes per 100 million VKT on state and local government roads in rural and urban areas ...................................................................... 68


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FIGURES

Figure 3.1: Percentage of route length versus vehicle kilometres travelled by road category – Australia ...................................................................................... 10

Figure 3.2: Average VKT per day for light versus medium and heavy vehicles by road category – Australia .............................................................................. 11

Figure 3.3: Medium and heavy vehicle VKT as a percentage of total VKT for all vehicles – Australia ....................................................................................... 11

Figure 3.4: Length of sealed and unsealed road in the public road network by jurisdiction – Australia ................................................................................... 12

Figure 3.5: Example Road Safety Issues report from New Zealand ................................ 24

Figure 4.1: Annual casualty crashes on local government roads and state highways ...... 41

Figure 4.2: Fatal crashes on local government roads and state highways ....................... 41

Figure 4.3: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by time of day .................................................................................................... 42

Figure 4.4: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by location ......................................................................................................... 43

Figure 4.5: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by speed limit ..................................................................................................... 44

Figure 4.6: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by horizontal alignment ...................................................................................... 45

Figure 4.7: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by vertical alignment .......................................................................................... 46

Figure 4.8: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by light conditions .............................................................................................. 47

Figure 4.9: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by weather condition .......................................................................................... 48

Figure 4.10: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by road surface .................................................................................................. 49

Figure 4.11: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by surface condition ........................................................................................... 50

Figure 4.12: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by crash type in Australia ................................................................................... 52

Figure 4.13: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by crash type in New Zealand ............................................................................ 52

Figure 4.14: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by intersection/mid-block.................................................................................... 53

Figure 4.15: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by intersection type ............................................................................................ 54

Figure 4.16: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by traffic control ................................................................................................. 55

Figure 4.17: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by object struck in Australia ............................................................................... 56

Figure 4.18: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by object struck in New Zealand ........................................................................ 57


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Figure 4.19: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by crash causation factors in New Zealand ........................................................ 58

Figure 4.20: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by seatbelt use ................................................................................................... 59

Figure 4.21: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by road user age ................................................................................................ 60

Figure 4.22: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by sex of driver .................................................................................................. 61

Figure 4.23: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by vehicle type ................................................................................................... 62

Figure 7.1: Fatalities on classified and unclassified roads within the Sydney-Newcastle-Wollongong Conurbation, 1999-2008 ........................................... 77

Figure 7.2: Fatalities on classified and unclassified roads outside the Sydney-Newcastle-Wollongong Conurbation, 1999-2008 ........................................... 77

Figure 7.3: Fatal crashes per 100,000 population on state controlled and local government roads in Queensland, 1993-2009 ............................................... 78

Figure 7.4: Serious injury crashes per 100,000 population on state controlled and local government roads in Queensland, 1993-2008 ...................................... 78

Figure 7.5: Fatal crashes in rural areas of Western Australia, local versus state roads, 1994 to 2008 ...................................................................................... 79

Figure 7.6: Fatal crashes in metropolitan areas of Western Australia, local versus state roads, 1994 to 2008 .............................................................................. 80

Figure 7.7: Fatalities on state highways versus local roads in New Zealand ................... 81


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SUMMARY

This document seeks to provide information on the safety of local government managed roads. A large proportion of the Australasian road network is managed by local government (82% in Australia, and 88% in New Zealand). However, little is known about the scale of the road safety problem on local roads, the types of crashes that occur, and causes of these crashes. It is difficult to develop strategies to reduce crash risk on local roads without first understanding the nature of the crashes that occur on these roads. This document provides the results of research on this topic, and is based on a review of literature, an analysis of crash data, site investigations, and a stakeholder workshop with representatives who are involved with local government road safety.

In Australia, around half of all casualty crashes, and around 40% of all fatal crashes occur on roads managed by local authorities. The figures are higher in New Zealand (65% of casualty crashes and 46% of fatal crashes). Given the volumes of traffic using these roads, the risk to a driver of being involved in a casualty crash is higher on local government roads (between 1.5 and 2 times) than on state roads, and for some specific road types is likely to be substantially higher. It appears that improvements in safety on local roads have been slower in coming (over the last 10 year period) than for state roads.

Key crash types on local roads include running off the road (either at curves or on a straight section of road), collisions with pedestrians, and intersection crashes. Collisions with roadside hazards are significant, and appear to be over-represented when compared with state roads. Also over-represented are crashes involving speed, alcohol, non-wearing of seatbelts, and young road users.

Surveys of crash locations on local government roads, and an in-depth exploration of crashes identified that there is generally a lower standard of design on local roads (for instance poor junction design, alignment, unsealed shoulders and narrow roads). Roadside hazards, poor sight distance, lack of pedestrian facilities, poor delineation and inappropriate speed limits were also noted.

A number of behavioural issues were also identified (particularly through the in-depth crash analysis) including excessive speed, driver distraction and inattention, impairment, medical conditions, and driver expectation.

Low cost measures are available to address many of these issues, including improvements to delineation (at curves and junctions) and review of speed limits. Many of the issues should be addressed through maintenance (e.g. signs, road markings and vegetation clearance). Higher cost options include removal of roadside hazards (or protection through installation of barriers), installation of adequate pedestrian facilities, provision of road shoulders, and improvements to road alignment. A number of enforcement options (including for speed, impairment and seat belts), as well as education programs (particularly to address driver speed, distraction and inattention, medical conditions and driver expectation) are available.

A literature review and workshop identified a number of barriers to improving safety on these types of roads. These were that:

Crashes are sparsely distributed over a vast network.

Those tasked with addressing safety within local government often do not have the time or means to access relevant safety guidance and expertise.

There are data issues (particularly relating to access and interpretation of crash data) that make addressing road safety difficult for local government.


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It is difficult to fund treatments (especially given the dispersed nature of crashes).

There is a need to gain community and political buy-in, and convert this to action.

There are shortages of skilled staff for delivering safety.

There are network planning issues, including a greater need for use of road safety audit and network assessments.

Responsibility/liability for improving safety appears to be unclear in some jurisdictions, and this can be a barrier to improving safety.

There appear to be competing policy demands within local government (e.g. for funding; between safety and environmental issues, as in the case of roadside tree removal).

The changing population structure, traffic volumes and composition need to be considered.

Numerous suggestions were made regarding ways in which safety on local government managed roads could be improved. A safety management systems approach for asset planning, building and management is a promising method for incorporating a Safe System philosophy throughout local government processes.

Multiple local stakeholder coordinating arrangements are important for creating a sense of responsibility and ownership of road safety within the community and for raising the profile of road safety on the local government agenda.

Creation of ‗partnership‘ between various local governments (particularly smaller ones) is crucial to improving safety outcomes.

For every council there should be available at least one full time employee who is responsible for road safety. For smaller councils, this might entail sharing of this resource across a number of councils. This safety coordinator should have a clearly defined role, and access to relevant information on addressing road safety specifically on local government roads.

There appears to be a need for specific road safety guidance for local government. In many cases, local government is not able to deliver ‗best practice‘ solutions, but rather would perhaps best deliver safety in an incremental fashion. The way in which information is provided to local government practitioners needs to be examined, with smarter ways to disseminate information required.

The benefit-cost approach to funding individual safety projects does not fit well with the types of problems found on local government networks, and guidance and/or a revision of this approach is needed to help fund local government road safety improvements. This approach could be based on cost-effectiveness of activities in aggregate or a risk management approach.

A risk assessment based approach, as well as those involving mass action or route treatments seem to be of high relevance to those managing local roads, although funding mechanisms might need to be altered to maximise their use.

Funding for safety is only a small proportion of total expenditure on roads in local governments. It is important to ensure that budgets and processes in other areas of road management (including planning and asset management) take account of up-to-date information on road safety to ensure that funds directed at these tasks maximise the safety benefit.

Improved information is required to help identify current crash problems within local government areas, and benchmarking would be a valuable tool to help authorities identify problem issues.


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Based on the key points presented above, the following recommendations are made:

1. Development and delivery of effective local government road safety strategies is of utmost importance in delivering road safety outcomes. Local governments which do not yet have a road safety strategy should be encouraged and assisted to develop one.

2. Partnership working between local governments and between state government and local government should be actively promoted. Various successful models exist and should be assessed by state authorities.

3. The introduction of a ‗safety management system‘ approach for local government should be investigated.

4. Each council should have access to a full time road safety practitioner (either within one council, or in some form of partnership arrangement between several councils). Guidance on the skills and knowledge such a practitioner would ideally possess would be of use, and this should be investigated.

5. Guidance on the delivery of safety on local government roads should be assessed, and revised to take account of barriers (and opportunities) on local government roads. This guidance should include information on network planning issues, mass action programs, road safety audit, route assessments and risk assessment.

6. Better dissemination of road safety information is required, and a tool (perhaps on-line) to assist in provision of information to local government safety practitioners (including those on behavioural measures) should be developed.

7. Funding arrangements for local government road safety should be reviewed at both state and federal level, and a model for road funding tied into the Safe System approach should be developed.

8. The quality, consistency and completeness of data held at a national level on expenditure, road condition, exposure and crashes on local roads is in need of improvement. Without good quality, reliable and complete data the question of whether funding for local roads is appropriate cannot be adequately addressed. Methods to improve the quality and consistency of data collection and processing at both state and local government level need to be investigated.

9. There is a need for greater dissemination of Safe System principles throughout local government to ensure opportunities to improve safety benefits are maximised. This dissemination should be conducted in a systematic way, and Safe System concepts need to be embedded within Council‘s strategic plans. A Safe System evaluation framework and performance indicators targeted specifically at local government would enable better target setting and monitoring of progress towards Safe System outcomes.

10. Information on crashes on local government roads should be provided by state government to each local government on a regular basis. This should include information to enable benchmarking.


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1 INTRODUCTION

A large proportion of the Australasian road network is managed by local government. However, little is known about the scale of the road safety problem on local roads, the types of crashes that occur, and causes of these crashes. It is difficult to develop strategies to reduce crash risk on local roads without first understanding the nature of the crashes that occur on these roads.

This document provides the results of research on the topic of local government road safety. This is based on a review of literature, analysis of crash data, site investigations, in-depth crash investigations and a stakeholder workshop with representatives who are involved with local government road safety.

The term ‗local roads‘ has two common meanings. From a functional perspective, the term is typically taken to mean ‗roads whose prime role is to provide access to properties or residences‘ (BTRE 2003, p.2). From a government responsibility and accounting perspective, the term refers to all roads managed by local government bodies (BTRE 2003). From the perspective of the road user, the expectation is that the same standards of safe design and maintenance will apply on every road they travel on, regardless of the caretaker. However, for the purposes of this report, the term ‗local roads‘ generally refers to roads managed by local government bodies unless otherwise stated. This is a more inclusive definition, particularly as it includes rural roads managed by local government.

This report is split into several sections. Following this introduction and a discussion of local government road safety in a Safe System context, the report presents the methodology used for each stage of the study. Section 3 provides results from a review of literature on the topic of local government road safety. Section 4 provides an analysis of crash data from each state in Australia and from New Zealand. It also includes an investigation of crash rates on local government roads. Section 5 includes a summary of an investigation of sites on local government roads that had a high incidence of crashes. Section 6 provides results from an in-depth analysis of crashes in South Australia (conducted by the Centre for Automotive Safety Research). The results from a stakeholder workshop are presented in Section 7, while the final section provides key conclusions and recommendations from this study.

1.1 Local Government and the Safe System Approach to Road Safety

This project is set firmly within the context of the Safe System approach. This approach to road safety recognises that humans, as road users are fallible and will continue to make mistakes. In addition, humans are physically vulnerable, and are only able to withstand limited kinetic energy exchange (e.g. during the rapid deceleration associated with a crash) before serious injury or death occurs. Infrastructure is required that takes account of these errors and vulnerabilities so that road users are able to avoid serious injury or death in the event of a crash. Safe System principles aim to manage vehicles, roads, roadside infrastructure, and speeds to eliminate death and serious injury as a consequence of a road crash. Based primarily on the Swedish Vision Zero and the Dutch Sustainable Safety approaches, the Safe System approach has been formally adopted by Austroads, and forms a key component of the Australian National Road Safety Strategy (Australian Transport Council 2008).


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It is recognised that local government is a critical element in delivering road safety outcomes. They manage a majority of the road network, have a more intimate knowledge of local issues and they are better placed to engage the local community. In line with the National Road Safety Action Plan 2009 and 2010 (Australian Transport Council 2008), most Australian states and territories have adopted the Safe System as the guiding philosophy underlying their road safety strategies. Table 1.1 provides an overview of the ways that local government is able to contribute to safety under the Safe System approach.

Table 1.1: Contributions of local government road safety to the Safe System approach

Safe System factor Local government contribution

Safe speeds Where it is the responsibility of local government to manage speed limits on local roads: review limits in response to changing land use and traffic; create low-speed environments; initiate local speed campaigns; deploy movable speed feedback displays to reinforce speed limits; evaluate benefits of low speed environments. Where responsibility for setting speed limits is outside of the jurisdiction of local government, act as advocate to the relevant road authority for reduced speed limits where speed limits are inappropriately high for the function of the road in question.

Safer roads and roadsides

Provide appropriate roads and road lighting to fulfil traffic function; conduct traffic and transport planning to manage infrastructure provision into the future; ensure adequate provision for vulnerable road users and heavy vehicles; conduct road safety audits of new and existing facilities; identify blackspots, problem routes and areas and develop plans to eliminate them over time; develop asset management plans to maintain safe conditions with special regard to road surface, signs and delineation; manage vegetation in the roadside environment; develop pedestrian crossing management plans; establish processes for reporting and acting on road safety hazards; support older road users through attention to lighting, signage and delineation.

Safer vehicles Council fleet: Have a safe driving policy in place that covers purchase of vehicles with good safety characteristics, fitness to drive, work and driving hours, and driver training; monitor fleet accident data; align safe driving with other OH&S policies. Local residents: Distribute information about infant and child restraints through clinics and health centres; distribute information about the safety benefits of buying cars with higher safety ratings and keeping cars well-maintained etc. Engage the community to take ownership of the problem and finding solutions.

Admittance to the system

Support programs to assist the disadvantaged obtain full licence; support the parents and mentors of learner drivers and learner drivers through a combination of education and practical experience.

Education and information for road

users

Identify road safety issues specific to the community and develop targeted education campaigns; support alcohol, speed and restraint and helmet use enforcement through media releases and education campaigns in partnership with the community; ensure council staff are aware of road safety issues, blackspot locations and other local casualty crash location patterns; educate the community about proposed road safety works and infrastructure changes.

Understanding crashes and risks

Collate information on road safety hazards; act as advocate for improvements on all roads affecting the community, especially local roads; investigate accident locations in partnership with other stakeholders; support direct action by community organisations to reduce high risk behaviours.

Legislation and enforcement

Support and encourage enforcement activities through media releases and education campaigns; develop enforcement programs using by-laws officers for high risk locations e.g. parking at schools; coordinate enforcement with education and engineering programs.

Planning* Include road safety requirements in guidelines for developments; develop policies for bicycle and pedestrian safety to ensure they will be considered in new developments or changes to land use; use developer contributions to fund road safety projects; include road safety in all council plans; include road safety audit as part of the planning and approval process.

*Although not specifically acknowledged in the Safe System approach, it is essential that Safe System principles be followed in planning and approval processes if they are to be reflected in the road system. It has therefore been included in this table.

Source: Adapted from Austroads (2009).


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2 METHODOLOGY

2.1 Literature Review

This report provides the results from a review of literature on topics relating to local government road safety. In order to identify relevant research, a literature review was conducted using the resources of ARRB Group‘s MG Lay Library, the leading land transport library in Australia.

These resources included the library‘s own comprehensive collection of technical land transport literature and information retrieval specialists with extensive experience in the transport field, as well as access to the collections and expertise of other transport-related libraries throughout Australia and internationally. The Australian Transport Index (ATRI) was used specifically in this literature search.

However, little information was obtained using search terms (such as ‗local government‘ and ‗road safety‘), so a more selective approach to obtaining literature was used. This involved searches of specific topics of interest to assess whether these contained references to local government road safety. Therefore, this review could not be considered either a systematic or comprehensive review of research on this topic. The internet was also searched in a similar manner.

2.2 Data Analysis

To identify the key factors associated with crashes on local roads in Australia and New Zealand, an analysis of road authority crash data was undertaken. Data for crashes on local government owned roads (which, for the purposes of comparison was analysed alongside data for crashes on other roads) in New Zealand and some Australian jurisdictions was disaggregated by variables reflecting:

temporal characteristics (e.g. time of day)

site characteristics (e.g. speed limit)

crash characteristics (e.g. DCA category)

environmental conditions (e.g. light conditions)

road user characteristics (e.g. controller age and vehicle type).

Table 2.1 describes the road authority crash data that was available for analysis.

Table 2.1: Data available for analysis

Jurisdiction Years

New South Wales 01 Jan 2003 – 31 Dec 2007

Victoria 01 Jan 2003 – 31 Dec 2007

Queensland 01 Jan 2001 – 31 Dec 2005

Western Australia 01 Jan 2003 – 31 Dec 2007

South Australia 01 Jan 2003 – 31 Dec 2007

Tasmania 01 Jan 2003 – 31 Dec 2007

Northern Territory –

Australian Capital Territory –

New Zealand 01 Jan 2003 – 31 Dec 2007


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No Northern Territory or ACT data was analysed, as the Northern Territory and ACT crash database do not include any variable which differentiates between local government and state government owned roads. Only casualty crashes (any injury level) were of interest for the present purpose. Property damage only crashes were not included because not all jurisdictions record such crashes.

Table 2.2 collates the definitions of ‗local government road‘ that were employed for each jurisdiction. ‗Other‘ roads were any that did not meet the definition of local government owned. Crashes that occurred at an intersection where a local government owned road met an ‗other‘ road were classified as local government road crashes.

Table 2.2: Definitions of a local government road

Jurisdiction Variable Values allowed Values excluded

New South Wales CRA_ROAD_CLASS_LEGAL_CODE Unclassified road Freeway/motorway, state highway, other classified road

Victoria Classification Local road Forest road, tourist road, main road, highway, freeway

Queensland ROAD_AUTHORITY Local road State controlled road

Western Australia

Road (First character)

First character not ‘H’ or ‘M’

First character ‘H’ or ‘M’

South Australia Maintenance C B, T

Tasmania DierRoadNo

Null Any value

New Zealand State Highway No Yes

Analyses of crash data were conducted using SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) Version 16.02.

2.2.1 Limitations of the Crash Analysis

It should be noted that even where results are presented for each jurisdiction separately, the information contained in this report is not designed to provide for a comparison between jurisdictions. This is largely because exposure (due to factors such as population size and the size of the rural road network) and the definition of what constitutes an injury crash can vary between jurisdictions.

Some crash characteristics that were of interest are not recorded in all jurisdictions. Where this was the case (or when, despite being recorded, information was not contained within the data held by ARRB) the jurisdictions for which the relevant information was not available are noted in the text associated with the relevant tables or figures.

The categories employed by jurisdictions to describe crash characteristics vary. For example, in Western Australian crash data, vertical alignment can be recorded as level, crest or slope. However, in other jurisdictions vertical alignment can be recorded as level, crest, slope or dip. In some cases, categories have been collapsed to create categories that correspond with those employed in other jurisdictions. Therefore, more detailed information is available in each jurisdiction.


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Measures of ‗exposure‘ are typically not available for many of the variables assessed in this section. As an example, there is no information to indicate how much of the road network is ‗hilly‘ and how much is ‗flat‘. Presentation of crash numbers for speed on hilly or flat roads provides no indication of the relative risks for these road types, and therefore, it is hard to interpret the significance for many of the results presented. For this reason, a comparison has been made between crashes on local government roads, and state managed roads. A comparison of the proportion of crashes for each factor gives some information about risks. However, this information must also be treated with caution. As an example, roundabouts might be more widely used on local government roads. A higher proportion of crashes at roundabouts for local government roads (when compared to state roads) does not necessarily indicate that this intersection type is ‗riskier‘ on local roads – just that there are more of them.

2.3 Site Inspections

2.3.1 Site Selection

A series of investigations was undertaken at a range of sites in NSW, Victoria and Western Australia to identify factors that may have contributed or could potentially contribute to the occurrence of crashes on local roads. The sites were split into mid-block and intersection sites. The total number of intersection sites investigated was 35, while the total number of mid-block sites investigated was 26. The 61 sites inspected are listed in Appendix A.

Eligible sites chosen for further investigation were selected through GIS analysis. Casualty crashes (recorded through police reports) were assigned to either a mid-block or intersection location. Mid-block or intersection crashes were based on the following criteria:

Mid-block: road was divided up into 200 m sections. Each non-intersection (refer below for criteria for intersection casualty crash) recorded casualty crash was assigned to a specific mid-block location.

Intersection: intersection casualty crashes as determined by the police report.

The locations were then sorted in descending order with the top approximately 30 sites (based on casualty crash numbers) for each state being selected as being eligible for further site investigations. A selection of these sites were then investigated.

2.3.2 Features Investigated

Site investigations were undertaken at mid-block and intersection locations using an inspection sheet (Appendix B) to assess contributing factors. The investigations involved the detailed examination of site specific crashes, in association with road and roadside factors at the selected high crash locations.

Examination of site features, together with a review of supplied casualty crash data (brief details of each casualty crash recorded at that site), provided the basis upon which contributing and potential contributing factors could be assigned to each site.

For each site the following types of road features were investigated (the inspection sheet outlining the features and sub-features investigated is contained in Appendix B):

road alignment

signing and delineation

roadside hazards

guard fencing


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pedestrians/cyclist facilities

traffic signals

parking and access

street lighting

road pavement.

With respect to the sites investigated the following were noted:

All Victorian sites were located within the Melbourne central business district (CBD).

All Western Australia (WA) sites were urban sites and with the exception of one site were all intersection sites.

For New South Wales (NSW) 40% of the sites were located in rural areas with 25% of those sites being mid-blocks (three sites) and 75% being intersection sites (nine sites).

2.4 In-depth Crash Analysis

The Centre for Automotive Safety Research (CASR) has been conducting in-depth crash investigations for three decades and currently has a database of over 1000 individual crashes. This study looked at crashes investigated as part of the last Metropolitan Adelaide Study (2002 to 2005) and also the last completed rural study (1998 to 2000). This section provides an overview of the methodology used, while Appendix C provides a more detailed outline of the methodology for crash investigation.

CASR has crash investigation teams made up of engineers, psychologists and health professionals who travel to the crash scene once notified about the event when an ambulance is dispatched.

Soon after the crash, an engineering survey is made of the site to record road geometry, the location of roadside objects and any other relevant information such as vegetation and skid marks. Engineering drawings of intersections are also obtained from the responsible road authority. Involved vehicles are also photographed and scrutinised prior to removal where possible.

Following the crash, further site visits and vehicle inspections may be performed to gather additional or missing information. Follow-up personal interviews are conducted whenever possible with those involved in the crash and any witnesses.

Data on injuries are obtained from hospital records. Police accident reports are obtained to provide information about the crash as reported to, and deduced by, the police. Where appropriate, coroners‘ files are also examined to check consistency of findings or shed further light with previously unobtainable evidence. These contain full reports from the Police Major Crash Investigation Unit, autopsy and toxicology reports together with information on any medical issues that may have existed with the deceased individual.

When all the evidence has been collected, a review is conducted of each case by a multidisciplinary expert group and factors that contributed to the causation of the crash and the resulting injuries are identified.

A total of 298 metropolitan cases, and 236 rural cases were reviewed for the purpose of this study. A qualitative assessment was made of crashes that had occurred on local government roads to determine factors that were likely to have contributed to the occurrence of these crashes.


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2.5 Workshop

A workshop was held at ARRB‘s Melbourne office on Tuesday 2 June 2009. Participants were invited on the basis of their experience in addressing safety on local government roads. A total of 20 people attended, with eight representatives from state government (all in local government liaison roles); eight representatives from local governments and local government associations; and four representatives from ARRB, including the two presenters (Blair Turner and Victoria Pyta). A list of attendees can be found in Appendix D.

The workshop involved three stages. Stage 1 involved presentations of information on local government crash risk garnered from the literature review, the crash analysis, site investigations and in-depth crash analyses. Following the presentations, a discussion was held on attendees‘ experiences of the local government crash risk in their jurisdictions.

Stage 2 involved presentations on barriers to implementing road safety on local government roads, based on findings from the literature. This was followed by a discussion on attendees‘ experiences of the barriers to implementing road safety in their jurisdiction.

Stage 3 involved a presentation, based on findings from the literature, of solutions for some of the barriers to implementing road safety on local government roads. This was then followed by a discussion on this topic. This included ‗brainstorming‘ and evaluation of the merits of potential solutions for some of the barriers to implementing road safety on local government roads.

The agenda for the workshop can be found in Appendix E. The presentations gave summaries of the key outcomes of the tasks associated with this project. The crash problem on local government roads is summarised in Section 7.1. However, this report is focused on the participant discussion of the issues that arose in Stages 2 and 3 (barriers and solutions, Section 7.1 and Section 7.2 respectively).

A summary document was produced following the workshop, and this was circulated to all attendees, as well as some who could not attend the event. The comments and information received have also been included in Section 7.


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3 RESULTS – LITERATURE REVIEW

3.1 Characteristics of the Local Road Network

3.1.1 Australia

Australia‘s public road network1 has a route length of 811,000 km. Local government roads account for 82% (roughly 667,000 km; BTRE 2003). The percentage of route length managed by local governments varies across jurisdictions, as can be seen in Table 3.1.

Table 3.1: State and local government road length by jurisdiction – Australia

Jurisdiction State managed roads (‘000 km)

LG managed roads (‘000 km)

Total (‘000 km) % LG

NSW 21 161 182 88

VIC 22 131 153 86

QLD 34 145 178 81

SA 23 74 97 76

WA 18 129 147 88

TAS 3 14 17 82

NT 22 13 35 37

ACT 3 n/a 3 0

Total 143 667 811 82

Source: Adapted from BTRE (2003); updated information for Victoria provided by VicRoads, personal communication.

Local governments are typically responsible for managing local access roads (including local streets and collectors) and, depending on the jurisdiction, they will also be responsible for a greater or lesser proportion of the secondary and primary arterials. There is variation between jurisdictions as to which roads (and which parts of the road cross-section) are considered local government responsibility and which are considered state government responsibility. For example, in NSW local government is responsible for upkeep of the verges of state managed roads (which the state would typically manage in other jurisdictions), and in Queensland the state government takes responsibility for the upkeep of district roads (which local government would typically manage in other jurisdictions; BTRE 20032).

The proportions of the local government managed network that are ‗local roads‘ (in the functional sense of the term) versus secondary or primary arterial roads are as follows:

NSW: 89% of local government managed roads are local roads and 11% are regional roads (secondary arterials connecting smaller centres and with the state road network).

Victoria: 91% of local government managed roads are local roads and 9% are declared main roads (rural or urban arterials that are not considered to be state highways). Note that this information was correct at the time the BTRE report was produced, but will have changed since the Road Management Act was instigated in Victoria.

Tasmania: local government managed roads include urban arterial roads, but the proportion of local versus arterial roads managed by local government is not known.

1 Public roads are roads managed by local government or state government and do not include roads managed by other

authorities such as national parks, the military or private organisations. 2 This document, State spending on roads, provides detailed information on what is and is not funded and managed by

state and local governments in all Australian jurisdictions.


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NT: local government managed roads include local roads (including collectors), sub-arterial roads and primary urban arterial roads but the proportion of each is not known.

ACT: the local and state government are one and the same, therefore all roads can be considered to be state managed.

Queensland, SA, WA: unable to determine (BTRE 2003, Appendix II).

In summary, for those jurisdictions for which the proportion of secondary or primary arterial roads managed by local government is known, the figure is between 0 and 10%. Arterial roads managed by local governments are generally those which connect smaller towns and cities.

Table 3.2 shows that, by route length, the majority of Australia‘s road network is rural local roads (72%), followed by rural arterial roads (13%) and then urban local roads (11%). By contrast, the majority of travel occurs on urban arterials (42%), followed by rural arterials (21%) and then urban local roads (17%). No information was available that identified the proportion of local roads that serve an arterial function. Given the strong link between traffic volumes and crash numbers, this information would be of interest, especially if broken down by jurisdiction, to help explain differences in crash numbers for different jurisdictions on their local road network.

Figure 3.1 illustrates a significant mismatch between kilometres of road in each road category and volume of traffic using that category of road.

Table 3.2: Road length and travel by road type – Australia

Road type NSW VIC QLD SA WA TAS NT ACT Total %

National highway

Length (km) 3,105 1,010 4,186 2,749 4,648 385 2,670 20 18,773 2.3

Travel (106 VKT) 9,296 3,470 7,389 2,522 1,528 748 561 n/a 25,514 13.2

Rural arterial

Length (km) 29,363 18,100 27,650 8,567 18,574 2,514 3,972 290 109,030 13.4

Travel (106 VKT) 14,021 10,060 7,337 2,648 4,973 1,061 170 n/a 40,270 20.9

Urban arterial

Length (km) 4,235 3,200 1,814 911 1,785 501 150 455 13,051 1.6

Travel (106 VKT) 26,351 24,390 13,666 5,401 7,894 2,656 534 n/a 80,892 42.0

Rural local

Length (km) 124,147 109,400 123,015 77,106 112,604 18,469 17,137 25 581,903 71.6

Travel (106 VKT) 1,003 7,040 2,287 1,295 1,679 337 185 n/a 13,826 7.2

Urban local

Length (km) 21,157 21,300 24,639 7,241 11,241 2,727 55 1,855 90,215 11.1

Travel (106 VKT) 12,470 8,170 4,313 2,077 3,500 1,613 4 n/a 32,147 16.7

All road types

Length (km) 182,007 153,010 181,304 96,574 148,852 24,596 23,984 2,645 812,972 100.0

Travel (106 VKT) 63,141 53,130 34,992 13,943 19,574 6,415 1,454 n/a 192,649 100.0

Note: ‘Local’ in this table refers to the functional definition. Some rural arterial and urban arterial roads fall under council management in some jurisdictions, and some ‘local’ roads fall under state management in some jurisdictions.

Source: Adapted from Austroads (2005).


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0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

State highway Rural arterial Urban arterial Rural local Urban local

Road Category

Pe

rce

nta

ge

of

tota

l ro

ute

le

ng

th a

nd

VK

TRoute length VKT

Source: adapted from Austroads (2005).

Figure 3.1: Percentage of route length versus vehicle kilometres travelled by road category – Australia

Although the majority of total travel occurs on urban arterials, Figure 3.2 shows that the majority of medium and heavy vehicle kilometres are travelled on rural arterials and almost as many kilometres are travelled on rural local roads as on urban arterials. When this is considered in light of Figure 3.3, it is clear that, although traffic volumes are greatest on arterial roads, the burden of heavy vehicles on the network falls disproportionately onto local and arterial roads in rural areas.


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-

20,000,000

40,000,000

60,000,000

80,000,000

100,000,000

120,000,000

140,000,000

160,000,000

Arterial Local Arterial Local Arterial Local Arterial Local Arterial Local

Urban Outer urban Regional Rural Remote

Road category

Avera

ge V

KT

per

day

Light vehicles Medium & heavy vehicles

Note: Light vehicles include cars, motorcycles and vans; medium vehicles include rigid trucks and buses; heavy vehicles include articulated trucks, B-doubles and road-trains.

Source: adapted from NTC (2007).

Figure 3.2: Average VKT per day for light versus medium and heavy vehicles by road category – Australia

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

Arterial Local Arterial Local Arterial Local Arterial Local Arterial Local

Urban Outer urban Regional Rural Remote

Road Category

Perc

en

tag

e o

f to

tal

traff

ic t

hat

is

heavy a

nd

med

ium

veh

icle

s

Source: adapted from NTC (2007).

Figure 3.3: Medium and heavy vehicle VKT as a percentage of total VKT for all vehicles – Australia


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It is known that 59% of the Australian road network is unsealed (Austroads 2005), but figures on the proportion of the unsealed road network that is managed by local government are difficult to obtain. Rural and low volume roads are more likely to be unsealed than urban and high volume roads. Therefore, as local governments are more likely to be responsible for rural local roads and low volume arterials, it is likely that local governments (particularly rural local governments) are responsible for a disproportionately large segment of the unsealed road network when compared with state governments.

Figure 3.4 shows that there is variation between jurisdictions in the proportion of the total route length that is unsealed. Whilst at least half of the route length in all jurisdictions is unsealed (except for the ACT), the proportion that is unsealed is slightly higher than average in Queensland (62%) and much higher than average in South Australia (71%), Western Australia (67%) and the Northern Territory (70%). Therefore, rural local governments, particularly those in South Australia, Northern Territory, Western Australia and Queensland, are likely to be charged with maintaining extensive networks of unsealed roads.

-

20,000

40,000

60,000

80,000

100,000

120,000

NSW Vic Qld SA WA Tas NT ACT

Jurisdiction

Ro

ute

len

gth

(km

)

Sealed

Unsealed

Source: Austroads (2005).

Figure 3.4: Length of sealed and unsealed road in the public road network by jurisdiction – Australia

Local roads, and unsealed roads in particular, are more likely than state managed roads to be characterised by:

a greater proportion of intersections and unsignalised rail crossings per km

low traffic volume, which sometimes has seasonal fluctuations

mixed traffic composition

poor road geometry

poor surface quality

inadequate delineation and advisory signing.

In addition to these deficits, unsealed roads generally have low levels of surface friction and can carry relatively high volumes of heavy vehicles (Austroads 2005, Boschert, Pyta & Turner 2008).


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3.1.2 New Zealand

In New Zealand, 88% (roughly 83,000 km) of the road network is managed by local government and most of that length is made up of rural local roads (Land Transport NZ 2007a). Overall, 49% of all vehicle kilometres are travelled on local roads, but 56% of heavy vehicle kilometres are travelled on local roads (Table 3.3; Austroads 2005).

As for Australia, no information was available on the proportion of local roads that serve an arterial function. This information would be of interest (given the link between volumes and crash numbers) to help identify differences between the proportion of crashes on local roads in New Zealand compared to that in Australian jurisdictions.

A smaller proportion of the New Zealand network is unsealed (35% compared with 59% of the Australian network). Almost half of the length of the rural local road network is unsealed and rural local roads account for 99% of the length of the unsealed network.

Table 3.3: Road length and travel by road type – New Zealand

Road type Route length Billion vehicle kilometres travelled

km % km % unsealed Light vehicles (%) Heavy vehicles (%) Total (%)

State highway 10,893 11.6 0.5 15.4 (52.9) 2.7 (44.3) 18.1 (51.4)

Rural local 65,432 69.9 48.9 13.7 (47.1) 3.4 (55.7) 17.1 (48.6)

Urban local 17,251 18.4 2.2

Total 93,576 100.0 34.7 29.1 (100.0) 6.1 (100.0) 35.2 (100.0)

Source: Route length – Land Transport NZ (2007a); travel – Austroads (2005).

3.2 Crash Characteristics

Studies of crashes specifically on local government owned and managed roads are rare. Many studies categorise roads into rural versus urban, type of street etc., but most do not make a distinction between local government and state or federally managed roads. In NSW between 2004 and 2006, 44% of casualty crashes occurred on local government managed roads (email from Andrew Graham, RTA NSW, 28 July 2008).

A recent study by ARRB (2007) analysed 1,530 km of local government roads in both urban and rural environments in a local government area in the outer suburbs of Melbourne. Five years of mid-block casualty crash data were analysed together with traffic volume data and road inventory data. This study found that there were slightly more crashes per kilometre driven for urban roads versus rural roads (Table 3.4). Local streets had casualty crash rates three times those of primary and secondary arterials and unsealed roads had casualty crash rates twice that of sealed roads. Over a five year period, the local government roads in this municipality experienced 346 casualty crashes at mid-block locations (roughly 70 per year).


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Table 3.4: Mid-block casualty crash rates on local government roads

Road stereotype Crash sample size

Crash rate* Relative risk

Rural 136 9.9 1.00

Urban 210 11.4 1.15

Primary arterial 6 6.8 1.00

Secondary arterial 152 7.2 1.05

Collector road 57 13.1 1.92

Local street 131 22.6 3.31

Sealed 317 10.3 1.00

Unsealed 29 20.9 2.03

* Casualty crashes per 100M VKT.

Source: ARRB (2007).

The overall casualty crash rates for the municipality were slightly lower than the casualty crash rate for the rest of Victoria in 2005, which was 11.4 injuries and 0.7 fatalities per 100 million vehicle kilometres travelled (ATSB 2007, Berry & Harrison 2008). However, as the majority of the length of local government managed roads is local streets and unsealed roads, the relative risk figures for collector roads, local streets and unsealed roads give some cause for concern. Further information on crash rates for local government roads in Australia can be found in Section 4.2.

Wall, Kreis and Griffiths (2003) compared fatal crash rates per capita for licence holders in NSW by local government area (LGA). As expected, when fatal crashes were mapped, they were concentrated around major population centres. However, when fatal crash rates (based on crashes per LGA and licence holders per LGA) were mapped, crash rates were highest in rural and regional locations and lowest in more populated areas. This has important implications for rural local governments who may experience low numbers of crashes and therefore not be overly concerned about road safety, but whose populations may be experiencing a higher than average casualty rate per capita.

In New Zealand, crashes per 100 million vehicle kilometres travelled are compared regularly by the New Zealand Transport Agency for use by councils. Between 1999 and 2003, crashes occurred 1.2 times as frequently on urban local roads as urban state highways and 1.5 times as frequently on rural local roads as on rural state highways (Table 3.5; Land Transport Safety Authority 2004).

Table 3.5: Crash and casualty rates for state versus local and urban versus rural roads – New Zealand

Urban Rural

Local roads State highways

Local : State Local roads State highways

Local : State

Crashes per 100 million VKT 32 27 1.2 : 1 24 16 1.5 : 1

Casualties per 100 million VKT 42 38 1.1 : 1 38 26 1.5 : 1

Source: Adapted from Figures 1a to 1d, Land Transport Safety Authority (2004).

In addition, rural and urban local roads experience quite different crash patterns. The most frequent crash types experienced on urban local roads are crossing/turning and rear end/obstruction crashes whereas crashes on rural roads are most likely to be loss of control or head-on crashes on a bend or on a straight road (Table 3.6).


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Table 3.6: Comparison of crash types on urban versus rural local roads in New Zealand

Five most frequent crash types on local roads in New Zealand (in descending order)

Urban roads Rural roads

Crossing/turning Lost control/head-on (on bend)

Rear end/obstruction Lost control/head-on (on straight)

Pedestrian vs. vehicle Crossing/turning

Lost control/head-on (on bend) Rear end/obstruction

Lost control/head-on (on straight) Overtaking

Source: Adapted from Figures 59 and 60, Land Transport Safety Authority (2004).

In summary:

The majority of the Australian and New Zealand public road networks are managed by local government (82% and 88% respectively).

Approximately half of all travel in New Zealand occurs on local government roads. The amount on Australian roads is unknown.

The proportion of crashes that occur on local government managed roads is less than 50% in NSW (although it should be noted that under-reporting is more likely to be a problem on local roads and particularly those in remote rural locations) and in New Zealand crashes occur more frequently on local government roads per kilometre driven.

There is generally insufficient information currently available on crash risks and crash types on local government managed roads.

3.3 Challenges for the Local Road Network

The challenges for managers attempting to achieve safety on the local road network are many and varied, including:

dealing with problems peculiar to the length and characteristics of the local network

flow of information and cooperation between organisations

resource constraints, exacerbated by the age of the network and lack of funding for upgrades

increasing numbers of heavy vehicles

high rates of development and changing travel patterns creating stress on the network through increased traffic volumes.

Section 3.3 of this report discusses how these challenges affect local governments and Section 3.4 discusses the techniques and resources that can be used by local governments to address them.

3.3.1 Characteristics of Local Roads

The challenges for local governments include:

Rural local governments manage the majority of rural local and arterial road networks, both of which are extensive but carry very low volumes of traffic.

More than 60% of rural roads in Australia and almost 50% of rural roads in New Zealand managed by local government are unsealed.

Urban local governments manage most urban local roads, which are extensive but carry lower volumes of traffic.


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Urban local governments manage a large proportion of arterial roads (depending on the jurisdiction).

Although crashes on local roads occur less frequently per kilometre of road than on the state and national networks, crash rates per vehicle kilometre travelled can be very high.

This combination of extensive low volume roads and lower absolute numbers of crashes makes it difficult to justify significant expenditure on road safety treatments and difficult to objectively prioritise locations for treatment.

Some local roads can carry large numbers of heavy vehicles. It is well-established that heavy vehicles accelerate pavement deterioration and a greater proportion of heavy vehicles in the traffic mix can increase crash risk, particularly on roads with inadequate provision for overtaking, on roads with poor alignment and/or delineation, and on high speed roads without turning lanes.

Many local roads have not been built to the same rigorous design standards as highways. A high proportion are unsealed, and for these types of roads there are fewer treatment options available (e.g. no opportunity for line marking). Many have evolved over time and were originally intended for lower volumes of slower moving traffic.

Many local roads have not benefited from the process of road safety audit (RSA). Road safety audit as a formal process is a relatively recent concept. It was embraced by practitioners in the UK in the 1980s and the concept was endorsed by Austroads in 1992. A review of the uptake of road safety audit by local governments in Victoria in 1998 concluded that: the majority of Victorian municipalities were not making full use of the RSA process; there was a lack of understanding of the RSA process; and, there was a lack of confidence among local governments about the financial and safety benefits of RSA (Daly, Morgan & Jordan 1998).

Although eleven years old, the report has important implications for the current day. Regardless of whether support for and uptake of RSA has changed, current local governments have inherited networks of roads that have been designed without the benefit of road safety auditing. As a result, many local roads have problems with poor geometry, alignment, delineation and signage.

The extensive low volume roads that form the local road network also mean that any active police enforcement of speed limits, sober driving and other road rules is thinly spread. Lower levels of enforcement may lead to a higher incidence of risky behaviours such as speeding, drink driving, not wearing restraints or helmets and unlicensed driving. Fatigue can also be an issue on local roads.

3.3.2 Availability and Flow of Information

Information pertinent to road safety on local government roads includes:

best practice in road construction and maintenance, road safety education etc.

crash data

road condition data

exposure data.

Challenges in accessing and using this information are discussed in this section. See Section 3.4 for information on how governments can overcome these challenges.


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Best practice

The challenge for local government, particularly smaller local governments, is that road managers are expected to have a wide range of skills and may therefore not have a large amount of time available to become experts in all aspects of road safety. There is limited time available to learn about new, effective approaches to addressing safety, whether that be based on publications, training, or from contact with neighbouring authorities. The ability to cooperate and collaborate effectively with other local governments and with the state road authority relies on good communication between the parties on what action is being (or could be) taken, and this requires an investment in terms of time.

Crash data

Crash data is essential for identifying high risk road user groups and high crash risk locations on a network. Most jurisdictions provide crash data, but the format in which it is delivered varies. For example, New Zealand, Queensland and Victoria provide online access to their crash data. New Zealand also provides reports to each of its regions providing comparisons with similar regions, breakdowns of crashes and crash rates by urban versus rural areas, by road type, severity, road user types, contributing factors etc. (e.g. Land Transport Safety Authority 2004). In other jurisdictions, the state road authority will provide crash data in a data file for the use of the local road authority. The latter method of delivery requires the local governments concerned to have the ability to view, manipulate and analyse and interpret the data.

Road condition data

Road condition data includes information on road geometry, road surface condition, condition of line markings, condition of shoulders, any obscuration problems due to vegetation etc.

Most local governments are now aware that road condition data is critical in managing their duty of care toward users of roads under their control. Until May 2001, the nonfeasance rule essentially held that road authorities could not be sued for failing to repair or keep in repair highways under their control. However, if an inadequate attempt was made to repair a highway or further hazards were created for the road user, then the road authority could be considered guilty of misfeasance, which they could be sued for. This was cited as a possible incentive for local governments to be hesitant to initiate works on a road if they only had funds available to make partial improvements to the condition of the road (New South Wales Law Reform Commission 1987). In other words, the nonfeasance rule could have encouraged councils to do nothing to improve the state of their roads.

The nonfeasance rule was overturned in May 2001 by the High Court of Australia, and most road authorities would now be aware that they have a duty of care to ‗take reasonable steps‘ to:

identify, assess and prioritise deficiencies in the road system for treatment

have a system in place for allocating available funds to remedy deficiencies

manage unsafe situations until remedial works can be undertaken.

Surveys of road condition can be undertaken through visual inspection, or through desk top analysis based on collected data (for an example involving collection of data on local roads see Wix 1998).

Exposure data

Exposure data gives meaning to crash data. In the road safety context, ‗exposure‘ refers to exposure to risk or, put differently, opportunities for crashes. Common measures of exposure include:


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kilometres driven

population

number of vehicle registrations or licence holders.

These measures are not perfect, but kilometres driven in particular correlates very strongly with crash involvement with allowances for driving on different types of road and average trip length. Population size can be misleading when used at a regional level, as people who live in different environments (e.g. urban versus rural, remote rural Queensland versus rural Tasmania) experience different average trip lengths on vastly different types of roads. Numbers of vehicle registrations and licence holders do not take into account vehicles that are driven very rarely (e.g. motorcycles and hobby cars for recreational use) and persons who obtain the learner permit or driver licence who do not currently have access to a vehicle. Kilometres driven also does not take into account pedestrians and cyclists and usually does not include a measure of heavy vehicles in the traffic mix.

ARRB has developed a crash rates database for Austroads based on traffic volumes on a cross-section of representative roads managed by local government across Australia (Austroads 2008). The objective of developing the database is to identify broad crash rate information for different elements of the road network. Currently, the database has input from seven local government areas. The database allows relative crash risks to be compared for different types of roads and intersections in different environments. The database does not include factors such as pedestrian and cyclist exposure and it is limited due to scarcity of data. As an example, there is a lack of comprehensive data on traffic volumes.

3.3.3 Resource Constraints

Resources relevant to road safety on local government roads include:

funding

materials

skilled labour

community engagement.

Funding

In Australia, spending on state managed roads in 1997-98 totalled $3.5 billion compared with local government spending of $2.7 billion (BTRE 2003). Based on these figures and the figures on route length given in Section 3.1.1, state government spends 6.7 times as much as local government per kilometre of road (note that this refers to total route length and not lane kilometres. State government is likely to manage a larger proportion of multi-lane roads). Therefore, local governments are charged with managing a much larger network with a much smaller budget per kilometre of road network (albeit one that is subject to lower volumes of traffic than state managed roads). Local governments need to be particularly shrewd in choosing cost-effective road safety strategies and asset management policies.

In 2000, local councils from Australia‘s rural areas organised a National Rural Roads Congress to highlight their plight and encourage better funding. Their argument was that local roads and bridges throughout Australia, but particularly in rural and remote areas, are in very poor condition. It was posited that the poor condition of local roads:

increases the burden of transport costs on country industries

hinders export trade


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impedes delivery of education and health services

generally impacts negatively on the social amenity of rural areas

increases the risk of death and injury from crashes (BTE 2001, p.1).

When the (then) Bureau of Transport Economics (BTE) conducted an evaluation of the adequacy of funding for local roads (BTE 2001), they found that each 5% increase in local government roadworking operations across Australia would cost $100 million per annum (p.2).

Further, the BTE found that evaluating the case for extra funding is very difficult due to a lack of information at a national level, and variability in the quality and type of data held at a local level. The types of information needed to evaluate the case for extra funding include information about the roads themselves, i.e. the physical condition of local roads, the numbers of vehicles that travel on them and the tonnage of freight that they carry. It also includes financial information about expenditure. The variation in classification of local roads and variation in which roads and what level of responsibility was delegated to local government among the states also posed difficulties. They note that at present there is insufficient data to answer the question of whether funding levels on local government roads are ‗adequate‘.

Whilst the BTE uncovered a lot of information about local government expenditure on roads, they also catalogued a list of possible causes for the as yet un-quantified local road problems which remain pertinent today. These are logically compelling but also unquantified:

Many local roads were built in the 1950s and 1960s and they are now reaching a point where they will need substantial remedial works.

Tonnage has increased on rural roads as a result of (1) migration from grazing to cropping; (2) closure of some branch rail lines; and (3) increases in maximum legal truck tonnage limits. Bridges are particularly vulnerable to increases in tonnage.

Ratepayers are demanding improved roads, e.g. sealing in rural areas etc.

Ratepayers are generally demanding improved service from local government. Population growth also leads to increases in demands for resources. This competes with resources available for roads.

Local government spending is limited by restrictions on increases on the taxes and charges that they place on their residents and also by restrictions on borrowing.

Declining populations and levels of business activity erode revenue bases, but communities continue to expect that road standards (along with other services and amenities) will not decline.

Lack of effective monitoring of the weights of trucks on local roads allows overloading and excessive damage to roads and bridges (p.6).

The report also noted that council spending on roads in 1997/98 (the most recent year for which data was available) totalled $2.7 billion (as also reported in the BTRE 2003 report above), of which $1.4 billion was spent in city areas and $1.3 billion in country regions. In that year, funds were drawn from: own funds (71%), Commonwealth roads grants (13%), State grants (11%) and the private sector (5%). Also for that year, spending on roads in some country areas accounted for 40% of council spending on goods and services, compared to about 20% for all capital city divisions. It was concluded that ‗local road costs are distance driven in the country and a function of traffic volumes in cities‘ (p.10). In rural areas, ongoing investment is required given the extent of the road network, while for urban areas, investment in roads relates more to high vehicle numbers rather than the extent of the network.


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Materials

Materials for road building, maintenance and repair can be difficult and/or expensive to source, particularly on a small scale and in rural and remote locations. The cost and local availability of good quality aggregate is already a problem in some areas and is likely to become more of a problem for Australian road authorities over the next 20 years. The widespread issue of water shortages means that aggregate for sealed roads cannot always be cleaned. This results in a need for precoating of aggregate (to ensure the material will bind with the bitumen), further increasing costs (personal communication, Christina Chin, ARRB Group Ltd, 27 February 2009).

In addition, sprayed seals, bitumen and asphalt all contain a large oil component. As oil becomes scarcer it is likely to become more expensive. It is therefore likely to become more expensive to purchase road building materials as well as to transport them to where they are needed. The effects of this have recently become apparent in the USA where an asphalt shortage is delaying road maintenance across the nation. Refineries are overhauling their equipment so they can produce more of the profitable fuels such as gasoline and diesel, leading to a dearth in the production of chemicals and products necessary to produce good quality and durable asphalt. The shortage of particular polymers means that less durable asphalts are being produced and more frequent repairs will be required in the future (Valdes 2008).

Skilled labour

Skills shortages are clearly a concern for many local governments. This is evident from the fact that Local Government Managers Australia felt the need to conduct a National Forum on Skills Shortages in 2006; the International Public Works Conference devoted an entire stream of sessions to the issue in 2007; and the Civil Contractors Federation in Victoria will be conducting a Skills Summit in 2009 to address the issue of recruiting skilled employees. The Local Government Managers Association (2008) notes that the local government workforce is dominated by workers over 45 years of age. Many are expected to retire over the next ten to twenty years and the supply of appropriately skilled persons to replace them is insufficient.

Fewer than half of the councils who responded to the Saferoads survey in Victoria could confirm that they had a particular Councillor nominated to oversee development and/or implementation of the road safety plan. Most persons with day-to-day responsibility for road safety within the Council were only expected to spend half a day to a day on road safety work per week (Hennessy 2008).

Community engagement

Local government is better placed than state or federal government to realise and address community concerns about road safety for program development and implementation purposes. However, there are challenges in harnessing community enthusiasm for road safety so that efforts are efficient, productive and work in harmony with the goals of the local government.

3.3.4 Changing Population Demographics and Traffic Volumes

As the baby boomers approach retirement age, the proportion of older drivers in the traffic mix will increase. This is exaggerated for the baby boomer generation by the greater proportion of people who hold a licence, which is further boosted by increases in the number of women who are licence holders and active drivers. The ageing population brings with it challenges and opportunities for local government. Driving is important for older people, as it helps them maintain their independence and remain socially active and healthy. However, many road safety practitioners have concerns for the safety of older drivers on our roads.


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Older drivers are more frail and therefore more likely to be injured in the event of a crash; they tend to drive older cars which have fewer safety features; and involvement in casualty crashes per hour of driving increases with age (Catchpole et al. 2005). As people age, their visual acuity, night vision and depth perception generally deteriorate. They tend to experience increased sensitivity to glare, reduced muscle strength, decreased flexibility of the neck and trunk and slower reaction times. They are also less able to divide their attention among tasks, filter out unimportant stimuli, and make quick judgements (Stutt & Wilkins, cited in Langford & Oxley 2006). It is noted that many older drivers self-regulate by reducing their driving as their abilities deteriorate. Unfortunately, this puts them into the category of ‗low mileage drivers‘ who typically drive shorter distances per trip and are more likely to complete their trips on local roads with more conflict points and therefore more opportunities for collisions, especially when combined with a decreasing ability to negotiate intersections (Langford & Oxley 2006).

However, local government is well-placed to take advantage of the skills and experience of older members of the community who have time to devote to community based programs, particularly in the early years of transition from full time employment to retirement.

It is expected that, as the populations of Australia and New Zealand continue to grow that traffic volumes will also grow and congestion will intensify. In Australian cities, it is predicted that:

freight traffic will increase by 80% between 2003 and 2020 (measured in tonne-kilometres; BTRE 2006)

congestion (measured in total kilometres travelled in passenger vehicle equivalent units) will increase by an average 37% between 2005 and 2020 (BTRE 2007).

Increasing traffic puts greater pressure on pavements (although council income and therefore funds for road maintenance should also increase in proportion with population increase). There is also the potential for increased traffic volumes to be associated with an increase in ‗rat-running‘ on residential streets, leading to an increase in crashes on these roads. This is of particular concern as these crashes potentially involve vulnerable roads users such as pedestrians and cyclists.

Whilst increasing oil prices might be expected to ameliorate traffic congestion to some extent, Australia is a car dependent nation and many residents will still require a car for at least part of their journey to work, to do their shopping and to access essential services. Those who will suffer the most from the effects of increasing oil prices are those who can afford it the least – low income earners and people who live outside of a good public transport catchment area. These are often the same people, as housing is cheaper further away from good services. Rural and outer suburban communities may experience more hardship over time due to the increases in the cost of oil than urban communities (Dodson & Sipe 2008). Local government will be faced with the task of ensuring access to essential services is available to local residents with minimum use of private vehicles.

3.4 Addressing Challenges on the Local Road Network

3.4.1 Road Safety Strategies

Road safety planning is essential for effective and systematic allocation of funds to address local road safety problems and to allow evaluation of progress towards well-defined goals. The Guide to Road Safety – Part 2: Road Safety Strategy and Evaluation (Austroads 2006a) provides detailed information on the process of developing a road safety strategy. The Guide to Road Safety – Part 4: Local Government and Community Road Safety (Austroads 2009) highlights the key concepts of particular relevance for local government.


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Benefits of a road safety strategy for local government are:

comprehensive assessment of road safety issues for the LGA

commitment of stakeholders to a coordinated set of actions

prioritisation of effort

public commitment to actions which the community can understand and support

whole of council approach, embracing traffic, assets, vegetation management, fleet management, social and transport planning, health, family, children‘s and youth services

multi-action approach to addressing road safety issues (Austroads 2009).

Compared with ten years ago when most local governments did not have a road safety plan (e.g. Haworth & Kowadlo 1999), many local governments now have a documented road safety strategy (Austroads 2009). The results of the Saferoads survey highlighted some of the challenges that councils experience with road safety planning (Hennessy 2008). The Saferoads survey asked Victorian councils questions about their road safety planning and implementation activities. In 2007, it was emailed to all 79 Victorian councils, and 61 (77%) responded. The metropolitan councils had the best response rate (>90%) whereas the rural councils had much poorer response rates, with fewer than 60% of the north and north eastern councils responding. Follow-up interviews were conducted with 12 selected councils (five metropolitan and seven rural).

In Victoria, most councils had a road safety plan, whether it be current, expired or in the process of being redeveloped. Only two (3%) of the respondents had never had a plan. Five (8%) had adopted a new plan but implementation was not proceeding. Less than half of the respondents rated their road safety plan as appropriately targeted and achievable. Whilst many believed their plan was ‗appropriately targeted and achievable‘ (44%), many noted that it was difficult to implement fully (40%) and six (10%) of the respondents said that it was well beyond their capability. Three (5%) believed it was not ambitious enough. Rural councils were slightly more likely than metropolitan councils to believe the plan was difficult to implement.

There was some evidence of integration of the road safety plan with other strategic plans, most notably the general Council Plan, the Community Safety Plan and the Municipal Public Health Plan. Fewer than half of the responding councils had a committee that actively oversaw road safety. For those that did, the majority met quarterly or more frequently. Only half of the responding councils had a regular procedure in place for documenting progress with road safety efforts. Written reports were most likely to be made yearly or quarterly. Such reports are not always formally presented to council members.

Most respondents believed that CrashStats (a Victorian crash database available via the internet) was ‗a good starting point‘ or ‗very useful for planning‘. Nine of the responding councils noted that it ‗underpins all important decisions about road safety‘ whereas five indicated that it was ‗of little or no use‘.

Hennessy noted that although efforts in road safety have been sustained and perhaps improved since previous surveys (2004 was the most recent), there were differences between metropolitan and rural councils. In particular, some of the smaller and more remote councils appear to be struggling to find resources to allocate to road safety. This discrepancy is emerging as an historical trend, although there is some debate over whether it is a geographic or financial effect. A 1998 survey of local council road safety programs found that annual budget was a more important determinant of involvement in road safety activities than metropolitan or regional location. Councils with fewer funds were less involved in road safety activities (Haworth & Kowadlo 1999).


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The Guide to Road Safety – Part 4: Local Government and Community Road Safety (Austroads 2009) summarises the planning process for local government in the following steps.

Identifying and prioritising issues

The first step in addressing any problem is to understand it. Crash analyses typically ask the following questions in order to gain a picture of the likely sources of road safety problems:

Who is predominantly involved in crashes on the local road network? Is any group over-represented when compared with the numbers using the network? (e.g. younger drivers, older drivers, motorcyclists, pedestrians, truck drivers, shift workers, tourists, commuters etc.).

What kinds of vehicles are involved? Is any group over-represented?

Where are crashes and near misses occurring in the local road network?

— Are there any locations that attract a high number of crashes or near misses?

— Is there a particular origin or destination within the road network that seems to be generating a lot of crashes, e.g. a mine, industrial complex, pub, school, etc?

— Are there any commonalities in the layout of the roads where crashes are occurring?

When are the crashes occurring? Are there any patterns? (i.e. time of day, light levels, road conditions and weather conditions).

How are the crashes occurring? e.g. are they predominantly:

— single vehicle crashes where the vehicle leaves the carriageway?

— crashes involving one vehicle crossing the median into the path of another?

From careful interpretation of the answers to the above questions, a road authority can build a picture of the extent and characteristics of the road safety problem on their roads. For a local government with low traffic volumes, however, the total number of crashes on the road network is likely to be low and this approach may not provide the answers that are needed.

A local government is well placed to consult with local road users about their perceptions of dangerous locations and behaviours. Community meetings, canvassing suggestions via local media and consultation with groups representing different types of road users are common methods. The crash analysis should guide discussions to keep the focus on the problem, but discussion of areas where near misses or property damage crashes are frequent may allow the local government body to identify risky areas on their network that are ‗accidents waiting to happen‘ (Austroads 2009).

Case study – Road Safety Issues and Road Safety Report, New Zealand

The New Zealand government is an excellent example of providing easily understood and useful information to local governments. Road Safety Issues is a document provided annually to local governments throughout New Zealand (e.g. http://www.ltsa.govt.nz/performance/2006/docs/safety-christchurch-city.pdf; see Figure 3.5).


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Source: LTNZ (2006).

Figure 3.5: Example Road Safety Issues report from New Zealand

The document highlights key road safety issues and provides evidence-based recommendations for addressing the road safety problems. The report format requires no special data analysis skills on the part of the reader to reach conclusions about the state of road safety in their jurisdiction. A map of blackspots in the local government area provides the local authority with a list of priority areas for treatment.

In addition, a full detailed analysis and comparisons of similar local government areas are provided in a stand-alone document, the Road Safety Report (e.g. Land Transport Safety Authority 2004), also freely available on the Land Transport Safety Authority website. This provides information on progress over time, as well as detailed benchmarking against ‗peer‘ road authorities.


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Case study, Road Safety Performance Information, Victoria

The Road Safety Statistics page on the Saferoads website (http://www.mav.asn.au/saferoads) provides 11 page fact sheets for each local government area in Victoria entitled Road Safety Performance Information. The fact sheets summarise in graphs the characteristics of crashes on local roads in the municipality. They also provide comparisons with the whole of Melbourne (for councils within the Melbourne area) or the whole of country Victoria (for councils situated in the rest of Victoria) as well as depicting five year trends. Local government still has the task of interpreting the information and determining appropriate solutions.

Stakeholder involvement

Police, emergency and health services are integral to the success of the plan and should be involved in its development and implementation. Other community organisations such as service clubs which have an interest in strengthening the community can be helpful in implementing specific parts of the plan. Lobby groups such as motorcycle, bicycle and pedestrian councils, as well as senior citizens groups and schools may also become part of the plan (Austroads 2009).

Selecting countermeasures

Whether engineering or behavioural in nature, countermeasures should be directly relevant to the problems that have been identified. They should be evidence-based (i.e. there should be sound research supporting their efficacy, preferably in a similar environment). Further, they should align with state or national programs as this will allow some resource sharing and will increase the likelihood of accessing any available funding (Austroads 2009). Tools exist that can be used to prioritise and select engineering countermeasures that will meet a council‘s budget. These are discussed in Section 3.4.7.

It should be noted that it is not always possible to use an established countermeasure. Rural and remote local governments need to address road safety over vast areas with scarce resources. Therefore, if a problem is not responding to evidence based countermeasures or if none are applicable in the particular situation, local governments may need to take a methodical approach to finding new solutions to their problems. If councils are following this path, they should remember to review what other councils have done in similar situations (if possible) to avoid duplication of effort, incorporate provisions for assessing the success or otherwise of their activities and preferably share their experiences with other local governments in similar circumstances.

Countermeasures should be selected with regard to the resources available in the local community, including skills and capabilities, facilities, equipment and budget. As mentioned in the review of road safety planning in Victoria, some councils, particularly rural and remote councils, find it difficult to implement the road safety plans that they have developed; or believe the targets in their plans are not realistically achievable given the resources at their disposal (Hennessy 2008).

Allocating responsibilities and timing

Good communication about needs and goals, as well as allotting well-defined roles and tasks to be completed within timeframes that are followed up on, will assist in maintaining commitment and sourcing helpful contributions from stakeholder groups (Austroads 2009).

Funding

Funding specifically related to addressing physical deficiencies in road infrastructure is discussed in Section 3.4.7. For other aspects of the road safety plan, other sources of funding include:

council funds

support from the state authority


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state and federal grants for specific projects

community fund raising

sponsorship by local business.

It is likely that multiple sources of funding will have to be tapped, and it should be noted that some sources favour community programs and others capital works.

Identifying and linking with supporting policies, plans and/or programs

The objectives and implementation of the road safety plan are likely to overlap with other council plans, for example:

health promotion programs and the impact of drugs and alcohol in the community (the risks of drink-driving can easily be mentioned as an impact on families and the community)

assisting migrants to integrate into their new communities (attitudes to seat belt wearing and drink-driving are very different in some other cultures and can lead to trouble with the law)

health promotion walk to school programs (include educating children to choose a safe route to school, safe crossing behaviours and walking school bus programs etc.).

It is more efficient to link in with such programs to ensure consistency between messages being communicated by council to the community and also to reduce duplication of effort (Austroads 2009).

3.4.2 Models of Collaboration and Local Road Safety Programs

New South Wales

In NSW the Local Government Road Safety Program covers most of the larger local governments and many of the smaller ones. Its goals are to improve road safety by increasing the priority of road safety in local government; improving knowledge, understanding and skills in road safety at the local level; improving the coordination of local government road safety activities with state and national road safety initiatives; facilitating the development and involvement of local level road safety networks and partnerships; and demonstrating the impact and effectiveness of community based road safety programs (RTA 2002). Participating councils have a full-time or part-time Road Safety Officer (RSO). The RTA has influence over the RSOs as it contributes funding to the position, and provides other support in the form of materials, training and advice, and controls the distribution of project grants (Austroads 2009).

Victoria

The Victorian government supports two community based road safety programs – the Saferoads Local Government Road Safety Program and the RoadSafe Community Road Safety Councils.

Saferoads has funded 78 councils to develop road safety strategies for their communities. As noted, the success of these plans has been variable. To date 18 councils have appointed RSOs and 48 councils have nominated an officer within council as its road safety champion to drive the road safety strategy. Often this is a traffic engineer. VicRoads also funds regional staff to assist local government with the development and implementation of road safety strategies. However, the value of this assistance is likely to rely heavily on the quality of the communication between relevant individuals (Austroads 2009).


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RoadSafe is also a VicRoads initiative. There are 24 Community Road Safety Councils across Victoria, and local government is usually a member of the councils alongside local organisations and community groups, Victoria Police, road user groups, business, community service organisations and individuals. The RoadSafe groups develop road safety initiatives that support local and state government programs. These are generally awareness raising and education campaigns based on road safety topics that are relevant to the road safety plan and of particular importance in the local area. Involvement in RoadSafe meetings was almost universal among respondents to the 2007 Saferoads survey, apart from three rural councils (Hennessy 2008). Most councils thought that RoadSafe was a helpful partner. Rural councils were most likely to report that RoadSafe was an ‗essential partner‘ whereas metropolitan councils were most likely to report that they were only ‗occasionally helpful‘.

Queensland

Queensland Transport delivers community road safety programs through its five regional offices across the state. Regional Road Safety Advisors have developed extensive community networks which they use to develop initiatives in collaboration with key stakeholders in their communities. The Queensland Road Safety Strategy provides the road safety framework for the state, whereas the Queensland Road Safety Action Plan is updated biannually and drives implementation of initiatives (Austroads 2009).

Western Australia

RoadWise committees around WA plan and coordinate delivery of a variety of local road safety activities. RoadWise is an initiative of the WA Local Government Association (WALGA). WALGA‘s role is one of coordination of the RoadWise Road Safety Councils towards implementation of the WA Road Safety Strategy. A team of Regional Road Safety Officers (RRSOs) report to a central program management and development group. Each RRSO is responsible for one region spanning 4 to 24 LGAs. They advise, support and assist RoadWise committees. The Western Australian Government provides funding to WALGA to support the program.

South Australia

There are 35 community road safety groups in South Australia. The aim is to develop a sense of community ownership of road safety issues and broad understanding of road safety measures and why they are being introduced. A Community Road Safety Consultant and project officers encourage the formation of community groups and offer support, advice, assistance in setting priorities and liaison between communities and with the state government. The state government provides funding to the groups on the basis of project proposals and $500 for administrative costs. Local councils are meant to provide support and assistance, including administrative support (Austroads 2009).

Tasmania

The Community Road Safety Partnership program involves advisory groups in 24 municipalities across Tasmania. The groups develop partnerships with local government authorities, police and other community groups. They identify key road safety issues, advise on community consultation processes and endorse an action plan. Road safety consultants from Department of Infrastructure, Energy and Resources (DIER) work closely with local government officers, advisory committees and community organisations to initiate local projects and activities in line with the Tasmanian Road Safety Strategy (Austroads 2009).


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Australian Capital Territory

The Australian Capital Territory government is both the state and local government. Roads ACT has responsibility for policy and road safety activities, road safety engineering and data monitoring. Other agencies also have road safety responsibilities, including ACT policing, Traffic Camera Office and the Department of Education and Training. The ACT Road Safety Action Plan guides activities in the ACT and formal coordination arrangements are in place to support activities in accordance with the Plan, including the appointment of a Road Safety Officer.

The NRMA-ACT Road Safety Trust is an important supporting organisation – funded by a $2 levy paid at vehicle registration and matched by NRMA Insurance (which is the ACT compulsory third party insurance provider (Austroads 2009). The Trust provides grants to research organisations to conduct research and evaluations that are relevant to road safety for ACT drivers (NRMA – ACT Road Safety Trust 2009).

Northern Territory

No formal programs are in place for community level road safety. It is noted that ‗schedule 2 of the LG Act in the Northern Territory does not include road safety as a possible function of local government‘ (Northern Territory Government 2006). However, the 2006 Northern Territory Government report Safer Road Use: A Territory Imperative recommended formalising local government‘s role in road safety, supported by funding in the amount of $100,000 per year for five years to conduct road safety activities including: employment of a road safety officer, support of local road safety committees, or funding of community based road safety projects. Funding was recommended to be reviewed at the end of five years. The report noted concerns about how effective the community road safety model can be expected to be in the Northern Territory, given limitations including the lack of a resident centre for road safety research, the challenges peculiar to the Northern Territory and the limitations of the current Road Safety Council. The report recommends the inclusion of a road safety expert on any future iteration of the Road Safety Council to ensure that road safety activities are evidence based and best practice.

New Zealand

The National Land Transport Program (NLTP) funds local and regional government, police activities and approved organisations for capital, operations and maintenance activities and community programs relating to the land transport system. The NLTP funds a 75% subsidy for education and promotion based road safety projects (the balance comes from the local authority or in-kind contributions). This subsidy applies to the employment of road safety coordinators and the management, promotion and advertising of local road safety projects. The coordinator works to: ensure that road safety programs and activities are in line with the Road Safety Action Plan (RSAP); ensure that they are coordinated with engineering and enforcement initiatives where appropriate; and support local community driven road safety initiatives. Organisations such as the Accident Compensation Corporation and Road Safety Trust are other sources of funding (Austroads 2009).

3.4.3 Key Elements of Successful Collaboration in Community Road Safety

The literature review identified a number of elements that are required to ensure successful collaboration when delivering community road safety. Requirements at the local level include:

a stable representative local body – usually the local council which communicates with the community road safety group and the state or territory authority

effective personnel – as a minimum, a road safety officer capable of managing road safety activities, usually from council or a stakeholder organisation


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effective partnerships – good working relationships between members of the partnership, with clearly defined and agreed roles and responsibilities, working towards shared goals

commitment of local resources – i.e. funding, contributions in kind and volunteer input (Austroads 2002).

Local government needs to encourage a culture where road safety is valued and where this value is institutionalised by including road safety in council business and strategic plans and requiring formal reporting of road safety activities to council (Austroads 2002). Progress towards this more holistic commitment to road safety is slow but appears to be improving, particularly among metropolitan local governments (Hennessy 2008). Beyond funding, the quality of personnel and their working relationships is paramount to effective and sustained community road safety programs.

3.4.4 Delivering a Successful Road Safety Program

There are many hundreds of possible examples of successful activities that form part of a local government road safety program (Austroads 2009). It is not the intention of this report to list them. Some examples can be found in the Guide to Road Safety – Part 4: Local Government and Community Road Safety (Austroads 2009). The literature indicates that successful activities at the local level target a specific problem that has been identified as a high priority for the local area. In addition, the nature of the activity and method of delivery is well defined; tasks and timelines are specified and responsibilities assigned; and, the activity is chosen with careful consideration of the target audience and available resources (Austroads 2009).

Two recent publications in the USA have attempted to measure and rank the effectiveness of behavioural countermeasures: Effectiveness of Behavioral Highway Safety Countermeasures (Preusser et al. 2008) and Countermeasures That Work: A Highway Safety Countermeasure Guide For State Highway Safety Offices (University of North Carolina Highway Safety Research Center 2008). Both of these documents are freely available online.

The reader of these reports should be mindful that initiatives that have been successful or unsuccessful in the USA may have a very different reception in their local area; and lack of research and data on specific countermeasures does not necessarily equate to lack of effectiveness. Many evaluations are unpublished; change in behaviour can be very difficult to measure objectively; and ‗the best countermeasure may have little effect if it is not implemented vigorously, publicized extensively, and funded satisfactorily‘ (University of Carolina Highway Safety Research Center 2008, p.2).

That said, the following general underlying principles emerge. Public education campaigns are more likely to be successful if they:

are aimed at a well-defined audience

clearly indicate the desired behaviour change and, if necessary, the way in which the change can be achieved

are age-appropriate

recognise different levels of educational attainment and literacy in the community

tell the audience something they do not already know or give a new perspective on the problem

are pre-tested to ensure maximum relevance and impact for the target audience (e.g. through social market research methods such as focus groups)


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are based on validated theories of behaviour change

include interactive methods to teach skills to resist social influence

are supported by legislation, law enforcement and/or other community messages

have active and vocal support of influential people and organisations such as parents and partners, employers, police, and government; role models such as sports figures, singers and actors/actresses; and relevant special interest groups such as bicycle, motorcycle and car clubs, etc. (Preusser et al. 2008; Shinar 2007).

In the United Kingdom, an attempt was made to create a database of road safety education projects to ‗improve use of road safety education materials by improving access to them‘. The database was under-utilised and the recommendations were that any future revisions of the database needed to:

make the resource more user friendly, easily accessible and sensitive to the needs of the end-users

carefully promote the resource to current Internet users and non-users (Department for Transport 2003).

Although not viewed in the course of this literature review, the unpublished report by British Institute of Traffic Education Research (BITER) is reported to include more detailed recommendations for revising the database and publicising the resource.

3.4.5 Evaluation and Review of Road Safety Plans and Activities

Evaluation and review of the effectiveness of road safety plans and individual activities is necessary to establish what has been achieved and whether the methods of delivery were efficient and effective. Monitoring of the plan also ensures the strategy has achieved its targets within the timeframe. Many road safety plans are poorly implemented (Hennessy 2008) and monitoring implementation problems can identify areas of the plan that can be improved. Conversely, successful implementation reassures council that the plan is effective and should be continued. Essentially, monitoring and evaluation is a tool for growth and development of road safety planning skills.

The ultimate goal in road safety programs is to reduce road trauma. Therefore, the natural outcome measure for any program has traditionally been the number of crashes before and after program implementation. This approach is termed ‗outcome evaluation‘. The outcome evaluation approach can be problematic for local government plans and activities:

It may be difficult to distinguish the effects of the local plan and activities from the wider programs implemented by state governments.

Insufficient crash numbers may make it difficult to determine whether crash numbers have changed.

It is likely that any changes in crash numbers will not be statistically significant purely due to the small number of crashes.

People may confuse a lack of statistical significance with ineffectiveness and conclude that because the change in crashes was not statistically significant, the treatment was not effective (when it is more likely that there were simply not enough crashes to determine whether the treatment was effective) (Hauer 1997).


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Therefore, alternative approaches to evaluation and review are appropriate for Local Government. The Guide to Road Safety – Part 4: Local Government and Community Road Safety (Austroads 2009) outlines evaluation methods for local government plans and activities. In short, the Guide recommends an approach based broadly on process evaluation. Process evaluation is focused more on what was done than what was achieved, for example the number of events held, number of participants or attendees etc.

The Guide proposes the following framework for evaluations:

Assessment in the light of the full range of objectives

Program delivery outcomes – based on behavioural changes achieved by different road safety activities, and progress in providing safer infrastructure.

Human capital outcomes – based on the number of individuals acquiring specific competencies.

Social capital outcomes – based on the number of individuals and organisations engaging in program activities, amount of time committed, and possibly measures of commitment and/or connectedness.

Social network analysis – based on the linkages or contacts between individuals and groups and the extension of road safety knowledge beyond the initial network into workplaces and private life.

Process evaluation – with the focus on smoothness of operation and quality of events and presentations rather than numbers attending.

Source: Austroads (2009, p.37).

Program delivery outcomes may include crash reductions but the evaluation may also be focussed on changes in targeted behaviours rather than crashes. Risky behaviours which are precursors to crashes occur much more frequently than crashes. Thus, an increase in restraint and helmet use, reductions in drink-driving and speeding may be expected to result in fewer crashes and/or injuries. As with measuring crash numbers, it is difficult to ascertain whether the effects observed can be attributed to the local program or a wider campaign by the state government. The assessment should be focused on specific behaviours which have been the subject of recent local campaigns and results should be compared with a neighbouring area or areas where the campaign has not been active. Where the intervention is related to improving the road infrastructure, the Guide recommends keeping a record of the number of hazardous sites treated or eliminated and identifying the crash reduction that would be expected from such a treatment.

Human capital outcomes refer to specific competencies acquired by participants in the program or activity. This might include competencies gained among local government staff from formal training programs, skills acquired by individuals, businesses and community groups in delivering road safety services (e.g. correct child restraint fitting, organising ‗driver reviver‘ operations etc.).

Social capital is less easily defined, but may be thought of as consisting of attributes of social networks.


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Attributes of social networks

qualities – norms such as trust, reciprocity and inclusiveness, and common purposes such as social, civic and economic participation

structure – attributes such as size, frequency of interaction, openness and stability

transactions – interactions which contribute to and draw from relationships, such as sharing knowledge and support

network types – bonding (strengthening relationships between similar types of people), bridging (making connections between people who have less in common) and linking (making connections to sources of influence or authority which provide financial and other support).

Measurement is by means of responses to questions about feelings or behaviours which indicate the extent to which social capital is evident in the situation.

Source: Austroads (2009, p.39).

Social network analysis focuses on links between individuals and/or groups and the position of individuals and groups in the network of social connections. This analysis may help to understand patterns of influence in the networks that support local government programs and assist in more effective delivery of programs (Austroads 2009).

The Guide recommends that: ‗Process evaluation should focus on issues such as how smoothly projects run, the quality of materials and presentations, the impressions they made on their target audience, the challenges that arose and how they were overcome.‘ (Austroads 2009, p.40).

The Guide recommends that a consistent approach to evaluations would benefit different departments that engage with the community at the local level. A standard format may be necessary, with opportunities for local government to include additional elements that are particularly relevant for the location or issue being evaluated.

Reviews are necessary to assess and interpret the results of evaluations, and on the basis of the evaluations, to make decisions about the future of the activity or program. Timing should suit the nature of the program or activity, with sufficient time to make a review worthwhile but not so much that it is too late to be useful. Results should be shared with others that are running or considering running similar programs so that local governments and groups may learn from one another what works and what does not and avoid expending precious resources unnecessarily on ineffective activities or modes of operation (Austroads 2009).

3.4.6 Planning and Designing a Safe Local Road Network

Many of the approaches in road safety are retrospective or reactive. That is, they seek to address existing problems, typically using previous crash history. A more proactive approach, appropriate when new developments are being planned, is to address road safety and efficiency issues at the planning stage. Managing road safety and efficiency (LTNZ 2007b) and Australian Model Code for Residential Development (Department of Housing and Regional Development 1995) are important resources in this regard.

In the history of planned residential development in Australia and New Zealand, there have been two broad phases of residential development design. The first is a grid design and the second has been termed ‗curvilinear‘.


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The grid design can be most clearly seen in many rural towns that were designed before the Second World War in a time when land was plentiful, traffic volumes were low and vehicle speeds and acceleration were curtailed by the physical constraints of the vehicles. The grid design was characterised by straight, wide streets that were frequently intersected by uncontrolled, stop or give way controlled cross-intersections. It was a convenient design, but in the latter half of the 20th century traffic volumes increased exponentially, as did vehicle speed and acceleration capacities.

The wide residential streets of the grid design encouraged speeds in excess of the local street speed limit and the through connections between major roads encouraged misuse of these streets as alternative routes when the main road was congested. Increasing volumes of faster vehicles and heavy vehicles made local roads less safe, particularly for pedestrians, cyclists and children at play. The liabilities inherent in the potential conflict points of the plethora of cross-intersections became obvious.

In response to these deficits, new ‗curvilinear‘ residential developments began to appear in the 1960s. The principal design features of roads in the new developments of this era were to use curves to reduce speeds on longer local streets, reduce the number of cross-intersections, reduce the width of the streets and avoid local streets connecting arterial roads to reduce the likelihood that they will be used as ‗rat runs‘.

There were still problems with this type of development, including inappropriate sight distances for the speeds that vehicles could reach, and in the 1990s, The Australian Model Code for Residential Development (AMCORD) was developed. The design of Timbarra Estate in the City of Casey, Victoria, coincided with the development of AMCORD and the local council allowed the estate to be a testing ground for some of the principles included in the code (O‘Brien 2003).

Case study – Timbarra Estate, City of Casey, Victoria

Timbarra Estate was designed in the late 1980s and built in the 1990s. The basic design of the roads in the Timbarra Estate is 70 km/h minor arterial roads with no residential driveways and 50 km/h collector roads which efficiently carry traffic from local streets to exit the estate and vice versa. Through access on local streets is minimised for vehicles. Pedestrian pathways allow pedestrians to remain on the local street network to access local amenities, whereas the maximum time a motor vehicle will spend traversing local streets is one minute. Initial descriptive crash statistics for the Timbarra Estate indicated that the design, in addition to creating a pleasant ‗liveable‘ environment led to there being consistently fewer injury crashes on the local streets per local resident population than the surrounding estates which were not built to the same design standards. All of the crashes in Timbarra during the study period occurred on collector roads or arterials and not on local streets (O‘Brien 2003).

An example of careful development to meet both local resident and commercial needs can be seen in the City of Dubbo, New South Wales.

Case study – City of Dubbo, New South Wales

Dubbo City is a transport hub for freight, with an average 1,200 trucks transiting Dubbo per day serviced by five major highways. The local government recognises that the transport industry provides 4% of the Dubbo workforce with employment. In addition, truck drivers who stop to buy food and refuel provide local businesses with valuable income. However, the large number of heavy vehicles accelerates pavement deterioration, they are a source of noise pollution and they can pose a safety problem, particularly when they detour from the designated truck routes. Dubbo City Council recognises that land-use planning is the best way to maximise the benefits of its position as a transport hub and minimise the costs of the associated pavement damage.


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Dubbo manages the impact of heavy trucks on road safety and amenity in Dubbo by locating heavy vehicle trip generators close to truck routes (i.e. away from residential areas) and clearly signposting the bypass of the CBD. In this way, trucks are kept on roads that are designed to cater for them. New intersections and roads that will service trucks are designed to a standard that can cope with road trains (McLeod 2008).

In addition to managing pavement deterioration, Dubbo‘s town planning ensures that smaller vehicles and pedestrians are protected from heavy vehicles in the course of their daily activity.

3.4.7 Addressing Physical Deficiencies in the Road System

Local governments inherit road networks that have evolved over time and which suffer from both changing patterns of use leading to increased volumes of traffic in areas not designed to handle them and general deterioration of the road surface over time. Where necessary, improving the surface condition, width and alignment of many local roads, implementing local area traffic management, upgrading dangerous intersections and better signage, can make a big difference to the safety of the local road network. Allocating precious funds to addressing deficiencies is a difficult task. The process involves:

gaining knowledge of the deficiencies of the road network

assessing the relative risks of those deficiencies

prioritising deficiencies for treatment

identifying appropriate and cost-effective countermeasures.

Guides to Best Practice

Austroads and the state and territory road authorities provide readily available guides to road design, maintenance and asset management. The Austroads Guide to Road Safety and the Guide to Traffic Management are also invaluable for local road authorities. The Sealed Local Roads Manual (Giummarra 2005) and the Unsealed Roads Manual (Giummarra 2009) provide guidelines to good practice in design, construction, maintenance and rehabilitation of sealed and unsealed pavements in Australia and New Zealand. The New Zealand Government produced a guideline entitled Managing road safety and efficiency under the Resource Management Act 1991 to give guidance to New Zealand local governments, developers and consultants in assessing provisions in plans for addressing road safety and efficiency (LTNZ 2007b).

Assessing the network – tools to help

Gaining knowledge of the deficiencies of the road system can involve such measures as prospective and retrospective road safety audits, hotlines for road users to report problems and whole of network reviews. It can involve requiring road construction workers to report deficiencies and present traffic management plans for approval before commencing work.

The Road Safety Audit Toolkit is an on-line tool to assist practitioners in carrying out road safety audits. The online system assists road safety auditors by:

prompting auditors with the Austroads Road Safety Audit Guide 2nd Edition checklist questions

providing a medium in which they can record the location and audit team details

providing a medium in which auditors can record the findings of an audit in a structured manner based on the Austroads Road Safety Audit Guide


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providing relevant Australasian and jurisdiction specific reference publications and a searching function that allows auditors to interrogate references using ‗key words‘ to identify salient sections

providing an export function that will allow auditors to generate road safety audit reports (Austroads 2003).

Similarly, Austroads has developed the Road Safety Engineering Toolkit, an online guide to provide information on effective countermeasures for addressing known crash types or road deficiencies (Jurewicz 2007).

ARRB, in collaboration with the Queensland Roads Alliance developed the NetRisk safety assessment procedure – a computer based process which simplifies network inspections and helps identify sites with highest crash risk. The process is proactive in that it is designed to help identify high risk sites and treat them before they become accident blackspots (Affum & Goudens 2008).

The risk based proactive approach to road safety is a useful approach to local road safety for a number of reasons:

Safe System – road users make mistakes and there is a need to provide a safe road environment for when these mistakes do occur.

Black spot – the blackspot approach to dealing with the road safety problem is less appropriate for the scattered crash patterns on vast networks of low volume roads.

Legal liability issues – road authorities are required to make reasonable efforts to be aware of the risks on their road network.

Changing public perception – motorists are often aware of high risk locations, and it is not acceptable to say that these sites have not been treated as there is no crash history at the location (Affum & Goudens 2008).

NetRisk uses a two stage process:

Stage 1 involves a review of still images of the road network at set intervals or physically driving the road and rating homogenous sections and recording risk scores according to the key engineering features and roadside conditions.

Stage 2 involves more detailed inspection of the high risk locations and identification of possible treatment options.

The road authority can configure the system to detect a manageable number of the most hazardous locations which can be addressed satisfactorily in each budgeting period.

The Road Safety Risk Manager (RSRM) is a software program that enables users to compare treatment options to reduce crash risks at a given site. The program computes crash likelihood and severity likelihood from exposure and road data. It then provides a risk reduction cost benefit ratio for each possible treatment. This means that a number of proposed road safety projects can be evaluated against each other in terms of the amount of crash risk reduction they provide for every dollar spent. This assists local governments to get the greatest crash risk reduction within their budget (McInerney, Tziotis & Roper 2005).


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The Road Infrastructure Safety Assessment (RISA) tool is being developed by Land Transport NZ. The aims of the tool are to:

provide an indication of the performance of Road Controlling Authorities (RCAs) with respect to road safety (measured by comparing crash rates for equivalent road types and prevalence of road features that contribute to risk)

assist RCAs to improve road safety by identifying features that make the greatest contribution to risk and providing an objective measure of their performance relative to other RCAs.

Unlike tools like Netrisk and RSRM, the results from RISA are used at the policy or network wide level, and are not designed to treat specific locations. The tool identifies ‗themes‘ that may require some program of work and allows comparisons before and after the implementation of measures to assess the improvement in safety in these themes (Austroads 2006b).

Land Transport New Zealand‘s website (now New Zealand Transport Agency) indicates that current use of the tool (as at 26 February 2009) is to assess the prevalence of risk related road features on the road network and make ‗recommendations for high-level strategic actions to improve road safety on a network-wide basis‘ and that the information obtained from RISA is used as input to technical reviews. They note that the method is still being trialled (LTNZ 2008).

Funding improvements to physical infrastructure

The sources of funding to assist councils in road asset management in Australia include the:

Roads to Recovery Program

Black Spot Program

Strategic Regional Program

Financial Assistance Program.

These programs are administered by the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government and are often coordinated by the state or territory governments.

In New Zealand, additional funding for road maintenance and road repair activities is controlled by the Central Government through the National Land Transport Program‘s National Land Transport Fund.

Roads to Recovery Program

In Australia, under the Roads to Recovery Program, councils and state and territory governments can receive funding directly from the federal government to fund specific projects to repair and upgrade local roads. The Australian government has previously specified that ‗Money provided under the Roads to Recovery Program is not intended to replace council spending on roads or State and Territory Government assistance to councils for local road construction or maintenance‘ (Roads to Recovery Funding Conditions; Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 2008a). For the five year period from financial year 2009/10 to 2013/14, $1.75 billion has been allocated to local councils under the Roads to Recovery Program (Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 2010a).


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Black Spot Program

The Australian government Black Spot Program invites anybody in the community, including ‗community groups, motorist organisations, industry organisations, councils and individuals‘ to nominate Black Spot sites to be considered for treatment. The relevant state or territory road authority then assesses the site based on crash history and site visits and advises the federal government. More than 50% of funding for the Black Spot Program is reserved for rural areas in recognition of the fact that greater than 60% of road deaths occur outside of metropolitan areas (Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 2006).

Strategic Regional Program

The Australian government Strategic Regional Program was a program targeted at local government for ‗land transport projects that support growth of regional industry, respond to structural change or strengthen local social and economic opportunities‘. Between 2004 and 2007, some $470 million was allocated to projects under the program (Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 2008b). Future funding commitments for infrastructure by the Australian Government would need to be considered in the context of future budgets.

Financial Assistance Grants

The local roads component of the Financial Assistance Grants Program in Australia is allocated to local governments based on fixed historical shares. The grants are ‗untied‘ meaning that the spending of the grants can be determined by local governments based on local priorities and neither the federal nor the state or territory governments can direct how the money should be spent. In the 2009/10 financial year, $591 million has been allocated to local governments for spending on local roads. (Financial Assistance Grants to Local Government; Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government 2010b).

National Land Transport Programme

The National Land Transport Programme (NLTP) is the mechanism through which the New Zealand Transport Agency allocates funds to local and regional government for land transport infrastructure and services (New Zealand Transport Agency website).

3.4.8 Human Resources

Methods for tackling the human resource problem are many and varied. However, the outcome of the National Forum on Skills Shortages, which draws together the experience of local government, their partners in state and national governments, and representatives from peak professional bodies aligned with local government, were the following ‗Recommendations for Action‘:

1. ‗establishing a virtual Local Government Centre for Excellence … to showcase, promote and develop best practice in Local Government workplace development‘

2. adopting ‗New Ways of Working‘ (e.g. part-time, job-share, flexi-time, etc.)

3. developing ‗a range of Local Government Training and Professional Development‘ initiatives to address shortages in the supply and retention of appropriately skilled workers

4. attracting new workers

5. ‗promoting local government as an Employer of Choice‘ (Local Government Managers Association 2008, p.17).

The following case studies provide information on some successful initiatives that have been undertaken to address this issue.


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Case study – Overseas Qualified Professionals Program, Victoria

Skilled migrants are an important human resource in Australia and New Zealand. However, overseas qualified professionals (particularly those from non-English speaking backgrounds) can experience difficulty gaining employment that matches their skills and qualifications. Employers are sometimes apprehensive about employing workers whose qualifications are more difficult to ratify and who have no references from people of an English-speaking background. In addition, they may be wary about employing people who have little or no experience of working in an Australian workplace, fearing the possibility of inadequate English language skills and cross-cultural problems. Despite the current skills shortage, overseas qualified professionals are under-utilised in the workforce and receive comparatively lower return on their qualifications than Australian qualified professionals (MacDonald, Bertone & MacDonald 2004).

The Victorian Local Governance Association (VLGA) sponsors overseas qualified professionals to gain work experience in local government. The dual aims of the program are to:

1. improve employment prospects for overseas qualified professionals

2. provide assistance to councils who are experiencing difficulty in recruiting experienced professional staff.

With financial support from the Department of Innovation, Industry & Regional Development, VLGA supplies participating local governments with suitably qualified professionals for a 16 week work experience placement. The program funds 10 participants per year. Half of the 10 placements are in regional Victoria. VLGA subsidises the participants‘ pay, pays superannuation and bears the risks and the costs of Workcover. The council contributes $450 per week and the professional receives an appropriate wage for their level of experience and qualification.

With the assistance of the Victorian body for Local Government Professionals (LGPro), VLGA selects and funds suitable mentors for participants to support them during their work experience. The mentors are from Holmesglen Institute of TAFE and participants also undertake training in ‗workplace and cross-cultural training and job seeking skills‘ at the TAFE.

Councils are expected to treat participants as genuine employees, provide them with induction and ensure that they are ‗employed in meaningful participation in their professional capacity‘ (proforma letters supplied by Sarah Colgan, VLGA, 20 January 2009).

Feedback from participants and participating councils has generally been positive. Participating councils have been pleased with how well the program has met their skills needs. In approximately two-thirds of cases, participants have gained ongoing employment with the council where they conducted their work experience placement. Those participants who were not offered ongoing employment with their host council have used the experience to gain employment in similar positions at other councils or in industry (email, Sarah Colgan, VLGA, 20 January 2009).

Case study in regional collaboration – Roads Alliance, Queensland

The Queensland Roads Alliance is a well-organised model of partnership between neighbouring local government areas in regions of Queensland and with the state road authority, Queensland Department of Main Roads (Doyle 2008).


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Regional Road Groups (RRGs) consist of representatives from the participating local governments in the region (typically mayors and councillors) and a state road authority regional director. They are supported by a committee of technical staff from both local government and Main Roads in the region. In 2006, there were 18 such RRGs. Membership is voluntary and participation among local governments is nearly 100%. RRGs are formed consultatively and with regard to the economic, social, environmental and geographic characteristics of the region.

The focus of the Alliance is the effective planning and management of the Local Roads of Regional Significance (LRRS) which comprises approximately 32,000 kms of local government higher order and state controlled lower order roads. The cooperative approach also serves to more generally increase the capacity of road managers across Queensland to be efficient managers of their road assets. The approach empowers local governments to share resources and make joint purchases and generally deliver projects more efficiently. The resource sharing aspect of the Alliance means that every local government contributes something important to the management of LRRS in their region but not every local government has to have experts in every aspect of road management. The collaborative approach means that decisions are made with the bigger picture of the regional network in mind, improving consistency in planning and investment.

The Roads Alliance model adopted in Queensland addresses one of the biggest challenges faced by local government: resource constraints, both in terms of skills and financial capacity.


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4 RESULTS – CRASH DATA ANALYSIS3

4.1 Crash Data

The following analysis is based on crash data from Australia and New Zealand. The method for collection and analysis of this data is described in Section 2.2. When interpreting this data it is important to realise that there is no indication of exposure for many of the variables assessed. For instance, it is not known how many intersections are T intersections, or what proportion of the network is hilly. Therefore, it is difficult to determine the level of risk presented by these road features or types. The only comparison that can be made with the data available is to compare the proportions of different crash types on local government roads against the proportion of crashes of that type on the state network. For further discussion on this issue, and other factors to consider when assessing this data (Section 2.2.1).

4.1.1 By Severity

As indicated in Table 4.1, more casualty crashes occur on the local network than on the state road network. The difference is relatively minor when considering all jurisdictions for Australia (52% of casualty crashes on local roads. This includes fatal and injury crashes combined), but is more pronounced in New Zealand (65% on local). However, when just considering fatal crashes, slightly fewer of these crashes occur on the local road network (40% in Australia, and 46% in New Zealand).

Table 4.1: Annual average fatal and injury crashes in each Australian jurisdiction and New Zealand

Jurisdiction Annual crashes – local Annual crashes – state % crashes local

Fatal Injury Fatal Injury Fatal Injury

New South Wales 158 8,895 292 11,042 35% 45%

Victoria 142 9,355 161 5,704 47% 62%

Queensland 119 7,392 171 6,152 41% 55%

Western Australia 84 4,593 84 3,015 50% 60%

South Australia 34 2,307 86 4,110 28% 36%

Tasmania 15 976 29 687 34% 59%

Total Australia 553 33,517 824 30,709 40% 52%

New Zealand 171 7,099 198 3,672 46% 66%

4.1.2 By Year

In Australia there has been a slight decrease in total casualty crashes between 2003 and 2007, and this has occurred on both the local and state network (Figure 4.1).

In contrast, casualty crash numbers have been increasing in New Zealand, both on the local government and state network. It appears that numbers have increased at a greater rate on local government roads.

Note: This analysis does not include data from Queensland (who provided data for 2001 to 2005), Northern Territory or ACT.

Figure 4.2 shows just the fatal crashes during this same period. The downward trend in fatal crashes is less pronounced in Australia for both local government and state roads. There has been a similar (but slight) decrease for both road types.

3 Figures for Australia exclude ACT and NT.


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In New Zealand it appears that the number of fatal crashes on local government roads has remained stable, while there has been a decrease on state roads.

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4.1.3 By Time of Day

Figure 4.3 shows the distribution of casualty crashes by time of day. The patterns appear very similar for the local government and state road networks, with marked peaks in the late afternoon (between 3 pm and 6 pm). This peak is more pronounced for local government roads in Australia.

In New Zealand there appears to be a disproportional number of crashes on local roads in the evening and early morning (between 7 pm and 2 am), and there is a similar but lesser trend for Australia.

Note: This analysis does not include data from Northern Territory or ACT.

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Figure 4.3: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by time of day


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4.1.4 By Rural and Urban

Figure 4.4 shows that the vast majority of local government casualty crashes occur on urban roads (around 75% for both Australia and New Zealand). However, when considering just fatal crashes, around half occur on rural roads for both Australia and New Zealand (50% in Australia, and 53% in New Zealand). This is in contrast to the state highway network where for Australia, two-thirds (66%) of casualty crashes occur on the urban network, while in New Zealand, only a quarter (25%) of casualty crashes occur on urban roads. For fatal crashes in Australia, around a third (36%) occur on rural roads, while in New Zealand only 12% occur on urban roads.


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Figure 4.4: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by location


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4.1.5 By Speed Limit

Figure 4.5 shows a similar picture based on speed limits. The vast majority of local government crashes occur on 50 km/h and 60 km/h roads in Australia, and 50 km/h roads in New Zealand. Further exploration of the data showed that the relative severity of crashes (the ratio of fatal to all casualty crashes) increased as the speed limit also increased. This occurred in a fairly constant and similar way between local and state managed roads. However, it was interesting to note in Australia that the relative severity of roads with a speed limit of 110 km/h was higher on local roads (10.5% of reported crashes were fatal) than for state roads (7% were fatal). The fatality rate for local roads with speed limits of 110 km/h was substantially higher than for 100 km/h roads on the local network (10.5% versus 5%).

The higher proportion of state highways that are rural roads is likely to influence crash severity for other analyses in this section. That is, given more crashes occur on higher speed rural roads, these are likely to result in higher severity outcomes. It could therefore be expected that there will be higher severity ratios (e.g. the number of fatal crashes compared to all casualty crashes) on state managed roads. Given this, any analysis involving severity outcomes needs to be treated with caution.


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Figure 4.5: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by speed limit


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4.1.6 By Horizontal and Vertical Alignment

Figure 4.6 shows that the majority of casualty crashes occur on straight road sections, for both local and state roads, and in both Australia and New Zealand. It is interesting to note that a higher proportion of casualty crashes occur on curved road sections within the state highway networks than on local roads, and this is the pattern shown for both Australia and New Zealand.

Further exploration of the data showed that 68% of fatal crashes occurred on straight local roads, and 67% of fatal crashes occurred on straight state roads, in Australia. This proportion suggests that there is a similar degree of risk on straight roads for both local and state roads.

In New Zealand, 52% of fatal crashes occurred on straight local roads, and 44% of fatal crashes occurred on straight state roads.


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Figure 4.6: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by horizontal alignment


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Figure 4.7 shows that the majority of casualty crashes occurred on flat road sections for both local and state managed roads where this variable was recorded (for Australian data, this variable was unknown in more than half of the cases analysed).

In Australia, a slightly higher proportion of casualty crashes were reported on ‗hilly‘ local government roads, compared with state roads (24% for hilly local government roads compared with 20% on hilly state highway roads).

This trend was reversed in New Zealand where slightly fewer crashes were reported on hilly local government roads (22%) compared to state roads (24%).

The severity ratio of crashes (fatal crashes versus all) was slightly higher for hilly roads compared with flat roads for both local government and state roads (particularly in Australia), but in each case the fatality ratios were higher on state controlled roads.


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Figure 4.7: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by vertical alignment


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4.1.7 By Light Conditions

Figure 4.8 shows that most casualty crashes occur in daylight conditions for both local and state roads, in both Australia and New Zealand. The proportion of crashes during daylight, dawn/dusk (for Australia) and darkness appear very similar for local and state roads. Note that information on light conditions is missing from many crash reports, and the results presented here represent only those crashes where this data has been included.


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Figure 4.8: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by light conditions


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4.1.8 By Weather Conditions

Figure 4.9 indicates that the vast majority of casualty crashes occur in clear weather conditions for both local and state roads, and in both Australia and New Zealand.

In Australia, 91% of fatal crashes occur in clear weather on local roads, and 88% of fatal crashes occur in clear weather on state roads.

In New Zealand, 82% of fatal crashes occur in clear weather on local roads, and 75% of fatal crashes occur in clear weather on state roads.


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Injury

Fatal

Figure 4.9: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by weather condition


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 49 —

4.1.9 By Road Surface

Figure 4.10 shows that a large proportion of reported casualty crashes occur on sealed roads for both local and state roads, in both Australia and New Zealand. A greater proportion of casualty crashes occur on unsealed local roads than unsealed state roads, and this pattern appears in both Australia and New Zealand.

In Australia, 89% of fatal crashes occur on sealed local roads, and 99% of fatal crashes occur on sealed state roads.

In New Zealand, 94% of fatal crashes occur on sealed local roads, and 99% of fatal crashes occur on sealed state roads. This indicates that a higher proportion of fatal crashes occur on unsealed local roads.


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Sealed Unsealed Sealed Unsealed Sealed Unsealed Sealed Unsealed

Local government State highw ay Local government State highw ay


Jurisdiction/Road Surface

Ca

su

alt

y C

ras

he

s

Injury

Fatal

Figure 4.10: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by road surface


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 50 —

4.1.10 By Surface Condition

Figure 4.11 indicates that the vast majority of casualty crashes occur on dry surface conditions on both local and state roads, in both Australia and New Zealand. The graph also indicates that a slightly higher proportion of injury crashes occur on wet state roads than on wet local roads.

In Australia, 81% of fatal crashes occur on dry local roads, and 80% of fatal crashes occur on dry state roads.

In New Zealand, 77% of fatal crashes occur on dry local roads, and 72% of fatal crashes occur on dry state roads.


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Dry Wet Dry Wet Dry Wet Dry Wet



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Ca

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Figure 4.11: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by surface condition


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 51 —

4.1.11 By Crash Type

Figure 4.12 and Figure 4.13 show the types of crashes occurring in Australia and New Zealand respectively. In Australia, the most common crash types on local roads involved vehicles travelling in the same direction (20%), vehicles from adjacent approaches (18%), off path on a straight (14%), and vehicles from opposing directions (12%).

In New Zealand, the most common crash types were loss of control while cornering (21%), vehicles colliding from adjacent approaches (18%), same direction (12%) and pedestrian (11%).

When compared to state road crashes in Australia, almost all crash types are over-represented on local roads given the predominance of same direction crashes on the state road network.

In New Zealand, adjacent approaches, opposing turns, manoeuvring and collisions with obstructions are all over-represented when compared to crash types on state roads.

The data was also analysed to determine the most common types of fatal crashes on local roads. For Australia, the most common types were off path on curve (22%), off path on straight (21%), pedestrian (16%) and opposing directions (12%). Crashes involving opposing directions were under-represented when compared to the state network (24%), while those for off path on curve, off path on straight and pedestrian were all over-represented (the figures for state roads were 17%, 20% and 11% respectively).

In New Zealand the most common fatal local road crash types were loss of control while cornering (32%), pedestrian (16%), head-on (14%) and loss of control on straight (13%). Cornering, pedestrian and loss of control on straight crashes were all over-represented when compared to the state road network (23%, 7% and 9% respectively), while head-on crashes were under-represented (36% of state road fatalities).



A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 52 —

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Local government State highway

Australia

Crash Type

Ca

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Figure 4.12: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by crash type in Australia

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New Zealand

Crash Type

Casu

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Figure 4.13: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by crash type in New Zealand


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 53 —

4.1.12 By Intersection/Mid-block

Figure 4.14 shows that in Australia the majority of casualty crashes occur at intersections on local roads, but on state roads the majority of casualty crashes occur at mid-blocks.

In New Zealand, the majority of casualty crashes occurs at mid-blocks for both local and state roads, but a higher proportion occur at intersections for local government roads.

In Australia, 30% of fatal crashes occur at local road intersections, compared to 17% of fatal crashes that occur at state highway intersections (the remainder occurring at mid-block locations).

This same pattern is seen in the New Zealand crash data (24% at intersections for local government roads, and 15% at intersections for state roads).

It appears that both casualty and fatal crashes are over-represented on local government roads.


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Intersection Midblock Intersection Midblock Intersection Midblock Intersection Midblock

Local government State Highway Local government State Highway


Jurisdiction/Intersection/Midblock

Ca

su

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y C

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s

Injury

Fatal

Figure 4.14: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by intersection/mid-block


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 54 —

4.1.13 By Intersection Type

Figure 4.15 indicates that T-intersections have the highest proportion of casualty crashes on both local and state roads in Australia and New Zealand. In Australia, a slightly higher proportion of crashes occur at roundabouts and T-intersections on local government roads, while in New Zealand, a higher proportion of casualty crashes occur at X-intersections on local government roads.


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Local government State highw ay Local government State highw ay


Jurisdiction/Intersection type

Casu

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rash

es

Injury

Fatal

Figure 4.15: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by intersection type


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 55 —

4.1.14 By Traffic Control

Figure 4.16 indicates that in situations where traffic control is used, most crashes in Australia occur at traffic signals. However, a higher proportion of crashes occur at either giveway or stop controlled intersection on local government roads.

In New Zealand, the proportion of crashes at signals (or traffic lights) is much lower, with most crashes occurring at giveway controlled intersections. The majority of casualty crashes occurs where there is an absence of traffic controls on both local and state roads.


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Jurisdiction/Traffic Control

Casu

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Figure 4.16: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by traffic control


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 56 —

4.1.15 By Object Hit

Figure 4.17 shows that in Australia, the most commonly struck object during local government and state highway crashes is tree or bush. On local government roads, this is followed by utility poles, fence, embankment and signpost. For state roads the pattern is similar, with tree or bush followed by fence, utility pole, embankment and signpost. The proportion of crashes into tree or bush and utility pole is higher on local government roads, while that for fence, embankment and signpost is lower.

Also of interest is the high proportion of fatal crashes involved when objects are struck. Of the fatal crashes, 47% were the result of hitting a tree or bush on local government roads, with a similar figure on state roads (44%).

Note: The Australian data analysis is only representative of Western Australia, New South Wales and Victoria. Although South Australia and ACT have an ‗object struck‘ category, there was limited detail, and therefore this was not used in the data analysis.

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Figure 4.17: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by object struck in Australia


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 57 —

Figure 4.18 shows the main objects struck in New Zealand. The most commonly struck objects on local government roads were fence, parked vehicle, embankment, guide post, tree or bush, and drain or culvert (in that order). For state roads, the picture was slightly different, with the most commonly struck objects being embankment, fence, drain or culvert, tree or bush, guardrail and guide post.

It is interesting to note the high proportion of fatal crashes when a tree or bush is hit (21% of fatal crashes on local government roads, and 17% on state highways).

New Zealand data also included casualty crashes with vehicles and parked vehicles, which were not present in the Australian data.

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Figure 4.18: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by object struck in New Zealand


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 58 —

4.1.16 By Crash Causation Factors

Figure 4.19 shows the crash causation factors in New Zealand. An Australian analysis of crash causation factors is not included because there are discrepancies between state data for this data field. The most common cause attributed to both local and state roads was poor observation. For local roads, this was followed by failed to giveway or stop, speed, poor handling and alcohol. On state roads, poor handling, speed, failed to giveway or stop, road factors and alcohol were the next most common factors.

For local roads, poor observation, failed to giveway or stop, speed and alcohol were all over-represented when compared to state highway crashes.

Further analysis of the data showed that speed and alcohol were the most common causes attributed to fatal crashes, and that both of these factors were over-represented on local government roads compared with state roads (15% of fatal crashes were attributed to speed on local roads, with 10% on state highways. 13% of fatal crashes were attributed to alcohol on local roads, with 10% on state roads).

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Figure 4.19: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by crash causation factors in New Zealand


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 59 —

4.1.17 By Seatbelt Worn

Figure 4.20 shows that reported seatbelt usage following a crash is quite common on both local and state roads, in both Australia and New Zealand. There is a higher proportion of non-seatbelt usage on local government roads, when compared to state highways in both Australia and New Zealand.

Further analysis of the fatal data showed that when there is knowledge about whether a seatbelt is worn or not (i.e. excluding the ‗uncertain‘ category), for Australia, 22% of fatal crash records for local government roads indicated no seat belt was worn compared with 14% on state roads.

This pattern is even more pronounced in New Zealand, where records indicated that 36% of fatal crashes on local government roads involved drivers or passengers not wearing seatbelts, compared with 20% on state roads.

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Figure 4.20: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by seatbelt use


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 60 —

4.1.18 By Road User Age

The data for this analysis has been grouped by age bands. This is because data from some jurisdictions was only available for these groupings. Figure 4.21 shows that most casualty crashes (this includes all those injured, and not just the driver) occur within the 17-24 age group in both Australia and New Zealand and for both local government roads and state highways.

Casualty crashes for the 17-24 age group were over-represented on local government roads for both Australia and New Zealand. In Australia, those in the 0-16 and 75+ age groups were slightly over-represented on local government roads.

In New Zealand, the 0-16 age group was greatly over-represented on local government roads.

This finding is even more pronounced when just considering fatal data. This additional analysis showed that in Australia, 28% of fatalities on local roads were aged 17-24. For state highways, 22% of fatalities were from this age group.

The pattern was similar in New Zealand, with 33% of fatalities were in the 17-24 age bracket on local government roads, compared with 24% on state roads.


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Figure 4.21: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by road user age


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 61 —

4.1.19 By Sex of Driver

Figure 4.22 shows that the majority of casualty crashes involve male drivers on both local and state roads in both Australia and New Zealand. There is a slight over-representation of males on local government roads when compared to state roads.

In Australia, the proportion of fatal crashes involving males is 77% on both local and state roads. In comparison 67% of fatal crashes involve male drivers in New Zealand on local roads, and 64% of fatal crashes on state roads.


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Figure 4.22: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by sex of driver


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 62 —

4.1.20 By Vehicle Type

Figure 4.23 shows that passenger vehicles account for the vast majority of casualty crashes occurring on both local government roads and state highways, in both Australia and New Zealand. For both Australia and New Zealand, passenger vehicles are slightly under-represented on local roads compared with state roads as are heavy vehicles. Motorcycles and cyclists are slightly over-represented.

Note: the Tasmanian data only classifies trucks as a vehicle type. Thus all entries for trucks are categorised as rigid trucks in the Australian analysis. For New Zealand data, there was no separation between rigid trucks and semi-trailers.

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Figure 4.23: Proportion of local government and state highway casualty crashes by vehicle type

4.2 Crash Rates Analysis

Casualty crash rates indicate the likelihood of a casualty crash for a given road stereotype. Average casualty crash rates are expressed in casualty crashes per 100 million vehicle kilometres travelled (VKT) for roads and as casualty crashes per 10m vehicles entering (VE) for intersections.

4.2.1 Crash Rates Based on Previous Research

Local government crash rates and crash risk are an area where little knowledge has been developed to date. This issue was partially addressed during a previous Austroads project (Austroads 2008). Following a pilot project in 2005-06, crash rates were derived for a number of municipalities of varying degree of urbanisation and size throughout Australia. Over 30 municipalities were canvassed seeking data for the study across all Australian jurisdictions. Only seven municipalities possessed geospatial road and traffic flow information of an adequate standard and format for the purpose of in-depth crash rate analysis. Table 4.2 lists the local government areas for which crash rates were derived.


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 63 —

Table 4.2: Local governments for which local road crash rates were derived

State Local government Region

NSW Wollondilly Outer regions of Sydney and

rural hinterland

VIC Boroondara Inner Melbourne

VIC Mornington Peninsula Outer Melbourne, coastal

and hinterland

QLD Maroochy South-east Queensland,

coastal urban and hinterland

SA Salisbury Outer Adelaide, urban

SA West Torrens Inner Adelaide

WA Albany Remote rural town and rural

surrounds

The methodology used to derive crash rates for local roads is described in the project report (Austroads 2008), and is similar to the spatial GIS method used to calculate crash rates for state roads. The most fundamental difference was the classifying of intersection crashes based on their distance from the nearest intersection node. Whereas 100 metres from the intersection node was used for state road intersections, 50 metres was used for all intersections in the local road networks. This decision was made due to the lower speed limits and traffic volumes on local roads and the shorter mid-block lengths of local roads.

Another fundamental difference was the estimation of traffic volumes on local roads. On the state-controlled roads, only the traffic flow data provided by the road authorities was used – mid-blocks or intersections without annual average daily traffic (AADT) information were simply left out of the analysis. For local road authorities, however, the AADT estimations had to be made where no information was provided in order to complete the task. This was because a high percentage of local roads did not have known volumes. Estimations were made based on the volumes that were provided for nearby roads of the same hierarchy. State roads which ran through these local jurisdictions were included in the study. Effort was made to ensure that any estimated volumes on such roads were accurate for the few sections of the state roads where volumes had not been provided.

Table 4.3 gives the comparative crash rates and relative risks (per 100 million VKT) for local versus state government managed roads in the municipalities that participated in the study. The table includes only those participating municipalities for which crash rates were available for both state and local government managed roads. In three of the four municipalities the crash risk per VKT was higher on local government roads than on state government roads. Crash rate ratios varied between less than one crash to more than three crashes on local roads for every crash on state roads. It is important to highlight that figures for state roads are based on actual traffic volumes, while those for local roads are based on estimates (and therefore likely to be less reliable).

Table 4.3: Crashes per 100 million VKT for local versus state government roads (road sections)

State LGA Degree of urbanisation

Crash rate (Casualty crashes per 100M VKT) Relative risk for local roads

Local State

VIC Boroondara Inner urban 12 19 0.66

QLD Maroochy Outer urban/rural 47 13 3.57

SA Salisbury Outer urban 33 15 2.15

SA West Torrens Inner urban 68 36 1.89


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 64 —

In addition, further analysis within the outer urban/urban municipality of Maroochy (QLD), crash rates were six times higher on local versus state roads in rural areas and two and a half times higher on local roads versus state roads in urban areas.

The following information is based only on local government managed roads within the participating municipalities and shows the differences in crash rates across different types of local roads. The results from the municipalities varied greatly as shown in Table 4.4 to Table 4.8. There were, however, some similarities for collector road crash rates on a state basis and more robust correlation between crash rates for different intersection types.

Table 4.4: Local road stereotypes in the participating municipalities

State LGA Degree of urbanisation

Crash rate (Casualty crashes per 100M VKT)

Collector Local access

NSW Wollondilly Outer urban/rural 30 26

VIC Boroondara Inner urban 14 11

VIC Mornington Peninsula Outer urban/rural 13 23

QLD Maroochy Outer urban/rural 39 76

SA Salisbury Outer urban 56 40

SA West Torrens Inner urban 54 108

WA Albany Regional

urban/rural 29 31

Table 4.5: Mid-block stereotypes in the participating municipalities – crash rates (casualty crashes per 100M VKT)

State Local government

Environment Carriageway

Rural Urban Single Divided

NSW Wollondilly 23.47 27.19 – –

VIC Boroondara 15.47 18.9 22.83 10.72

VIC Mornington Pen. – – 29.21 9.93

QLD Maroochy – – 58.48 33.94

SA Salisbury – – 16.87 13

SA West Torrens 9.91 11.38 – –

WA Albany 32.46 26.56 28.68 23.61


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Table 4.6: Mid-block stereotypes in the participating municipalities – relative risks


Environment Carriageway

Rural Urban Single Divided

NSW Wollondilly 1.00 1.16 – –

VIC Boroondara 1.00 1.22 2.13 1.00

VIC Mornington Pen. – – 2.94 1.00

QLD Maroochy – – 1.72 1.00

SA Salisbury – – 1.30 1.00

SA West Torrens 1.00 1.15 – –

WA Albany 1.22 1.00 1.21 1.00

Table 4.7: Intersection stereotypes in the participating municipalities – crash rates (casualty crashes per 10M VE)


Environment Legs Traffic control type

Rural Urban 3 4 Signals Roundabout Stop/Give Way

NSW Wollondilly 0.56 0.88 0.5 0.78 – – –

VIC Boroondara – – 0.34 0.81 1.34 0.58 0.33

VIC Mornington Pen. 0.36 0.25 0.16 1.07 – – –

QLD Maroochy 0.84 0.83 0.73 1.06 1.57 1.59 0.68

SA Salisbury – – 0.53 1.16 1.59 1.11 0.49

SA West Torrens – – 0.41 1.35 1.91 0.58 0.36

WA Albany 0.87 0.48 0.45 0.56 – 0.51 0.48

Table 4.8: Intersection stereotypes in the participating municipalities – relative risks


Environment Legs Traffic control type

Rural Urban 3 4 Signals Roundabout Stop/Give Way

NSW Wollondilly 1.00 1.57 1.00 1.56 – – –

VIC Boroondara – – 1.00 2.38 4.06 1.76 1.00

VIC Mornington Pen. 1.44 1.00 1.00 6.69 – – –

QLD Maroochy 1.01 1.00 1.00 1.45 2.31 2.34 1.00

SA Salisbury – – 1.00 2.19 3.24 2.27 1.00

SA West Torrens – – 1.00 3.29 5.31 1.61 1.00

WA Albany 1.81 1.00 1.00 1.24 – 1.06 1.00

Crash rates for state roads have been derived through previous Austroads projects (e.g. ST1343), and are provided in Appendix F. Great caution needs to be used when comparing crash rates from different locations (as the method of data collection varies, as does the format and type of data), but some very general statements can be made.

Although there is a lot of variability in the local government data, it appears that crash rates show trends in the same direction for mid-block locations as for the state road network. Crash rates on urban roads are higher than for rural roads, and higher for single carriageway roads than for divided roads. There is also a trend towards higher crash rates on the local government road network than for state roads. For example, rural crash rates appear to be higher as do rates for divided and single carriageway mid-block locations.


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The situation is more mixed for intersection crash rates. The trend for local government intersections seems to be for lower crash rates at urban intersections compared with rural (this is the opposite to what is typically seen on state roads). The trend for crash rates by number of approaches to the intersection is the same, with higher crash rates on 4-leg intersections compared with 3-leg. The trend is also similar for the type of intersection, with signalised intersections having a higher crash rate than roundabouts or Stop/Give Way controlled intersections. The crash rates for local government intersections seem to be lower than for state roads. One exception to this is for signalised intersections.

The following tables (Table 4.9 and Table 4.10) provide an example of the detailed analysis performed for all seven municipalities. They report mid-block and intersection casualty crash rates for the City of Salisbury in South Australia.

Table 4.9: Salisbury, South Australia – mid-block crash rates

Attributes 100M VKT 5yrs Casualty crashes

Crash rate (Casualty crashes per 100M VKT)

Carriageway Divided 26.139 245 9.37

Undivided 19.035 556 29.21

Road hierarchy Primary 39.165 600 15.32

Secondary 3.562 88 24.71

Collector 0.960 54 56.22

Local 1.486 59 39.69

Road owner Council 6.654 217 32.61

State 38.520 584 15.16

Speed zones (km/h)

<60 2.683 123 45.84

60 8.104 289 35.66

70 to 80 19.844 268 13.51

>80 14.542 121 8.32


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Table 4.10: Salisbury, South Australia – intersection crash rates

Attributes 10M VE 5yrs Casualty crashes

Crash rate (Casualty crashes per 10M VE)

Number of legs 3 legs 1850.052 980 0.53

4 legs 568.873 659 1.16

5 legs 4.750 12 2.53

Roundabouts No 2345.502 1564 0.67

Yes 78.173 87 1.11

Traffic signals No 2039.541 1042 0.51

Yes 384.134 609 1.59

Road hierarchies All primary 256.867 399 1.55

All secondary 34.015 24 0.71

All collectors 31.453 14 0.45

All locals 241.327 137 0.57

Primary – secondary 356.947 382 1.07

Primary – collector 285.684 190 0.67

Primary – local 758.434 268 0.35

Secondary – collector 82.865 70 0.84

Secondary – local 252.609 130 0.51

Collector – local 175.594 101 0.58

Carriageways All undivided 1775.918 1290 0.73

Undivided – divided 647.757 361 0.56

4.2.2 Crash Rates Based on Crash Data from this Review

Analysis of casualty crashes per 100 million VKT on local versus state government roads was performed based on the data obtained in the literature review (Section 3) and the analysis of crash data (Section 4). Data used in the analysis included:

estimates of VKT on local and state government managed roads by urban and rural location from an unpublished report for the NTC based on data collected in 2007 (NTC 2007).

crash data from all Australian states and territories that was analysed as part of this Austroads project for the five year period: 2003 to 2007 (see Section 2.2 for an outline of how this data was collected and analysed).

It should be noted that the definition of urban and rural may differ slightly between the two data sources. The NTC report divided local government areas into five regions (urban, outer urban, regional, rural, and remote).

For the purpose of calculating the VKT figures that are presented in Table 4.11, urban, outer urban and regional were combined to form the ‗urban‘ category and rural and remote were combined to form the ‗rural‘ category. The distinction between rural and urban in the crash data is as described in Section 2.2.


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The unquantifiable differences that may have resulted from these disparate classification methods, may affect the reliability of the results that follow. Therefore, these results should be interpreted with caution. Table 4.11 shows that:

On rural roads, crashes were 1.6 times as likely to occur on the local network as on the state network.

On urban roads, crashes were 1.9 times as likely to occur on the local network as on the state network.

Table 4.11: Casualty crashes per 100 million VKT on state and local government roads in rural and urban areas

Road authority

Region 108 VKT per year

Casualty crashes, 5 yr average, 2003 to 2007 Crashes per 100 million vkt

Fatal Injury All Fatal Injury All

State Urban 1,227 297 20,719 21,016 0.24 16.88 17.12

Rural 356 527 9,979 10,506 1.48 28.06 29.55

All 1,583 824 30,698 31,522 0.52 19.39 19.91

Local Urban 757 274 24,669 24,943 0.36 32.59 32.96

Rural 194 279 8,847 9,126 1.44 45.63 47.07

All 951 553 33,516 34,069 0.58 35.25 35.83

Total Urban 1,984 571 45,389 45,960 0.29 22.88 23.16

Rural 549 806 18,826 19,632 1.47 34.26 35.73

All 2,534 1,377 64,215 65,591 0.54 25.35 25.89

Source: Travel data adapted from NTC 2007; crash data analysed as part of this Austroads project.

However, the results for crash rates on state roads differ significantly from that reported in previous research (Appendix F). That analysis was performed on roads where both crash numbers and traffic volumes were known (on a route by route basis and then aggregated) and not through an estimation of traffic volumes. For this reason, the results presented above (Table 4.11) appear to lack reliability.

4.3 Summary of Crash Data Analysis

Half of all casualty crashes in Australia and two-thirds in New Zealand occur on local government managed roads. A slightly lower proportion of fatal crashes occur on these roads (40% in Australia, and 46% in New Zealand).

The five year trend has been for a slight decrease in crash numbers for both state managed roads and local roads in Australia, but New Zealand has seen an increase in crashes on local government managed roads. Note that 10 year trend data is supplied for some jurisdictions in Section 7.1.2, and this shows a slightly different picture.

The vast majority of local government road crashes occur on urban roads (75%), but around half of fatal crashes occur on rural roads.

The fatality ratio (proportion of fatal crashes to all casualty crashes) increases as the speed limit increases. The level of risk for Australian 110 km/h local roads is particularly bad, with double the risk of a fatal crash when compared to 100 km/h roads (10% chance of a fatal outcome on 110 km/h roads, compared to 5% for 100 km/h roads).


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The leading crash types for local government roads in Australia are vehicles travelling in the same direction; adjacent approaches; off path on a straight and curve; and pedestrians. For fatal crashes most frequent crash types are off path on curve; off path on straight; pedestrian and opposing directions.

For New Zealand, the leading crash types are loss of control while cornering; vehicles travelling in the same direction; from adjacent approaches; and pedestrians. The leading types of fatal crashes are loss of control while cornering, pedestrian, head-on, and loss of control on a straight.

Crashes on local government roads appear to be over-represented (when compared to state managed roads) for the following factors:

during the evening peak, and in the late evening/early morning

off path crashes

pedestrian crashes

crashes into trees and utility poles

speed

alcohol

not wearing seatbelts

road users aged 17 – 24 years old (and in New Zealand 0 – 16 years).

Data on the crash rates (based on crashes per 100 million VKT) was thought to be relatively unreliable given the variation found. However, it appears in general that crash rates for local roads are higher than those for state roads. Best estimates would place the overall risk at between 1.5 and 2 times higher than for state roads, although on some types of local roads, this is likely to be substantially higher (for example, rural roads in one local council were estimated to have six times the risk compared to rural state roads).


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5 RESULTS – SITE INVESTIGATIONS

As described in Section 2.3, a total of 61 site investigations were undertaken in New South Wales, Queensland and Western Australia. These sought to identify factors that may have contributed or could potentially contribute to the occurrence of crashes on local government roads. Findings from the site investigations for each of the states investigated were grouped together to give an indication of the contributing or potentially contributing factors to casualty crashes in Australia. The key factors for intersection and mid-block sites are outlined below. Appendix G graphically shows the road and road environmental factors that were considered to have contributed, or potentially contributed to the occurrence or severity of crashes at the sites investigated.

5.1 Intersection Sites

With the results from the site investigations grouped together to represent the Australian wide context, the following major factors were observed:

Poor sight distance at the intersection was identified as a contributing factor at 29% and a potential contributing factor at 26% of sites.

Signing and delineation were identified as a factor. Insufficient signing, or signs hidden or inconspicuous were thought to contribute to crash occurrence (6% and 3% of sites respectively), while raised reflective pavement markers not provided was identified as a potential contributing factor at 20% of sites.

Inappropriate speed limits were identified as a potentially contributing factor at 14% of sites.

Trees located within the clear zone were identified as a potential contributing factor at 51% of sites.

Poles located within the clear zone were identified as a potential contributing factor at 57% of sites.

Absence of any pedestrian facilities was identified as a potential contributing factor at 46% of sites.

Unsatisfactory entry to the carriageway at a private driveway was identified as a potential contributing factor at 23% of sites.

Poor street lighting was identified as a potential contributing factor at 14% of sites.

The following factors were less significant (in terms of incidence), but were also identified as potentially contributing to crashes:

glare from oncoming headlights (9%) or the sun (9%)

signs restricting sight distance (9%) or mounted at an inappropriate height (6%)

traffic islands poorly delineated (11%).

5.2 Mid-block Sites

At mid-block sites the following major factors were observed:

Poor sight distance at access points was identified as a potential contributing factor at 23% of sites.

Trees located within the clear zone were identified as a potential contributing factor at 62% of sites.


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Poles located within the clear zone were identified as a potential contributing factor at 69% of sites.

Inadequate guardrail was identified as a potential contributing factor at 54% of sites.

Signs hidden or inconspicuous were identified as a potential contributing factor at 12% of sites.

Absence of pedestrian facilities was identified as a potential contributing factor at 15% of sites.

The following factors were less significant (in terms of incidence), but were also identified as contributing to crashes at mid-block locations:

poorly maintained edgelines (8%)

unsealed shoulders (8%)

road too narrow (8%).

The following factors were less significant (in terms of incidence), but were also identified as potentially contributing to crashes at mid-block locations:

poor sight distance for overtaking (8%)

ambiguous/unclear advisory speed/warning signs (8%)

poor curve delineation (8%)

inappropriate speed limit (8%)

poorly maintained pavement (8%).


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6 RESULTS – IN-DEPTH CRASH ANALYSIS

The in-depth crashes that were reviewed by the Centre for Automotive Safety Research (CASR) in Adelaide occurred at mid-block locations or intersections between local government roads. Some examples of the crashes are provided in Appendix H to demonstrate the variation in crash types and circumstances. Each is accompanied by a combination of site diagrams and photos of the crash scene. The following results and comments were produced by the CASR research team4. These results are based on a qualitative assessment of case studies, and are not meant to be representative of all crashes on local government roads.

6.1 Metropolitan Crashes

The discussion that follows highlights crash factors that are prevalent on local government roads. Examples of crashes in the metropolitan area are provided in Appendix H. Many of the contributing factors to crash causation and severity outcomes have been identified in the past and are well known to road authorities. These include:

the prevalence of roadside hazards close to the edge of the road

visual obstruction of signs and traffic controls

poor delineation

high numbers of crashes at controlled junctions

the issue of young drivers and risk taking behaviour

the role of moderate speeding in many of the crashes

impaired drivers

driver distraction.

Utility poles continue to pose a major hazard to errant vehicles and crash outcomes tend to be severe. Trees are also a significant roadside hazard and LGAs are commonly involved with their planting beside the road or in medians, even along main roads controlled by DTEI. It is notable that there appears to be no coordination of tree species or planting position from a road safety perspective. Often the road safety problem will not present itself for several years until the tree trunk increases in diameter.

Despite the fact that a junction may have traffic control, crashes continue to occur. Common problems associated with such junctions include motorists becoming habituated to the low traffic volumes at the junction and not exercising due care when they should give way, problems caused due to shadows by overhanging trees, the low conspicuity of oncoming vehicles and failure to recognise that a junction was present in the first place. Several of these crashes also involved the selection of a gap in which the oncoming vehicle was travelling above the speed limit. Many of the crashes involved elderly drivers making errors of judgement when selecting gaps. Give Way and Stop signs should not be regarded as solutions to problems as is commonly the case in practice. Instead, the more widespread use of roundabouts needs to be encouraged wherever possible.

A few cases involved the obstruction of traffic control signs and traffic signals by vegetation. Such situations are usually handled by routine maintenance but dangerous situations can develop unnoticed and road authorities need to maintain robust systems for regular checking. At many of the junction crashes with give way signs, the give way pavement marking was not visible usually due to spoon drains and drainage contouring. Consideration ought to be given to moving holding points further back from the intersections in such situations. 4 This team was led by Jeremy Woolley, and included co-authors Tori Lindsay and Matthew Baldock.


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For the raft of human factors that may contribute to crashes such as distraction, inattention, impairment, risk taking and misjudgement, the development of more forgiving roadside environments and the application of speed limits better aligned to harm minimisation is regarded as essential. For many of the crashes reviewed, it is not feasible to apply specific site treatments. In such cases, more appropriate speed limits that minimise harm to vehicle occupants and vulnerable road users is the one thing that could make a difference across the whole network for many crash types. The crashes involving pedestrians or those occurring at junctions provided excellent examples of this.

Other factors that stood out in the review included crashes involving U-turn manoeuvres and conflicts between through traffic and parking vehicles. The conflicts between pedestrians and manoeuvring commercial vehicles in commercial environments were also highlighted by some of the case studies assessed.

Other factors that were noted in the review had much in common with crashes on busier state managed roads. Crashes at signalised intersections were prevalent in the Central Business District area and either involved motorists running red lights or occurred during an uncontrolled filter right turn manoeuvre. The latter is one thing that operators have control over yet it poses a significant problem in traffic safety and its use should be discouraged. There were three cases that involved pedestrians being struck by turning vehicles at signalised intersections. These did not have any initial controlled right turn protection for the pedestrians in operation at the time of the crash (i.e. a red arrow is displayed to motorists until the pedestrian has safely commenced crossing).

Pedestrian crashes on multilane roads, in the vicinity of bus stops and near signalised intersections are common characteristics of the crashes on the local government roads in the CBD and on state managed roads in general. Environmental conditions such as sunglare were also identified as major contributing factors in several of the collisions with pedestrians.

Investigations by CASR has also indicated that a considerable proportion of crashes involve drivers who have a pre-existing medical condition that has contributed to the crash. It is conservatively estimated that 13% of drivers involved in crashes are affected by this condition and further research is being conducted.

6.2 Rural Crashes

Examples of crashes on local government roads in rural areas are provided in Appendix H. Many of the contributing factors to crash causation and severity outcomes have been well established and documented in the past. Some of the common factors identified from the review include:

the severe injury outcomes of crashes at rural junctions

the lower standard of traffic control, artificial lighting and delineation at rural junctions (compared to metropolitan areas)

the prevalence of roadside hazards and especially trees

general lack of clear zones and hazard protection

poor location of junctions relative to bends and crests

poor junction geometry

poor road alignment and delineation

high prevalence of unsealed shoulders

driving inexperience


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loss of control

excessive speed

impairment.

Due to the higher travelling speeds on the rural road network, crash outcomes tend to be more severe than equivalent metropolitan crashes. Several crashes at cross roads and T-junctions were caused by motorists failing to give way as they had become habituated to not expecting a vehicle to come from the other direction. Many of the crashes at junctions involved poor road geometry, poor junction delineation and obscured lines of sight due to vegetation. Several of the junctions lacked any form of traffic control and in many instances where a give way sign was erected the pavement marking was either non-existent or not visible. Given that the standard (AS 1742) only permits stop signs where lines of sight are inadequate, it is essential that give way signed junctions are also well maintained and delineated.

Crashes involving loss of control on unsealed roads were noted for young inexperienced drivers as well as locals who were very familiar with the road and travelled on it daily. Many of these crashes occurred under conditions when the unsealed road was wet. Loss of control on sealed roads with unsealed shoulders tended to result in severe or fatal injuries. Many of these crashes were the result of distraction, inexperience or impairment but unlike higher volume state rural roads, many of the local government sealed and unsealed rural roads reviewed did not have suitable clear zones or barrier protection for hazards. This combination is well established as a major predictor of severe crash injury outcomes.

Many of the crashes reviewed involved conflict between vehicles on narrow carriageways. Some of these were on tight bends with minimal sight distance around the bend. Others were on straight sections of road at the crests of hills. These reflect the contribution of poor road geometry given the high speed limits that existed on the roads (100 km/h). Two crashes highlighted the importance of lower speed limits on the fringes of built-up areas where manoeuvres to access private property were common.

As with metropolitan local government crashes, many crashes involved vehicles travelling at excessive speed. The excessive speeds in rural areas tended to be very high (in excess of 120 km/h) and resulting collisions frequently involved a fatality following a collision with a tree or group of trees. Such crashes were observed on sealed and unsealed roads. Moderate speeding (i.e. travelling within 10 km/h over the speed limit) was a factor in the majority of the crashes investigated.

Two of the crashes involved confusion during night time conditions. In one, the driver became disoriented by the headlights from three oncoming vehicles and the reaction by the driver led to a loss of control of the vehicle resulting in a fatal head-on collision. There were no sealed shoulders or edge lining on the section of road where the crash occurred. In another, the driver stopped his movement midway through a T-junction in response to the headlights of an oncoming vehicle resulting in a collision.

Lack of awareness of the presence of junctions and a lack of speed advisory signs were common problems. Maintenance issues in relation to visual obstruction caused by vegetation and missing road signs were also a feature in many crashes.


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6.3 Summary

Daytime crashes on local government roads in metropolitan areas highlight issues mainly in relation to roadside hazards and conflicts at junctions. Utility poles contribute to severe crash injury outcomes. Give way and stop controlled junctions still pose a problem from a behavioural perspective and junctions need to be modified to eliminate through and right turn movements or converted into roundabouts on a more widespread basis. In several cases, shadows and visual obstruction were major contributors to the cause of the crash. The conspicuity of oncoming vehicles was also a likely factor in several of the crashes. It is difficult to provide site specific solutions to collisions between pedestrians and vehicles in the metropolitan area other than to acknowledge that any lowering of travelling speed is likely to have a large effect on injuries to vulnerable road users. Several of the crashes reviewed demonstrated this point.

For crashes on rural roads (both day and night), road geometry, delineation and artificial lighting in rural areas is generally of a lower standard than that in metropolitan areas. Many crashes at junctions were the result of ambiguity in priority, inadequate delineation or poor lines of sight. In many of the cases investigated, pavement marking was in poor condition or lacking altogether. Substandard road geometry was also a factor in many of the crashes reviewed, especially in hilly areas. In similarity with state controlled roads, the combination of unsealed shoulders and high rural speed limits tends to result in crashes with severe or fatal injury outcomes. The loss of control of vehicles on unsealed roads by both inexperienced young drivers and experienced local drivers was notable. Unlike their state counterparts, local government roads tended to have inadequate clear zones and hazard protection.


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7 RESULTS – WORKSHOP

This section summarises the results of a stakeholder workshop held in Melbourne in June 2009. The workshop involved 20 participants from around Australia and New Zealand, including representatives from state government (all in local government liaison roles), local government and local government associations. Further details about the workshop can be found in Section 2.5.

7.1 Crash Trends on Local Government Roads

7.1.1 Summary of Presentation

The following main points emerged from the various analyses of crashes and trends on local government roads:

The local government road network is vast (84% of the public road network in Australia, and 88% in New Zealand). However, travel on local government roads is less than that on the state government networks (although the exact amount is not known) and crashes are less frequent and far more dispersed. However, crash rates per vehicle kilometre travelled (VKT) on local government roads are high relative to state government roads.

Heavy vehicle kilometres as a percentage of total VKT are higher on local roads than state roads. They account for a particularly high percentage of VKT on rural local roads.

Crashes on local government roads (compared with state government roads) are more likely to involve speed, alcohol and failure to wear a restraint. Young crash victims are even more over-represented on local government roads than on state government roads.

While crashes on state government roads have tended to reduce over the last 10 years, crashes on local government roads have remained stable and in some cases have increased.

7.1.2 Crash Trends Noted by Workshop Participants

Participants were asked to comment on crash trends on the local government roads in their jurisdiction. Note that some of the information presented below was provided following the workshop.

New South Wales has conducted a comparison of crashes for two five year periods – 1999 to 2003 and 2004 to 2008. This analysis revealed that the reductions in crashes on classified roads have not been mirrored on unclassified roads5. In urban areas, casualty crashes on classified roads have reduced by 25% but the equivalent figure for unclassified roads is only 18%. The disparity is particularly noticeable in rural and remote areas where there has been a 16% reduction in crashes on classified roads but a 2% increase on unclassified roads. Figure 7.1 and Figure 7.2 illustrate the conflicting trends in fatalities on classified versus unclassified roads within the Sydney-Newcastle-Wollongong Conurbation and outside the Sydney-Newcastle-Wollongong Conurbation between 1999 and 2008. The New South Wales data also shows a disproportionately high number of fatalities on curves and fatalities that involved drink-driving on unclassified roads when compared with fatalities on classified roads.

5 Classified roads are generally state government managed roads, with some exceptions. They are called classified

roads because they are classified hierarchically (i.e., freeway, state highway, main road, tourist road, secondary road). Unclassified roads are any roads that do not fit into this classification, and are controlled by local government in NSW (except for speed limits).


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0

50

100

150

200

250

1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

Fatalities

Classified

Unclassified

Source: RTA, NSW.

Figure 7.1: Fatalities on classified and unclassified roads within the Sydney-Newcastle-Wollongong Conurbation, 1999-2008

0

50

100

150

200

250

1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

Fatalities

Classified

Unclassified

Source: RTA, NSW.

Figure 7.2: Fatalities on classified and unclassified roads outside the Sydney-Newcastle-Wollongong Conurbation, 1999-2008

In Queensland the number of fatal crashes by population has reduced over time for both state and local roads (Figure 7.3). However, it appears that this reduction has been less for local government roads. During this same period, serious injury crashes by population have increased, with slightly higher numbers on local government roads (Figure 7.4).

It was suggested that most of the killed and seriously injured crashes on local government roads tend to be dispersed, and not clustered in ‗blackspots‘. Therefore they warrant a mass action approach for which it is harder to generate a case for funding.


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Fatal Crashes on All Roads per 100,000 Population

(12 Month Rolling)

0.00

2.00

4.00

6.00

8.00

10.00

12.00

14.00

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

Year

Nu

mb

er

of

Fa

tal

Cra

sh

es

/10

0,0

00

Po

pu

lati

on

All Crashes

SCR Crashes

LG Crashes

Source: Queensland Department of Transport and Main Roads.

Figure 7.3: Fatal crashes per 100,000 population on state controlled and local government roads in Queensland, 1993-2009

Serious Injury Crashes on All Roads per 100,000 Population

(12 Month Rolling)

0.00

20.00

40.00

60.00

80.00

100.00

120.00

140.00

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

Year

Nu

mb

er

of

SI

Cra

sh

es

/10

0,0

00

Po

pu

lati

on

All Crashes

SCR Crashes

LG Crashes

Source: Queensland Department of Transport and Main Roads.

Figure 7.4: Serious injury crashes per 100,000 population on state controlled and local government roads in Queensland, 1993-2008


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The situation is similar in rural areas in Western Australia, where it was thought that 60-70% of treatments are funded from the results of road safety audits, not crashes. This is because there are not enough crashes on which to base prioritisation. However, treatments are still more likely to be installed at sites than along routes.

Trends in fatal crashes in Western Australia over the last 15 years are quite variable, and it is difficult to discern clear patterns. On aggregate, the majority of fatal rural crashes occurred on state roads (Figure 7.5). However, in metropolitan areas (Figure 7.6), the number of fatal crashes is greater on local roads. Fatal crash numbers decreased between 1994 and 2000 but have been increasing since then (the same is true for metro state roads). These numbers need to be qualified by acknowledgement of the vast network of rural and remote roads in Western Australia and the recent boom in the metropolitan population.

Distribution of Fatal Crashes by Road Type and Year, 1994 to 2008

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

Year

No

. of

Cra

shes

Rural Local

Rural State

Source: Main Roads Western Australia.

Figure 7.5: Fatal crashes in rural areas of Western Australia, local versus state roads, 1994 to 2008


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Distribution of Fatal Crashes by Road Type and Year, 1994 to 2008

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

Year

No

. of

Cra

shes

Metro Local

Metro State

Source: Main Roads Western Australia.

Figure 7.6: Fatal crashes in metropolitan areas of Western Australia, local versus state roads, 1994 to 2008

In South Australia, most sites that meet blackspot criteria are urban arterials which are managed by the state government (largely a function of higher traffic volumes on these roads). Approximately 30% of funded treatments are estimated to be proactive (i.e. based on the outcome of road safety audit, and not crash history alone).


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As illustrated in Figure 7.7, road deaths have tended to decline on New Zealand state highways over the past 10 years. Contrasting with this is a rise in deaths on local government roads (green line in graph), which is particularly marked in the last 18 months.

Source: NZTA.

Figure 7.7: Fatalities on state highways versus local roads in New Zealand

7.2 Barriers to Improving Road Safety on Local Government Roads

7.2.1 Summary of the Presentation

Based on information obtained during the literature review, the barriers to implementing road safety on local government roads were identified as falling into two broad categories:

network and user issues

organisational and resource issues.

The observation was made that there was a limited amount of published work from which to draw information and there is a need for people who work with and within local government to publish their data and their findings.

Network and user issues

Local government is charged with maintaining an extensive network of low volume roads with low numbers of crashes per kilometre but high crash rates per VKT. It is therefore difficult to objectively prioritise treatments, justify expenditure and actively police road users.

The proportion of the traffic mix that is heavy vehicles is higher on local roads in rural and regional areas, putting increased pressure on pavements that are typically not designed to withstand the loading, and therefore increasing crash risk and severity.


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Local governments have often inherited a largely ‗unplanned‘ road system that is not designed for modern traffic volumes and speeds.

Over the next 10 to 20 years the older driver population will increase dramatically. This is an issue for local governments because as drivers become less confident in their driving ability they prefer to drive on local roads because they perceive them as easier to negotiate with their lower speed limits and less complicated intersections. This may impact negatively on the crash problem for local government.

Increases in freight and congestion will increase pressure on pavements and encourage ‗rat-running‘. The latter particularly affects the safety of more vulnerable road users.

Organisational and resource issues

There is a high level of expectation of self-education and a broad knowledge basis placed on traffic engineers and road safety officers in local government.

The level of communication between and within local governments and with the state road authority is not optimal.

Not all local governments have access to comprehensive road condition data. Most do not have adequate exposure data to determine crash rates. Many do not have the technical capacity for road safety management.

Although crash data is generally available to local governments, the format that it is available in may not be user friendly and/or the person charged with interpreting it may not have the time and/or skills to do so.

Local government has nowhere near the amount of money available to spend maintaining their roads. Per kilometre of route length (i.e. not lane kilometre), state governments in Australia spend 6.7 times the amount on roads as local governments. Although greater amounts of travel occur on state roads, a less extreme but substantial disparity prevails even when traffic volumes are taken into account.

Costs of road building materials such as water, aggregate and oil (components of seals) are increasing and quality may be decreasing. This is a particular problem for local government (especially smaller authorities) as they do not have the same purchasing power as state government.

It is predicted that a large number of skilled workers in local government will retire in the next 10 to 20 years and there is not sufficient skilled workers in junior positions or the education system to replace them.

It is a real challenge to make the efforts of the community efficient, productive and work in harmony with the goals of the local government.

There is possibly a lack of commitment to road safety among some local governments, either due to or causing a lack of funding for projects to improve road safety.

7.2.2 Barriers Identified During Workshop Discussion

Following the presentation of the above information, a variety of barriers to delivering safety on local government roads were identified and discussed. These have been summarised below under the following headings:

crash distribution

access to knowledge about how to address safety

data issues


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funding/costs

community and political buy-in and expectation

staffing issues

network planning issues

responsibility/liability

competing policy demands

changing population structure, traffic volumes and composition.

Crash distribution

The dispersed nature of crashes on local government managed roads makes addressing the safety issue difficult. As crashes tend not to cluster on lower volume roads, it is harder to treat crashes on local government roads through established funding methods such as black spot programs. Similarly enforcement (although not a local government responsibility, but important in delivering safety outcomes) is challenging given the extent of the network, and the wide distribution of crashes and risk. Participants communicated an understanding that police are reluctant to spend time on low volume roads where crashes are infrequent and they are unlikely to apprehend many offenders.

It was also identified that crashes may be under-reported on local government roads, particularly in rural and remote environments.

Access to knowledge about how to address safety

There is a lack of resources within local government with which to keep on top of road safety knowledge. This is especially the case in situations where those responsible for delivering safety have a variety of other roles to perform. Even in local government where there is dedicated safety staff, it is often difficult to access recent research on new initiatives relating to road safety.

There is also a need for guidance specifically for local roads, possibly with advice on how incremental steps towards road safety can best be achieved with the money that a council has available to them.

Data issues

Access to data (including crash, asset and exposure data) was considered an issue. When data is available, there is often a lack of time or skills to interpret this information, and formulate strategies to address problems. There was a perception that the lag in the availability of crash data meant that it was a long time between a problem becoming apparent and the funding being available to address it.

Funding/costs

The current funding arrangements (based on the benefit-cost approach) for treating road safety problems are focused on treatment of blackspots, and less on the scattered crash patterns found on local government roads. The reactive approach (based on prior crash history) was thought by some to be out of step with the Safe System approach, which requires treatment of risks that might result in death or serious injury, regardless of whether crashes had already occurred or not. Given the current focus it is very difficult to fund mass action, risk assessment or route length treatments.


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It was also considered that in many cases local government ‗can‘t afford best practice‘. In some cases this can lead them to ‗do nothing‘. This was thought to be a particular problem for smaller local governments with scarce resources.

Applications for additional funding are often time consuming, with little guarantee of success. They lead to a ‗bidding war‘, which is counterproductive, taking time away from other key tasks. Funding applications also tend to favour those councils which are already successful, as these have the time and resources to prepare thorough proposals.

It was noted that ‗cost shifting‘ can be an issue, with local government required to pick up various services by state government with little or no additional funding to implement this service properly.

There is a lack of integration between funding streams. For instance, greater use needs to be made of maintenance budgets in addressing safety (i.e. maximising the safety benefits from maintenance work). There is a need to make asset engineers more aware of their potential role in delivering safety, but there is also a need for road safety professionals to better appreciate or to take greater advantage of maintenance in improving safety.

Community and political buy-in and expectation

Getting people to talk about road safety is not a difficult task, but eliciting productive discussion and convincing councils to give road safety sufficient priority to promote informed, concerted and coordinated effort is a more difficult matter. There is a need to raise the awareness of the real risks to the community, and gain greater political support, at all levels but particularly from local government councillors in this context, to achieve Safe System outcomes.

The community has high expectations of local government, and there are many competing demands. Road safety is sometimes forgotten or can appear to be at odds with these policies. As an example, cutting down trees to reduce roadside hazards can conflict with environmental policies.

As local government is closest to the community, they can become beleaguered by many demands, and there are difficulties in balancing expectations.

Staff issues

It was the opinion of participants that local government often lacks the staff resources to deliver safety outcomes. This includes availability of staff, and staff with appropriate skills to perform their roles. As an example, there may be a lack of skills to conduct a crash analysis, to interpret the data and then choose appropriate countermeasures.

Safety is lower priority for some local governments, which is understandable when crash numbers appear to be low, funds are limited and other more basic needs are paramount. Staff often have numerous responsibilities (especially in smaller authorities), and therefore cannot be expected to have in-depth skills in all areas of work.

Network planning issues

Much of the local road network was designed at a time when it was used by far fewer vehicles travelling at much slower speeds. Errors in design at the planning stage have long-term consequences. It is important to build safety into design at the planning stage to maximise safety benefits, and minimise the need for remedial safety treatments in future. There was some evidence that new urban planning principles are safer than old designs.


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Responsibility/liability

One state jurisdiction was concerned about the legal liability they faced if they got directly involved with local government management of roads. It was felt that if they were aware of problems, that they would be held liable for inaction in their remediation.

It was opined by some that there is too much emphasis on blame-shifting between the different levels of government and not enough emphasis on problem-solving.

Changing population structure, traffic volumes and composition

The issues highlighted in Section 7.2.1 relating to changing population, and traffic were recognised by the group. It was highlighted that there is likely to be a move to ‗ageing in place‘, or older people remaining in their family homes for longer, rather than moving to retirement centres. This will result in an even greater increase in mobility requirements for this group. Safety issues relating to use of mobility scooters were also highlighted.

7.3 Solutions for Improving Road Safety on Local Government Roads

7.3.1 Summary of the Presentation

Information from the literature review was presented to the group, and formed the basis of further discussion. Key points from the presentation are as follows:

Development and implementation of an effective road safety strategy is of utmost importance in producing positive safety outcomes.

There are lots of gains to be made from designing new roads to be safe and efficient. Making basic services (i.e. shops, schools and health clinics) accessible on foot and without requiring pedestrians to cross high speed roads, and designing streets to efficiently feed vehicles onto the main road network helps to foster a happy and healthy community. This also helps to meet some of the competing policy demands such as environmental and health targets. Two examples were given where town planning principles had been used in conjunction with road safety principles to create a safe road environment.

Road safety audits need to be better utilised.

Identification of safety problems on local roads should first be guided by crash analysis, preferably supplemented with information about road condition and traffic volumes. However, as crash databases do not count ‗near misses‘ and undercount or completely ignore property damage crashes, it may be necessary to consult the local community about where they perceive the safety issues to be located, and/or which groups or behaviours in the community need to be addressed.

Local government needs to be aware of all of the sources of funding available to them.

As local government is charged with managing a larger network with less money per kilometre, they need to be particularly efficient. Some ways to do this are to ensure they are making the most of human resources available to them, both inside and outside the organisation. Staff need to be appropriately trained. External to the local government, state governments can assist by providing expert advice and crash data in an easy to interpret format.

Linking in with supporting policies and programs at different levels of government can open up additional sources of funding and support. Policies that may appear to compete with road safety for funding can actually complement one another, e.g. improving pedestrian safety and encouraging walking in the community.


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There are tools and guidance available to assist local governments to prioritise and select appropriate, evidence based countermeasures. Similarly, there are tools to help identify risk on roads in situations where low traffic volumes do not indicate clear crash patterns.

Likewise, there is guidance about how to evaluate and review countermeasures. It is recommended that local governments share their experiences with both engineering and behavioural countermeasures to allow other local governments to learn from their experiences and promote improvements.

7.3.2 Solutions Proposed During Workshop Discussion

Ideas on solutions to the issues identified in Section 7.2.2 are provided below. The same topic headings as used in that section have been used below.

Crash distribution

Suggestions included to:

have police provide input about their perceptions of dangerous parts of the network or groups in the community that need attention

record property damage crashes and/or engage residents in the reporting of crashes on local streets via a form or the internet

access insurance and/or hospital data

develop a risk model based on road features (it was noted that this already exists) and raise the profile of the proactive approach which does not rely on blackspots and the traditional benefit-cost ratio approach

make additional use of mass action and route based approaches

provide a crash report that is easy to interpret, and that provides guidance on appropriate actions for local governments where required

ensure that state government plays a more supportive role (in terms of providing technical advice) to local government

compare reported crash records with hospitalisation data to determine level of crash under-reporting so that remedial treatments can be better justified.

It was noted that coordination between stakeholders such as police, local government, state road authority, public transport and community groups in a region can give real benefit in tackling the crash problem. Regional cooperation can allow:

joint purchases of technical expertise via consultancies

sharing of technical capacity between local and state government

public-private-partnership models of out-sourcing the road management.

It was also suggested that state government undertake a centralised approach to road safety management and supply local government with information and funding in a planned and controlled manner.

Access to knowledge about how to address safety

A key way to improve access to relevant safety knowledge was by improved communication between state and local government and between local governments.


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Various forms of partnership arrangements were identified, for instance groupings of smaller authorities. A sister-city approach was also suggested, whereby larger and/or more ‗road safety savvy‘ local governments might assist other local governments with technical advice and partner with them to increase the pool of knowledge and increase buying power.

Many of the issues associated with accessing knowledge relate to a lack of time and diverse roles performed by local government staff. Some of the staffing solutions identified elsewhere in this section will assist in better access to knowledge.

Information provided on maps was identified as being a powerful tool for providing information on safety issues to local government.

Information needs to be tailored to specific audiences. Those in diverse roles do not have time to read lengthy reports, and so other means are required to convey key messages.

More guidance would be useful for Road Safety Officers, including a database of activities that may be undertaken to address specific safety issues, and the effectiveness of each type of measure. Additionally, a summary of annual activities by Road Safety Officers around Australia and New Zealand would be useful.

Adapting a ‗safety management systems‘ (SMS) approach to road safety was also suggested. Not to be confused with the Safe System, the safety management system lays out comprehensive processes for achieving the goal of safety and has been used for a number of years in the aviation industry, and more recently in New Zealand for road safety. Broadly, it covers goal setting, planning and measuring performance. The safety management system aims to embed safety within the organisational culture and the way that people do their jobs. A safety management system is based on a management philosophy that recognises there will always be threats to safety but that their organisation has standards that every member is expected to conform with to manage the risks. A clear policy is developed reflecting this philosophy and stating how safety will be achieved. Roles are clearly defined in terms of responsibility, authority and accountability. Processes and structures are developed that promote safety in every aspect of the organisation. A training plan is typically required to ensure that all staff have the skills and knowledge necessary to do their job safely. Staff are given clear direction about how they can achieve their safety goals. Performance is monitored and regularly assessed to ensure that directions are adhered to and any previously newly emerging threats are addressed appropriately (Greenwood & Denton 2003).

In the context of local government, this can be interpreted to mean both requiring safety management systems to protect employees in the course of their work, but also to protect local residents and users of the local road system, services and amenities. For this approach to be implemented, every local government employee needs to be made aware of the standards that they are expected to meet and how they are expected to meet them. They should have a clear statement of their responsibilities, authority and accountability. A road safety plan would be one part of the overall system of safety policies, and staff would need to be trained in the implementation of the plan. Road safety issues would be the natural domain of asset management and maintenance, planning and community education. A system for measuring performance would also need to be devised and implemented.

It is of interest to note that an international standard for a road traffic SMS (ISO 39001) is currently being developed, with input from Australian authorities.


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Data issues

Suggestions from participants to solve data issues included:

state government providing GIS mapping of crashes on local government roads

providing local governments with access to a centralised online database of crash information

providing local governments with a crash report that gave a comparison between their LGA and surrounding and/or similar areas so they can benchmark their performance with those of their ‗peers‘

providing local governments with a map of their speed zones (for jurisdictions where local governments do not set their own speed limits)

understanding that data manipulation and interpretation skills vary greatly and that the presentation of crash data should be tailored to meet the needs of the audience

involving community groups in collecting some information (e.g. travel data)

raising the awareness of the need to collect volume data (although it was felt by some local government representatives that volume data was of little benefit as this could be easily estimated)

provision of data in a consistent format was critical at state and national level. If different formats are used (e.g. in traffic volumes) then comparisons are made difficult or are not possible.

Funding/costs

It was considered that a review of the current funding process should be undertaken if safety is to be adequately addressed on local government roads. The current benefit-cost approach is suitable for situations where there are clusters of crashes (i.e. blackspots), but is not as suited to improvements in infrastructure at high risk locations that have not necessarily had any, or high numbers of crashes. Whilst the blackspot approach has its place, more needs to be done to raise the profile of the proactive risk assessment approach. This is an evaluation of crash risk based on the physical characteristics of the road (e.g. presence and quality of shoulders, line markings and curvature) and the volumes of traffic using the road. When using such an approach, some estimate of likely cost-effectiveness will still be required, either based on reduction in pre-existing crashes, or some estimate of likely risk reduction.

Guidance is required on alternative (including longer term) approaches, such as funding for mass action, route based and risk assessment approaches. Guidance on how to take an incremental or staged approach to improving road safety, and how to make the most of the resources available was considered to be something that would be most useful for local governments which have limited resources.

One participant emphasised that local government needs to be made more aware of low and no cost treatments that can be effective on low volume roads such as improvements to signage and delineation; reducing speed; increased enforcement; and, if the problems are extreme and no affordable solution can be implemented, closing the road. This is particularly appropriate if there are other safer roads performing the same access function. The emphasis should be on managing the risk as best as possible within the resources that are available.

It was suggested that councils could take a ‗cocktail‘ approach when attempting to fund safety projects. This involves obtaining funding from various sources to provide the total budget.


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There is an administrative burden when completing lengthy applications for funding for road safety projects. Having one form to apply for funding and a standard application process for all state and federal sources of funding was considered to be a useful way to deal with this.

To maximise the ‗road safety dollar‘, it was suggested that safety needed to be considered in all aspects of road management and any other aspect of asset management or development that affected road safety. Thus, road maintenance works should ensure that they maximise safety outcomes. Town planning should take into account best practice principles in road safety at the same time as considering public amenity, health and the environment. It was noted that a prototype safety planning tool (the ‗Strategic Tool for Assessment of Road Safety‘, or STARS) had been developed by Austroads that may help address this issue.

Community and political buy-in and expectation

Providing information to the public and politicians on the risks associated with travel was seen as an important issue in gaining acceptance for safety initiatives, and attracting appropriate funding. It was considered that informing the community of risk and publicising realistic targets might be a way to bring community expectation into alignment with the capacity of the local government to deal with the issues. Communicating successes and visions with the community was also suggested. There was some disagreement about the effectiveness of these strategies. It was thought by some that publicising successes might encourage road users and/or local governments to believe that the level of death and injury had been reduced to an ‗acceptable‘ level and that there was not the urgent need to invest further time and effort in combating the problem.

Partnering multiple stakeholders in the coordination of road safety activities can improve community and political commitment. Further involving local politicians is an excellent way of improving the priority that road safety is given on the local government agenda.

With the adoption of the Safe System approach, it was considered there might be opportunities to ‗re-package‘ road safety messages, and provide the public and policy makers with new information. It was also suggested that planners and members of the public needed to be informed about how road safety measures worked and what they were achieving to promote acceptance and increase the likelihood that they would be put to their best use.

Guidance needs to be provided about how seemingly competing policy demands can be turned into opportunities to achieve best outcomes for all local government targets. The over-arching local government strategies and plans need to ensure that policies work together rather than competing for funds, to make the most of the resources available.

In respect to competing policy demands, an example was provided whereby safety had been reconciled with ‗competing‘ environmental demands. In the case of tree removal to improve roadside safety, 30 seedling trees were planted well away from the carriageway to replace each mature tree that was posing a roadside hazard. The term ‗green safety‘ was coined to describe these types of synergies.

New Zealand‘s Road Safety Action Planning is a working example of partnering multiple stakeholders in the coordination of road safety activities. Road safety partners agree on regional and/or local road safety risks, identify objectives, set targets, undertake road safety actions, and monitor and review progress towards road safety targets. The resulting Road Safety Action Plans reflect a partnership agreement for delivering road safety activities, projects and campaigns.


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In New South Wales collaboration has been built up over many years between the RTA and local government through the establishment of Local Traffic Committees. These committees have representation from Council, Police, RTA and the State Local Member. The committees investigate both road safety and traffic management issues in the local government area and make recommendations to Council as to the most appropriate course of action to take to address the road safety or traffic management issue.

Staff issues

A key method for improving skills of staff and capability for delivering safety outcomes is to have a dedicated road safety resource. It was considered that at least one full time member of staff whose sole responsibility would be road safety would be required to achieve this, either within one council, or in some form of partnership arrangement between several councils. This person (or persons) would need to have a Safe System role, cover all aspects of road safety management and have their performance measured from an outcomes delivery perspective.

Other ideas for improving staff capability and efficiency included:

secondments and exchange between state and local government, and between local governments

cadetships and apprenticeships for safety personnel

graduate rotation programs

funding for ‗road safety‘ scholarships

funding to tertiary institutions for road safety specific masters programs

‗up-skilling‘ staff in other departments whose work has an impact on road safety, e.g. asset and maintenance engineers, environmental officers and town planners.

Network planning issues

The importance of road safety audit and route assessments was stressed in regard to network planning. It is far easier to make changes that will benefit safety at this point in a project, than following construction. It was also suggested that specific guidance is needed to help address safety on existing (or ‗brownfields‘) sites, as best practice guidance for ‗greenfields‘ sites is not always affordable or appropriate.

It was suggested that discussions on funding (and specifically, who will fund different aspects of a project) be put aside at the planning stage. This stage is a time to develop the most appropriate solutions. Funding responsibility should then be allocated once planning decisions have been made.

Tools are available to assess risk based on road and roadside features (rather than purely on previous crash history), and these have been used successfully by a number of the workshop attendees. Such tools are particularly useful in determining and comparing risk on low volume roads.

Other suggestions included:

The available pool of money could be distributed to councils in a region and they could be asked to prioritise their projects and decide among themselves which would get the available funding. Accountability for such an approach would be required.


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Developers could be required to provide evidence of having done a road safety audit and planning requirements could also be updated to incorporate road safety requirements. It was noted that developers often engage consultants and experts that are outside of the budget available to local government, but that local government could capitalise on this expertise by ensuring that their contracts with developers required certain road safety standards be met.

It was also suggested that non-motorised user audits need to be conducted alongside road safety audits at the planning stage and that network planning should be understood to refer to the whole of the network including pedestrian, cycling, public transport and freight. This ensures that other modes are integrated with the network at the planning stage, promoting improved connectivity and service for the community. Further, it needs to be understood that safety needs to be addressed in planning each of these components of the network.

Responsibility/liability

A firm conclusion could not be reached regarding legal liability arising from state government support and assistance to local government. One workshop participant suggested that regardless of action or inaction, final responsibility for roads lies with state government under Commonwealth law. Opinions differed on this matter. It was not within the scope of this project to provide detailed guidance on this issue, but it is likely that final liability will not necessarily lie with state government, highlighted by the number of successful cases that have previously brought against local government.

Some participants highlighted a moral responsibility to assist and support local government. This assistance and support did not necessarily entail funding, but rather could entail expert advice, provision of important information such as crash data in an interpretable format, and guidelines, forums and other forms of facilitation.

It was thought important to have a road safety champion. This should be a senior member of council who is directly responsible for improving safety, and whose performance is measured on this basis.

Changing population structure, traffic volumes and composition

Appropriate planning was seen as the key way to address issues relating to changing populations and traffic. Road safety strategies should focus on existing and emerging road safety issues, and road safety experts should ensure that in addressing these issues they contribute to the development of other regional strategies such as growth, walking, cycling, public transport and freight. One example of an emerging issue is a need for greater emphasis on pedestrian facilities for older pedestrians and to consider the needs of users of mobility scooters. It is also necessary for local governments to consider the implications of older road users ‗aging in place‘.


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8 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

8.1 Key Issues

Crash risk and incidence

Road safety on local government managed roads is a significant public health issue. In Australia, around half of all casualty crashes, and around 40% of all fatal crashes occur on roads managed by local authorities. The figures are higher in New Zealand (65% of casualty crashes and 46% of fatal crashes). Information provided on long-term crash trends (over the last 10 year period) tend to indicate that improvements to safety have been made on state managed roads, but the effect has been less significant on local government roads, with increases seen in a number of jurisdictions.

In terms of road length, local roads constitute 82% of all public roads in Australia, and 88% in New Zealand. Traffic volumes on these roads are unknown in Australia, but it is likely that around 38% of travel is conducted on local roads in Australia (derived from figures presented in Section 4.2.2), and 49% in New Zealand. The crash rates (in terms of crashes divided by traffic volumes) are also unknown in Australia, but are likely to be higher for local government roads compared to state roads (1.5 to 2 times the risk of a casualty crash), and for some road types substantially higher. In New Zealand it is estimated that the risk of a casualty crash on local roads is 1.2 times higher on urban roads, and 1.5 times higher on rural roads compared to state roads.

Crash types and contributing factors

Results from the crash analysis indicate that key crash types on local roads include running off the road (either at curves or on a straight), pedestrians, and intersection crashes. Collisions with roadside hazards are significant, and appear to be over-represented when compared with state roads. Also over-represented are crashes involving speed, alcohol, non-wearing of seatbelts, and young road users.

Many of these crash findings were supported by data obtained in the site investigations and in-depth crash analysis. A general lower standard of road was identified on local roads (for instance poor junction design, alignment, unsealed shoulders and narrow roads). Roadside hazards were identified as likely contributory factors at a number of sites (both urban and rural). Sight distance was observed to be poor at intersections and mid-block locations, in some cases due to vegetation that had not been maintained. There was a lack of pedestrian facilities (intersections and mid-block). Poor delineation was observed (at both intersections and mid-block), often as the result of poor signage and road marking. Speed limits that were inappropriate were also noted.

A number of behavioural issues were also noted (particularly through the in-depth crash analysis). These included excessive speed, driver distraction and inattention, impairment, medical conditions, and driver expectation (i.e. not expecting other vehicles at certain locations, especially intersections, given low volumes).

Measures to improve safety

Low cost measures are available to address many of these issues. Most obvious are improvements to delineation (at curves and junctions) and review of speed limits. Many of the issues should be addressed through maintenance (e.g. signs, road markings and vegetation clearance). Higher cost options include removal of roadside hazards (or protection of vehicles through installation of barriers), installation of adequate pedestrian facilities, provision of road shoulders, and improvements to road alignment. A number of enforcement options are available (including for speed, impairment and seat belts), as well as education programs (particularly to address driver speed, distraction and inattention, medical conditions and driver expectation).


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Barriers to improving safety

There are many barriers to improving safety on these types of roads. A review of literature on this topic, and a workshop of local government road safety experts identified that these barriers could be summarised as follows:

Crashes are sparsely distributed over a vast network.

Those tasked with addressing safety within local government often do not have the time or means to access relevant safety guidance and expertise.

There are data issues (particularly relating to access and interpretation of crash data) that make addressing road safety difficult for local government.

It is difficult to fund treatments (especially given the dispersed nature of crashes on local government roads).

There is a need to gain community and political buy-in, and convert this to action.

There are shortages of skilled staff for delivering safety.

There are network planning issues, including a greater need for use of road safety audit and network assessments.

Responsibility/liability for improving safety appears to be unclear in some jurisdictions, and this can be a barrier to improving safety.

There appear to be competing policy demands within local government (e.g. for funding; between safety and environmental issues, as in the case of roadside tree removal).

The changing population structure, traffic volumes and composition need to be considered.

Of these, funding and costs are often identified as the most obvious barriers to delivering safety. A disproportionate amount is spent on state managed roads (6.7 times the amount of money per kilometre of route length is spent on state roads, but these roads only carry 1.7 times the VKT6). It should be noted that 1.3 times the amount of money is spent on local roads on a basis of vehicle kilometres travelled versus state government roads7. It is true that state roads carry a very large share of the traffic and incur higher construction, maintenance and operational costs in order to withstand this heavier load. However, the base costs of constructing and maintaining roads are difficult to reduce beyond a certain point. Further, local government are charged with managing a large portion of the road network that was built in the 1950s and 1960s and which is now reaching the end of its expected life. Pavement deterioration is accelerated by increasing amounts of freight traffic and increasingly heavy loads on roads that were never intended to withstand this pressure.

Although attempts were made at the start of the decade to address the question of whether spending on local roads is adequate, the inadequacy of the available data needed to complete this assessment prevails. Clearly, a concerted effort is needed to improve the quality, consistency and completeness of data in order for the question of whether funding for local roads is appropriate to be addressed. Improvements are needed in the areas of exposure, expenditure, road condition and crashes on local roads. Appropriate funding is a prerequisite if there are to be continued reductions in casualties across the whole road network.

Ways to address these barriers

Numerous suggestions were made regarding ways in which safety on local government managed roads could be improved. These are provided and explained in further detail in Section 7. Based on these suggestions, the following issues were identified.

6 Derived from figures presented in Section 4.2.2.

7 Derived from figures presented in Section 3.1.1, 3.3.3 and 4.2.2.


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The development and implementation of an effective road safety strategy is crucial. A safety management systems approach for asset planning, building and management is a promising method for incorporating a safety philosophy (and more specifically, the Safe System philosophy) throughout local government processes.

Multiple local stakeholder coordinating arrangements are important for creating a sense of responsibility and ownership of road safety within the community and for raising the profile of road safety on the local government agenda.

Creation of ‗partnership‘ between various local governments (particularly smaller ones) is crucial to improving safety outcomes. This can take the form of ‗sister council‘ arrangements or clusters of councils. This will assist in the pooling of resources and staff expertise.

For every council there should be available at least one full time employee who is responsible for road safety (or more specifically, a ‗Safe System‘ position). For smaller councils, this might entail sharing of this resource across a number of councils. This Safe System expert should have a clearly defined role, and access to relevant information on addressing road safety specifically on local government roads.

There appears to be a need for specific road safety guidance for local government. In many cases, local government is not able to deliver ‗best practice‘ solutions, but rather would perhaps best deliver safety in an incremental fashion. Guidance is needed on how to achieve this delivery.

The way in which information is provided to local government practitioners needs to be examined. It is unlikely that they will have time to access many of the research reports that exist on new and improved approaches to treatment of risk. There are some successful examples of on-line tools that are available to practitioners (e.g. the Austroads Road Safety Engineering Toolkit, available at www.engtoolkit.com.au) but wider promotion of such tools is required. It was also suggested that a database of behavioural interventions (and their effectiveness) be produced, and this idea appears to have merit.

The benefit-cost approach to funding safety projects does not fit well with the types of problems found on local government networks, and the ‗bidding war‘ that ensues takes valuable resources in terms of time with no guarantee of success. Guidance and/or a revision of this approach is needed to help fund local government road safety improvements, including longer term projects that will increase the safety of the local government road network.

The risk based approach, as well as those involving mass action or route treatments seem to be of high relevance to those managing local roads (particularly the low volume network). Greater use could be made of such tools, although funding mechanisms might need to be altered to maximise their use.

Funding for safety is only a small proportion of total expenditure on roads in local governments. It is important to ensure that budgets and processes in other areas of road management (including planning and asset management) take account of up-to-date information on road safety to ensure that funds directed at these tasks maximise the safety benefit.

Improved information is required to help identify current crash problems within local government areas. Benchmarking between similar local governments (either within one state, or even potentially between states) would be a valuable tool to help authorities identify problem issues.


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State government has an opportunity and a responsibility to assist in this task. Better knowledge about the safety situation will help raise awareness of road safety risks, providing useful information for politicians and the public. There are good models of how such information could be presented, and these should be used as a basis for such dissemination.

8.2 Recommendations

The following recommendations are made based on the discussion and conclusions presented above. These recommendations are provided by the report authors, and are not necessarily endorsed by all workshop participants.

1. Development and delivery of effective local government road safety strategies is of utmost importance in delivering road safety outcomes. Local governments which do not yet have a road safety strategy should be encouraged and assisted to develop one.

2. Partnership working between local governments and between state government and local government should be actively promoted. Various successful models exist and should be assessed by state authorities.

3. The introduction of a ‗safety management system‘ approach for local government should be investigated.

4. Each council should have access to a full time road safety practitioner (either within one council, or in some form of partnership arrangement between several councils). Guidance on the skills and knowledge such a practitioner would ideally possess would be of use, and this should be investigated.

5. Guidance on the delivery of safety on local government roads should be assessed, and revised to take account of barriers (and opportunities) on local government roads. This guidance should include information on network planning issues, mass action programs, road safety audit, route assessments and risk assessment.

6. Better dissemination of road safety information is required, and a tool (perhaps on-line) to assist in provision of information to local government safety practitioners (including those on behavioural measures) should be developed.

7. Funding arrangements for local government road safety should be reviewed at both state and federal level, and a model for road funding tied into the Safe System approach should be developed.

8. The quality, consistency and completeness of data held at a national level on expenditure, road condition, exposure and crashes on local roads is in need of improvement. Without good quality, reliable and complete data the question of whether funding for local roads is appropriate cannot be adequately addressed. Methods to improve the quality and consistency of data collection and processing at both state and local government level need to be investigated.

9. There is a need for greater dissemination of Safe System principles throughout local government to ensure opportunities to improve safety benefits are maximised. This dissemination should be conducted in a systematic way, and Safe System concepts need to be embedded within Council‘s strategic plans. A Safe System evaluation framework and performance indicators targeted specifically at local government would enable better target setting and monitoring of progress towards Safe System outcomes.

10. Information on crashes on local government roads should be provided by state government to each local government on a regular basis. This should include information to enable benchmarking.


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APPENDIX A SITES INVESTIGATED

No. Site State Intersection or Mid-block

1 Auburn Rd/Helena St NSW Intersection

2 Burranneer Bay Rd/Gannons Rd NSW Intersection

3 Cumberland Rd/Chiswick Rd NSW Intersection

4 Dawn Fraser Av/Edwin Flack Av NSW Intersection

5 Donnison St/Barker St NSW Intersection

6 Eastern Rd/Brooke Av NSW Intersection

7 Erina St/Mann St NSW Intersection

8 Goobarabah Av/Gorokan Dr NSW Intersection

9 Mann St/Faunce St NSW Intersection

10 Manns St/Georgina Tce NSW Intersection

11 Marsden St/Campbell St NSW Intersection

12 Marsden St/George St NSW Intersection

13 Mary St/Cumberland Rd NSW Intersection

14 Mary St/Lett St NSW Intersection

15 Moore St/Bigge St NSW Intersection

16 Pirie St/ Speed St NSW Intersection

17 Port Hacking/Burraneer Bay Rd NSW Intersection

18 Remembrance Drive/Arina Rd NSW Intersection

19 Robertson Rd/Buist St NSW Intersection

20 Rushby St/Lakin St NSW Intersection

21 Russell Av/Napoleon St NSW Intersection

22 Argyle Street NSW Mid-block

23 Bigge St

btw Railway St and Moore St NSW Mid-block

24 Carmen St

btw Meredith St and Cairds Av NSW Mid-block

25 Formosa St

btw Princes Hwy and Juniper Pl NSW Mid-block

26 Meredith St

btw Rickard Rd and French Av NSW Mid-block

27 Montpelier Drive NSW Mid-block

28 Mount Broughton Rd NSW Mid-block

29 Railway St NSW Mid-block

30 Silverdale Road NSW Mid-block

31 Lonsdale St/Exhibition St VIC Intersection

32 Parkhill Dr/Avebury Drive VIC Intersection

33 Queensbridge St/Power St VIC Intersection

34 Albert St

btw Gisborne St and Evelyn Pl VIC Mid-block

35 Collins St

btw Alfred Pl and Exhibition St VIC Mid-block

36 Collins St

btw Regent Place and Russell St VIC Mid-block


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No. Site State Intersection or Mid-block

37 Collins St

btw Swanston St and Sportsgirl Crt VIC Mid-block

38 Collins St

btw Spring St and Hotel Sofitel entrance VIC Mid-block

39 Elizabeth St

btw Little Lonsdale and Lonsdale St VIC Mid-block

40 Elizabeth St

btw Lonsdale St and Little Bourke St VIC Mid-block

41 Flinders St

btw Oliver Ln and Exhibition St VIC Mid-block

42 Flinders St

btw Swanston St and Degraves Pl VIC Mid-block

43 Lonsdale St

btw William St and Guests Lane VIC Mid-block

44 Lonsdale St

btw Spring St and Punch Ln VIC Mid-block

45 MacArthur Street

btw Spring St and St Andrews Pl VIC Mid-block

46 Market St

btw Flinders St and Queensbridge St VIC Mid-block

47 Queen St

btw Bourke St and Little Collins St VIC Mid-block

48 Queen St

btw Latrobe St and Guildford Lane VIC Mid-block

49

Swanston St

btw Flinders St and Princes Walk (north of Riverbank)

VIC Mid-block

50 Burns Beach Rd/Joondalup Dr WA Intersection

51 Glengarry Dr/Hepburn Av WA Intersection

52 Gnangara Rd/Beechboro Rd North WA Intersection

53 Hutton St/Collingwood St WA Intersection

54 Marmion Av/Shenton Av WA Intersection

55 Nicholson Rd/Garden St WA Intersection

56 Orrong Rd/Felspar WA Intersection

57 Safety Bay Rd/Mandurah Rd WA Intersection

58 Safety Bay Rd/Read St WA Intersection

59 Wharf St/Railway Pde WA Intersection

60 Wharf St/Welshpool Rd WA Intersection

61 Dixon Rd WA Mid-block


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APPENDIX B INSPECTION SHEET

CRASH CONTRIBUTING FACTORS AND SAFETY CHECK

ROAD NAME:……………………………………………………………………………………………...

LOCATION:………………………………………………………………………………………………...

Crash Contributing Potential Crash Factors Factors

1.0 ALIGNMENT

1.1 Sight distance is poor

a) at the intersection

b) at other points of access (e.g. property access)

c) for overtaking (ie. vertical / horizontal alignment)

1.2 Confusing alignment

a) of roadway (ie. new roadway)

b) old pavement markings not removed

c) vertical – due to undulations

1.3 Unsatisfactory transition from old alignment to new

1.4 Unexpected change in alignment

1.5 Glare due to

a) oncoming headlights

b) the sun

c) 2-way service road

2.0 SIGNING AND DELINEATION

2.1 Ambiguous / unclear

a) directional signing

b) advisory speed / warning signs

2.2 Unnecessary signing

2.3 Insufficient signing (e.g. advisory speed, curve warning)

2.4 Sign hidden or inconspicuous .

Comment


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1


2.5 Sign restricts sight distance

2.6 Sign mounted at an inappropriate height

2.7 Incorrect sign size

a) too low

b) too high

2.8 Guide posts

a) not provided

b) insufficient

c) poorly spaced

2.9 Poor curve delineation

2.10 Edgelines

a) poorly maintained

b) not provided

2.11 Centreline


b) not provided

2.12 Raised Reflective Pavement Markers (RRPM’s)


b) not provided

c) insufficient

2.13 Other Linemarkings (eg. turn arrows)

a) not provided

b) insufficient


2.14 Unclear vehicle path through intersection/road segment

2.15 Traffic islands

a) not provided

b) poorly located

c) poorly delineated

d) not mountable

2.16 Speed limits

a) insufficient speed limit signs (ie. Repeater)

b) wrong size speed limit signs/poorly positioned

d) inappropriate speed limit

Comment


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1


3.0 ROADSIDE HAZARDS

3.1 Roadside hazards within the clear zone

a) tree/s

b) pole/s

c) culverts

d) other (name)

3.2 Shoulders

a) unsealed

b) partially sealed (up to 1m)

c) poorly maintained

3.3 Steep embankments/slopes (ie. steeper than 1:4)

4.0 GUARDFENCING

4.1 General

a) not provided

b) inadequate


4.2 Bridge ends

a) not provided

b) inadequate


5.0 PEDESTRIANS / CYCLISTS

5.1 Absence of facility

5.2 Inadequate standing area

5.3 Fencing / barrier

a) not provide

b) inadequate


5.4 Insufficient sight distance to facility

5.5 Road surface unsafe for cyclist

5.6 Bus stop/s poorly

a) located

b) designed (specify)

……………………………………………………………………………………………………

Crash Contributing Potential Crash

Comment


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6.0 TRAFFIC SIGNALS

6.1 Traffic signals are

a) obscured by queued vehicles

b) obscured by poles, trees, signs, etc

c) effected by the sun rising / setting

6.2 Traffic signal layout is poor

6.3 Traffic signal phasing is unsatisfactory

7.0 PARKING AND ACCESS

7.1 Inadequate parking facilities (specify)

7.2 Unsatisfactory re-entry to the carriageway

a) service road

b) private driveway

c) public facility (e.g. shopping centre, school grounds)

8.0 STREET LIGHTING

a) not provided

b) not satisfactory / low level

9.0 ROAD PAVEMENT

9.1 The road is

a) too narrow

b) poorly maintained

c) poorly drained

9.2 The road surface

a) has loose material

b) is corrugated

c) has rutting

Comment


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APPENDIX C CASR CRASH INVESTIGATION METHODOLOGY

CASR has crash investigation teams made up of engineers, psychologists and health professionals who travel to the crash scene once notified about the event. The sequence of events for a crash investigation is as follows:

notification of the crash on the ambulance service radio or pager

attend the crash at-scene

photograph the scene and involved vehicles

discussions with police attending the crash

mark the positions of the vehicles and any skid or gouge marks

brief introduction and discussion with participants and witnesses at-scene (where appropriate)

examine the vehicle(s) at the scene and/or elsewhere

perform an engineering survey of the site using a theodolite

record video footage of the site from a driver‘s perspective.

Once these tasks have been completed, the investigation team returns to the office to conduct follow-up investigations including:

obtain the police report on the crash

obtain injury information from hospitals

conduct a detailed interview with consenting crash participants and witnesses

review site design and crash history of the site

review crash history of the drivers

review coroner‘s file where appropriate

computer aided crash reconstruction where relevant and practicable

perform a multidisciplinary case review.

Following the crash, an engineering survey is made of the site to record road geometry, the location of roadside objects and any other relevant information such as line marking and vegetation. Engineering drawings of the road section are also obtained from the responsible road authority. Sites may also be revisited for more detailed follow-up survey work or reassessment from a road engineering perspective.

Following the crash, involved vehicles are either taken home by their owners, taken to a crash repairer or held in a police compound. Follow up inspections are made of the vehicles as needed to gather any missing information or reconfirm crash injury mechanisms. The data collected for each vehicle includes:

photographic record of the vehicle, including detailed photos of any visible damage and evidence of occupant (or pedestrian) contact

recording of VIN (Vehicle Identification Number) and current registration details

inspection of tyres: dimensions, tread and pressure


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inspection of seatbelts for condition and load marks

measurement of deformation

inspection for window tinting and any vehicle modifications.

Follow up personal interviews are conducted whenever possible with those involved in the crash and any witnesses. The information sought during these interviews includes:

personal details (age, sex and, where relevant, height and weight)

driving experience, moving violation and crash history

familiarity with the vehicle driven in the crash

trip details

possible distractions

alcohol and drug use, if any, prior to the crash

emotional and fatigue factors

pre-existing medical and physical disabilities

perception of the crash and its contributing factors

immediate injuries and resultant disabilities

clarification of vehicle/pedestrian movements, positions and the crash sequence.

Data on injuries is obtained from hospital records. Police accident reports are obtained to provide information about the crash as reported to, and deduced by, the police. Where appropriate, coroner‘s files are also examined to check consistency of findings or shed further light with previously unobtainable evidence. These contain full reports from the Police Major Crash Investigation Unit, autopsy and toxicology reports together with information on any medical issues that may have existed with the deceased individual.

When all the evidence has been collected, a review is conducted of each case by a multidisciplinary expert group and factors that contributed to the causation of the crash and the resulting injuries are identified.

Metropolitan in-depth crashes

The Adelaide Metropolitan In-depth Study was conducted between April 2002 and October 2005. Over this period, 298 cases were attended at-scene and investigated by CASR (Woolley et al. 2006).

The sampling criteria for the inclusion of a crash in the study were as follows:

1. The crash occurred in the Adelaide metropolitan area (nominally within 10 km from the CASR offices on Frome Road in the city).

2. The crash involved at least one person who was injured severely enough to be transported by ambulance to hospital for treatment or was fatally injured.

Investigation teams were placed on call during working hours on weekdays between 9 am and 5 pm. This criteria was used more as a guide and a small number of crashes that merited attention were investigated outside the defined area.


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The sample was not intended to be representative of all crashes in the Metropolitan area. Crashes were generally attended during weekday business hours in daylight conditions, however, there were some exceptions to this and some night time pedestrian crashes were also attended. A period of the study was also associated with a separate project on pedestrian crash modelling resulting in a bias in the database towards pedestrian crashes.

The implications of these factors are that caution has to be exercised in making generalisations from the investigated cases to the broader road safety situation. However, many of the themes identified in the study can shed light on many road safety issues.

Notification of crashes was obtained from the ambulance call centre when an emergency ambulance was dispatched to the crash scene. CASR investigators were notified via a combination of ambulance pager messages and by scanning the ambulance radio frequency.

The following briefly outlines some of the characteristics of the Metropolitan in-depth study database.

Although 298 crashes were accepted for final inclusion in the study, many more crashes were rejected on the basis of insufficient evidence, inappropriateness (in cases with significant emotional trauma), or the fact that ambulance transport was not required.

Table C 1 shows the cases by the most severe outcome in the crash.

Table C 1: Summary of crashes by most severe outcome

Crash severity Number of cases Per cent

Fatal 21 7.0

Hospital admission 91 30.5

Hospital treated 184 61.7

Taken to hospital 2 0.7

Total 298 100

Table C 2 shows the time of day when the crashes occurred. Only a small number of crashes occurred outside of conventional business hours.

Table C 2: Crash frequency by time of day

Time of day Number Per cent

0000-0259 1 0.3

0300-0559 1 0.3

0600-0859 10 3.4

0900-1159 103 34.6

1200-1459 84 28.2

1500-1759 84 28.2

1800-2059 9 3.0

2100-2359 6 2.0

Total 298 100.0


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 109 —

Broad crash types as would be commonly defined in aggregate crash databases are shown in Table C 3. Right angle collisions imply that colliding vehicles were intending to head straight through an intersection as opposed to right turn crashes in which at least one vehicle was attempting to execute a right turn. Head on collisions represent vehicles colliding from opposing directions of travel and do not necessarily have to be a frontal collision.

Table C 3: Type of crash based on typical aggregate crash types

Crash type Number Per cent

Pedestrian 77 25.8

Right turn 70 23.5

Single vehicle 51 17.1

Rear end 41 13.8

Right angle 24 8.1

Side swipe 11 3.7

Head on 9 3.0

U-turn 8 2.7

Left turn 6 2.0

Other 1 0.3

Total 298 100.0

A more detailed breakdown of the crashes as discussed in this report is shown in Table C 4.


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 110 —

Table C 4: Manoeuvres performed at time of crash

Crash type Number of cases Proportion

Uncontrolled junctions

Right angle 0 –

Right turn 28 9.4

Left turn 6 2.0

Controlled junctions (Stop, Give Way)

Right angle 14 4.7

Right turn 11 3.7

Left turn 0 –

Signalised junctions

Right angle 9 3.0

Controlled right turn 35 11.7

Filter right turn during green 18 6.0

Filter right turn on change of signal from green to yellow 10 3.4

Left turn 7 2.3

Other crash types

Roundabouts 2 0.7

U-turns 11 3.7

Reversing 3 1.0

Loss of control 39 13.1

Side swipe 12 4.0

Rear end collisions 43 14.4

Head on collisions 8 2.7

Total 251 84.2

Intersection types are shown in Table C 5. The bulk of cases represented collisions at cross roads. Three intersections were classed as complex due to an ‗offset T‘ signal arrangement or junctions with extremely wide medians. Although slightly more than half the cases occurred at mid-blocks, 38 of these were still associated with the presence of a nearby intersection or driveway. Eighty crashes occurred where traffic signals were present, 14 where a stop sign was present and 15 where a give way sign was present. Two of the crashes occurred in the vicinity of a roundabout.

Table C 5: Intersection type

Intersection type Number Per cent

Intersection (in total) 136 45.3

Cross road 74 24.8

T-junction 57 19.1

Complex intersection 3 1.0

Multi-leg junction 2 0.7

Mid-block 159 53.4

Pedestrian crossing on mid-block 3 1.0

Total 298 100.0


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 111 —

Table C 6 summarises cases by all speed limits. Where crashes occurred at the intersection of roads with differing speed limits both speed limits were counted. This meant that the total number of cases exceeds 298 as many intersections were counted twice. It should be noted that during the course of the study the General Urban Speed Limit was reduced from 60 km/h to 50 km/h. Therefore a small number of crashes on LGA roads occurred when a speed limit of 60 km/h still applied.

Table C 6: Speed limit at crash location by all applicable speed limits

Speed limit Number of crashes Proportion

25 km/h 4 1.3

40 km/h 9 3.0

50 km/h 111 37.2

60 km/h 218 73.2

70 km/h 10 3.4

80 km/h 6 2.0

Total 358 –

Road types by responsible authority are shown in Table C 7. The majority of crashes occurred on State Road Authority (DTEI) arterial roads which tended to have multiple lane cross-sections and carry higher volumes of traffic when compared to the LGA roads.

Table C 7: Crashes by responsible road authority

Responsible authority Number of crashes Proportion

State Road Authority (DTEI) 133 44.6

Local Government Authority (LGA) 84 28.2

Intersection between DTEI and LGA roads 64 21.5

Intersection between private residence and DTEI road 0 –

Intersection between private residence and LGA road 3 1.0

Intersection between commercial residence and DTEI road 12 4.0

Intersection between commercial residence and LGA road 2 0.7

Total 298 100

Rural in-depth crashes

The last completed rural study was conducted between March 1998 and March 2000 and consisted of 236 cases (Baldock et al. 2008). A brief description of the road related characteristics of the crashes follows.

Most of the crashes in the study (67%) occurred on rural highways controlled by DTEI. A considerable proportion also occurred on minor rural roads and national highways and a small number occurred on local rural town roads (Table C 8). Where the crash happened at the intersection of a rural road or rural street with a rural highway, the road type was classified as being a rural highway.


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 112 —

Table C 8: Road type at the crash location

Road type Number Per cent

National highway 30 12.7

Rural highway 159 67.4

Rural road 37 15.7

Rural street 10 4.2

Total 236 100.0

The great majority of the crashes occurred on two lane roads with only 11% on roads with more than one lane in each direction. Most of the crashes occurred on sealed roads (93%). Five of the crashes listed as being on sealed roads were at an intersection of a sealed road with an unsealed road.

Over 58% of the crashes occurred on straight sections of road. In the remaining crashes, the involvement of a right hand bend was far more common than a left hand bend (from the point of view of the driver who initially lost control, experienced difficulty or was travelling straight through an intersection).

In the study, a crash was classified as an intersection collision only if it involved vehicles that approached, or turned into, different roads. Using this definition most of the crashes in the study were non-intersection crashes (Table C 9). Among the intersection crashes, those that occurred at cross roads and T-junctions were nearly equally represented.

Table C 9: Road layout at the crash location: presence and type of intersection

Road layout Number Per cent

Non-intersection 161 68.2

Cross road 31 13.1

T-Junction 29 12.3

Driveway 11 4.7

Multi-leg junction 2 0.8

Level crossing 2 0.8

Total 236 100.0

Over half of the intersection collisions investigated had no signs or signals relevant to any of the vehicles involved (Table C 10). In most of the no control cases the priority of vehicles was designated by the road layout and road rules. However, two of the crashes involved vehicles approaching an uncontrolled intersection from intersecting roads. The most common traffic control that was present and relevant was a Give Way sign.


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 113 —

Table C 10: Traffic controls relevant to vehicles involved in intersection collisions

Traffic controls Number Per cent

Priority designated 1 42 57.5

Give Way sign 20 27.4

Stop sign 6 8.2

Traffic lights 3 4.1

Uncontrolled 2 2 2.8

Total 73 100.0

Notes:

1. Priority indicated by road layout (e.g.: T-intersection) or road rules (e.g.: give way to approaching traffic when turning).

2. No controls and priority not indicated by road layout.

More than 40% of the non-intersection crashes on sealed roads occurred on roads with no edge lining of the side of the road (Table C 11). Approximately 10% of these roads with no edge lining were in rural towns (speed limit less than 80 km/h).

Table C 11: Edge lining at the crash location: non-intersection crashes

Edge lining Number Per cent

Yes 82 55.4

Kerb 5 3.4

No 61 41.2

NA (unsealed road) 13 –

Total 161 100.0

Very few of the crashes on mid-block sections of road occurred on roads with a sealed shoulder (Table C 12). While this is mainly a reflection of the small proportion of roads in the study area with sealed shoulders, data presented in Section 6 of this report confirms that unsealed shoulders are one of the major contributing factors to rural road crashes.

Table C 12: Sealed shoulders at the crash location: non-intersection crashes

Sealed shoulder Number Per cent

Yes 9 6.3

Kerb 8 5.6

Partial 12 8.5

No 113 79.6

NA (unsealed road) 13 –

No shoulder 6 –

Total 161 100.0


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 114 —

APPENDIX D WORKSHOP ATTENDEES

Name Organisation

State representatives

Michael de Roos Roads and Traffic Authority, NSW

Wal Smart Roads and Traffic Authority, NSW

Kenn Beer VicRoads

Colin Morgan VicRoads

Bettina Cruise Department of Transport and Main Roads, Qld

Brian Kidd Main Roads, WA

Andrew Townsend Department of Transport, Energy and Infrastructure, SA

Glenn Bunting NZ Transport Agency

Local government representatives

David Niven Fairfield City Council, NSW

Doug Bradbrook Mornington Peninsula Shire, Vic

Geoff Davis Yarra Ranges Shire Council, Vic

Jason Deller Moreton Bay Regional Council, Qld

Terri-Ann Petett WALGA

Graham Lantzke WALGA

Geoff Manuel Campbelltown City Council, SA

Andy Hrast ALGA

ARRB

Blair Turner (Melbourne) ARRB

Victoria Pyta (Melbourne) ARRB

Carlos Rial (Brisbane) ARRB

Peter Cairney (Melbourne) ARRB


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 115 —

APPENDIX E WORKSHOP AGENDA

Austroads workshop: local government road safety

Tuesday 2nd June 2009, 10:30am – 3pm ARRB Group Ltd Auditorium,

500 Burwood Hwy, Vermont South, Melbourne, Vic 3133

AGENDA

10:00 AM Arrival, tea and coffee

10:30 AM

Welcome

Objectives

Introductions

Road safety overview and Safe Systems approach

10:45 AM

Local government crash risk – findings from research to date

Crash risk from literature review

Crash risk from data analysis and site inspections

Discussion on experience of attendees

11:30 AM

Barriers to implementing road safety on local government roads

Findings from literature review

11:50 PM

Syndicate exercise 1

What are the major barriers to implementing road safety on local government roads

12:30 PM Lunch

1:15 PM

What are the solutions for improving road safety on local government

roads

Findings from literature review

1:45 PM

Syndicate exercise 2

What are the solutions for improving safety on local government roads?

2:45 PM

General discussion and wrap-up

3:00 PM Workshop end - Tea/coffee


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 116 —

APPENDIX F STATE ROAD CRASH RATES

As part of an earlier Austroads project (Austroads 2008) data was collected from each Australian jurisdiction to enable the production of crash rates for the state road network. Synthesis of the national crash rates was pursued by adjusting the results from individual state crash databases. Factors were initially developed to account for under-reporting of injury crashes in different jurisdictions. These were based on the difference between jurisdictions in the proportions of fatal crashes to injury crashes. After further consideration this analysis method was abandoned as there was no reliable way of distinguishing between:

improved reporting of injury crashes, i.e. injury crashes making up a higher proportion of the overall crash data sample

gains in road safety resulting in reduction in fatal crashes and increase in injury crashes

differences in reporting procedures.

There has been no recent in-depth Australian research into under-reporting. An audit of crash under-reporting in each jurisdiction would be required to fully understand the issue and to create reliable adjustment factors.

An alternative method was pursued resulting in provision of weighted mean crash rates based on each jurisdiction‘s proportional contribution to the nation‘s road toll (BTE 2000). The figures, which are presented in Table F 1 and Table F 2 should be used with caution as they do not account for varying levels of injury crash reporting in different jurisdictions. The relative risk and relative cost figures do, however, present the picture of relative safety of different road environments. Relative costs in particular reveal the previously hidden influence of crash severity in different road situations.

Table F 1: National weighted mean of crash rates – road stereotypes

Road stereotype Crash rate (casualty crashes

per 100M VKT)

Relative risk Crash cost rate (cents per VKT)

Relative cost

Urban 23.69 1.60 4.74 1.00

Rural 14.76 1.00 5.27 1.11

Urban Single 29.44 2.91 5.84 1.87

Urban Divided 16.95 1.68 3.47 1.11

Rural Single 16.26 1.61 6.01 1.92

Rural Divided 10.10 1.00 3.13 1.00


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 117 —

Table F 2: National weighted mean of crash rates – intersection stereotypes

Intersection stereotype Crash rate (casualty crashes per 10M VE)

Relative risk Crash cost rate (cents per VE)

Relative cost

Urban 1.71 1.32 3.24 1.00

Rural 1.30 1.00 4.11 1.27

Urban 3 leg 1.54 1.20 3.00 1.00

Urban 4 leg 1.98 1.54 3.75 1.25

Rural 3 leg 1.28 1.00 4.09 1.36

Rural 4 leg 1.73 1.35 7.06 2.35

Urban Signals 1.22 1.38 2.41 1.26

Urban Roundabout 1.07 1.20 1.91 1.00

Urban Other 0.93 1.05 2.22 1.16

Rural Signals 1.08 1.22 2.81 1.48

Rural Roundabout 0.89 1.00 2.31 1.21

Rural Other 0.99 1.12 3.81 2.00


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 118 —

APPENDIX G GRAPHS OF FINDINGS FROM SITE INVESTIGATIONS

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

a)

at in

ters

ectio

n

b)

at oth

er

access

poin

ts (

e.g

. pro

pert

y

access)

c)

for

overt

akin

g (

i.e.

vert

/horiz a

lignm

ent)

a)

of ro

adw

ay (

i.e.

new

roadw

ay)

b)

old

pavem

ent

mark

ings n

ot re

moved

c)

vert

ical-due to

undula

tions

- -

a)

on-c

om

ing

headlig

hts

b)

the s

un

c)

2-w

ay s

erv

ice

road

1.1 Poor sight distance: 1.2 Confusing Alignment: 1.3 Unsatisfactory

transition from old

alignment to new

1.4 Unexpected

change in alignment

1.5 Glare due to:

1.0 Alignment

Contributing

Possibly contributing

Figure G 1: Intersection crash factors – alignment


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 119 —

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

a) directional

signing

b) advisory

speed/w arning

signs

- - - - - a) too low b) too high a) not provided b) insuff icient c) poorly

spaced

-

2.1 Ambiguous/unclear: 2.2

Unnecessary

signing

2.3 Insuff icient

signing (e.g.

advisory speed,

curve w arning)

2.4 Sign hidden

or

inconspicuous

2.5 Sign

restricts sight

distance

2.6 Sign

mounted at

inappropriate

height

2.7 Incorrect sign size: 2.8 Guide posts 2.9 Poor curve

delineation

2.0 Signing & Delineation (part a)

Contributing


Figure G 2: Intersection crash factors – signing and delineation (a)


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 120 —

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

a)

poorly

main

tain

ed

b)

not

pro

vid

ed

a)

poorly

main

tain

ed

b)

not

pro

vid

ed

a)

poorly

main

tain

ed

b)

not

pro

vid

ed

c)

insuff.

a)

not

pro

vid

ed

b)

insuff.

c)

poorly

main

tain

ed -

a)

not

pro

vid

ed

b)

poorly

locate

d

c)

poorly

delin

eate

d

d)

not

mounta

ble

a)

insuffic

ient

speed li

mit

sig

ns (

i.e.

repeate

r)

b)

wro

ng

siz

ed s

peed

limit

sig

ns/p

oorly

positi

oned

c)

inappro

priate

speed li

mit

2.10 Edgelines: 2.11 Centreline: 2.12 RRPMs: 2.13 Other linemarkings (e.g. turn arrow s): 2.14 Unclear

vehicle path

through

intersection /

road segment

2.15 Traff ic islands: 2.16 Insuff icient speed limit signage

through:

2.0 Signing & Delineation (part b)

Contributing


Figure G 3: Intersection crash factors – signing and delineation (b)


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 121 —

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

a)

tree/s

b)

pole

/s

c)

culv

ert

s

d)

oth

er

(nam

e)

a)

unseale

d

b)

part

ially

seale

d (

up

to 1

m)

c)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed -

a)

not pro

vid

ed

b)

inadequate

c)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed

a)

not pro

vid

ed

b)

inadequate

c)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed - -

a)

not pro

vid

ed

b)

inadequate

c)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed - -

a)

locate

d

b)

desig

ned (

specify

)

3.1 Roadside hazards w ithin the clear zone 3.2 Shoulders 3.3 Steep

embank-

ment (i.e.

steeper

than 1:4)

4.1 General 4.2 Bridge ends 5.1

Absence

of facility

5.2

Inadequate

standing

area

5.3 Fencing/barrier 5.4

Insufficient

sight

distance to

facility

5.5 Road

surface

unsafe for

cyclists


3.0 Roadside Hazards 4.0 Guardfencing 5.0 Pedestrians/Cyclists

Contributing


Figure G 4: Intersection crash factors – roadsides, guard fencing, pedestrians and cyclists


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 122 —

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

a)

obscure

d b

y

queued v

ehic

les

b)

obscure

d b

y

pole

s, tr

ees, sig

ns,

etc

c)

affecte

d b

y the

sun r

isin

g / s

ettin

g - - -

a)

serv

ice r

oad

b)

private

drivew

ay

c)

public

facility

(e.g

. shoppin

g

centr

e, school

gro

unds)

a)

not pro

vid

ed

b)

not satis

facto

ry

/ lo

w le

vel

a)

too n

arr

ow

b)

poorly

main

tain

ed

c)

poorly d

rain

ed

a)

has lo

ose

mate

rial

b)

is c

orr

ugate

d

c)

has r

uttin

g

6.1 Traff ic signals are 6.2 Traff ic

signal layout

is poor

6.3 Traff ic

signal phasing

is

unsatisfactory

7.1

Inadequate

parking

facilities

(specify)

7.2 Unsatisfactory re-entry to the

carriagew ay

- - 9.1 The road is 9.2 The road surface

6.0 Traff ic Signals 7.0 Parking & Access 8.0 Street Lighting 9.0 Road Pavement

Contributing


Figure G 5: Intersection crash factors – signals, parking, street lighting, road pavement


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 123 —

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

a)

at in

ters

ectio

n

b)

at oth

er

access p

oin

ts

(e.g

. pro

pert

y

access)

c)

for

overt

akin

g

(i.e

. vert

/horiz

alig

nm

ent)

a)

of ro

adw

ay

(i.e

. new

roadw

ay)

b)

old

pavem

ent

mark

ings n

ot

rem

oved

c)

vert

ical-due

to u

ndula

tions - -

a)

on-c

om

ing

headlig

hts

b)

the s

un

c)

2-w

ay

serv

ice r

oad

1.1 Poor sight distance: 1.2 Confusing Alignment: 1.3 Unsatisfactory

transition from old

alignment to new

1.4 Unexpected

change in alignment

1.5 Glare due to:

1.0 Alignment

Contributing


Figure G 6: Mid-block crash factors – alignment


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 124 —

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

a) directional

signing

b) advisory

speed/w arning

signs

- - - - - a) too low b) too high a) not provided b) insuff icient c) poorly spaced -

2.1 Ambiguous/unclear: 2.2 Unnecessary

signing

2.3 Insuff icient

signing (e.g.

advisory speed,

curve w arning)

2.4 Sign hidden or

inconspicuous

2.5 Sign restricts

sight distance

2.6 Sign mounted

at inappropriate

height

2.7 Incorrect sign size: 2.8 Guide posts 2.9 Poor curve

delineation

2.0 Signing & Delineation (part a)

Contributing


Figure G 7: Mid-block crash factors – signing and delineation (a)


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 125 —

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

a)

poorly

main

tain

ed

b)

not

pro

vid

ed

a)

poorly

main

tain

ed

b)

not

pro

vid

ed

a)

poorly

main

tain

ed

b)

not

pro

vid

ed

c)

insuff.

a)

not

pro

vid

ed

b)

insuff.

c)

poorly

main

tain

ed -

a)

not

pro

vid

ed

b)

poorly

locate

d

c)

poorly

delin

eate

d

d)

not

mounta

ble

a)

insuffic

ient

speed li

mit

sig

ns (

i.e.

repeate

r)

b)

wro

ng

siz

ed s

peed

limit

sig

ns/p

oorly

positi

oned

c)

inappro

priate

speed li

mit

2.10 Edgelines: 2.11 Centreline: 2.12 RRPMs: 2.13 Other linemarkings (e.g. turn arrow s): 2.14 Unclear

vehicle path

through

intersection /

road segment

2.15 Traff ic islands: 2.16 Insuff icient speed limit signage

through:

2.0 Signing & Delineation (part b)

Contributing


Figure G 8: Mid-block crash factors – signing and delineation (b)


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 126 —

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

a)

tree/s

b)

pole

/s

c)

culv

ert

s

d)

oth

er

(nam

e)

a)

unseale

d

b)

part

ially

seale

d (

up

to 1

m)

c)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed -

a)

not pro

vid

ed

b)

inadequate

c)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed

a)

not pro

vid

ed

b)

inadequate

c)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed - -

a)

not pro

vid

ed

b)

inadequate

c)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed - -

a)

locate

d

b)

desig

ned (

specify

)

3.1 Roadside hazards w ithin the clear zone 3.2 Shoulders 3.3 Steep

embank-

ment (i.e.

steeper

than 1:4)

4.1 General 4.2 Bridge ends 5.1

Absence

of facility

5.2

Inadequate

standing

area

5.3 Fencing/barrier 5.4

Insuff icient

sight

distance to

facility

5.5 Road

surface

unsafe for

cyclists


3.0 Roadside Hazards 4.0 Guardfencing 5.0 Pedestrians/Cyclists

Contributing


Figure G 9: Mid-block crash factors – roadsides, guard fencing, pedestrians and cyclists


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 127 —

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

a)

obscure

d b

y q

ueued

vehic

les

b)

obscure

d b

y p

ole

s,

trees, sig

ns, etc

c)

affecte

d b

y the s

un

risin

g / s

ettin

g

- - -

a)

serv

ice r

oad

b)

private

drivew

ay

c)

public

facility

(e.g

.

shoppin

g c

entr

e,

school g

rounds)

a)

not pro

vid

ed

b)

not satis

facto

ry /

low

level

a)

too n

arr

ow

b)

poorly m

ain

tain

ed

c)

poorly d

rain

ed

a)

has lo

ose m

ate

rial

b)

is c

orr

ugate

d

c)

has r

uttin

g

6.1 Traff ic signals are 6.2 Traff ic

signal layout

is poor

6.3 Traff ic

signal phasing

is

unsatisfactory

7.1

Inadequate

parking

facilities

(specify)

7.2 Unsatisfactory re-entry to the

carriagew ay

- - 9.1 The road is 9.2 The road surface

6.0 Traff ic Signals 7.0 Parking & Access 8.0 Street Lighting 9.0 Road Pavement

Contributing


Figure G 10: Mid-block crash factors – signals, parking, street lighting, road pavement


A u s t r o a d s 2 0 1 0

— 128 —

APPENDIX H EXAMPLES FROM IN-DEPTH CRASH ANALYSIS

H.1 Metropolitan Crashes at Junctions

M009

A car (Unit 2) was travelling north and approaching a T-junction where the driver intended to turn right onto the through road. The driver brought the vehicle to a stop and looked in both directions. Another car (Unit 1) was travelling west along the through road of the junction at an estimated speed of 50 km/h. The driver of Unit 2 failed to see Unit 1 approaching from her right and began to execute the turn. The driver of Unit 1 saw Unit 2 move from a stationary position immediately prior to Unit 1 entering the junction. He sounded his horn and braked but was unable to avoid a collision. The right front of Unit 2, immediately in front of the wheel arch, was struck by the front left of Unit 1 within the junction at relatively low speed. Both vehicles came to rest in contact with each other following the impact. The driver of Unit 2 stated that she looked for traffic prior to executing the turn and could not explain why she did not see the approaching vehicle.

Figure H 1: Site diagram for location M009


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Figure H 2: Looking northeast across the T-junction where the driver of Unit 2 attempted to turn right

H.2 Metropolitan Vulnerable Road Users

M018

A bicycle (Unit 2) was travelling south toward a roundabout where the rider intended to continue straight. A car (Unit 1) was travelling west as it approached the roundabout. The car failed to give way to the right, with both vehicles entering the roundabout at approximately the same time. The bicycle struck the rear bumper of the car within the roundabout. The bicycle and cyclist fell to the road surface following the impact, coming to rest on the carriageway near the south eastern corner. The cyclist experienced a loss of consciousness at the scene. She has no memory of the impact or of seeing the car prior to the collision.


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Figure H 4: Looking west toward the roundabout, in the direction of travel of the car


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Figure H 5: Looking south toward the roundabout, showing the perspective of the rider of the bicycle. It is at least possible that the rider was difficult to see for the car driver because of her dark

clothing and shadows from overhanging trees.

H.3 Metropolitan Speeding Motorists

M039

A car (Unit 1) was travelling east and approaching an intersection controlled by a Give Way sign for this direction of travel. The driver brought the vehicle to a stop and checked for traffic in both directions before continuing through the intersection at a slow pace. As the driver was approaching the point half way through the intersection, she became aware of a black object coming toward her from the left. She braked to a stop within the intersection. Another car (Unit 2) was travelling south toward the intersection at an estimated speed of 80 km/h. On seeing Unit 1, the driver of Unit 2 veered to the left in an attempt to avoid the collision. The right rear panel of Unit 2 was struck by the front of Unit 1 as it travelled past, resulting in the front bumper of Unit 1 being torn from the vehicle. The driver of Unit 2 lost control of the vehicle following the impact, moving close to the eastern kerb before overcorrecting to the right. The vehicle yawed across the carriageway and mounted the western kerb. The left side of the vehicle collided with a small tree as it continued onto the western verge toward a Stobie pole. The left front door of the vehicle collided with the Stobie pole, resulting in intrusion into the cabin up to the centre console. The car came to rest against the Stobie pole with the front of the vehicle against a low brick wall, facing west. The driver was found to be unconscious at the scene and trapped within the vehicle.


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Figure H 7: Looking south from the intersection toward Unit 2 in final position against the Stobie pole. Yaw marks left by the vehicle as it travelled right across the carriageway can be seen in the lead up to the vehicle.


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H.4 Metropolitan – Other Crash Types

M089

A car (Unit 1) was the rear of six vehicles that had become stationary to the south of a tram crossing. The site of the crossing is complex, consisting of three roads that intersect immediately south of the tram line. The elderly driver of the car was a local resident in the eastern leg of the intersection and was intending to turn right south of the crossing to head home. While waiting in the queue, the driver of the car elected to overtake the stationary vehicles ahead by travelling onto the incorrect side of the carriageway. The car continued past three of the five queuing vehicles before being confronted with the next stationary vehicle whose driver was also attempting to move into the oncoming lane to undertake a similar manoeuvre. On seeing the actions of this vehicle, the driver of Unit 1 veered to the right to avoid a collision and lost control of the car. The vehicle mounted the raised kerb on the southern edge of the carriageway and travelled across the footpath and a residential driveway before the front right of the car collided with a corrugated iron fence and low metal gate. The car continued to move across a second residential driveway and collided with a water meter, steel pole and low residential brick wall before coming to rest, facing east. Observations of vehicle travel patterns at the intersection in the days following this collision suggest that the manoeuvre undertaken by the driver of the car was not uncommon in the event of a queue at the signal crossing.



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Figure H 9: Looking northeast toward the complex junction. Vehicles ahead of the car were stationary at a tram crossing when the driver attempted to overtake them and turn right. The car can be seen in final position to the right of frame.

M230

A car (Unit 2) was travelling in a westerly direction outside a secondary school. The young driver of Unit 2 (17 years old), a student at the school, attempted to undertake a U-turn to head east. The driver brought the vehicle to the left of the carriageway across the front of a side street to increase the width of carriageway available to execute the turn. A utility (Unit 1) was travelling west a distance behind Unit 2 at a speed reported by the driver to have been approximately 55 to 60 km/h. Failing to see the approach of Unit 1, the driver of Unit 2 began the U-turn, coming into the direct path of Unit 1. The driver of Unit 1 veered toward the centre line and braked hard but was unable to avoid the collision. The centre front of Unit 1 struck the right side of Unit 2, resulting in impact damage from the front right wheel and wheel arch to the rear right door. Both vehicles came to a stop near the impact point before being moved from the carriageway. Although the carriageway at the collision site is clear of visual obstructions, the driver of Unit 1 stated that he was unaware of the presence of Unit 2 until the vehicle was immediately ahead of him.


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H.5 Rural Junction Crashes

R060

Unit 2 was travelling east on a sealed carriageway approaching an intersection where the driver intended to continue straight ahead. The intersection was controlled by a Give Way sign for Unit 2‘s direction of travel but the driver of Unit 2 failed to give way. The vehicle entered the intersection and collided with Unit 1, which was travelling north. Neither driver had time to take evasive action to avoid the collision. The right front corner of Unit 2 struck the left front wheel of Unit 1. Unit 2 was rotated almost 180 degrees anticlockwise by the force of the collision, coming to rest 20 metres north of the point of impact. Unit 1 came to rest at the north east corner of the intersection, 10 metres from the point of impact. The intersection was characterised by 3 sealed roads and 1 unsealed no through road or track, leading to local shacks. The Give Way signs gave priority to the southern unsealed track. Though both drivers were very familiar with the intersection, the driver of Unit 2 stated that he rarely saw any vehicle use the track and so was not expecting to have to give way. Vegetation across the south west corner leading up to the intersection was not extensive, but may have created some visual obstruction, possibly contributing to the causation of the crash.


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Figure H 11: Site diagram for location R060

Figure H 12: Looking west across the intersection in the opposite direction of travel for Unit 2. Low lying vegetation over the south west corner of the intersection (left of picture) may have resulted in some visual obstruction.


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H.6 Rural – Poor Road Geometry and Delineation

R141

Both vehicles were travelling on the same narrow road from opposite directions approaching a 110 degree bend. The drivers of the vehicles lived locally and travelled the road daily. Unit 2 was negotiating a left bend at an estimated speed of 63 km/h when the driver was confronted with Unit 1 travelling towards the centre of the carriageway. The right front corners of the vehicles collided at the apex of the corner. The vehicles remained connected and rotated clockwise following the impact. Unit 2 rotated 50 degrees, coming to rest with the rear of the vehicle on the northern grass verge, facing south east. Unit 1 rotated 30 degrees, coming to rest in the centre of the carriageway, facing west. The impact caused intrusion into the right front foot well of Unit 2, trapping the driver. Both drivers stated that the road was narrow and that it was common to see vehicles ―cut the corner‖. The driver of Unit 2 stated that she could clearly see the approach of Unit 1, however, the driver of Unit 1 stated that he did not see the approach of Unit 2. Tall grass and the undulating nature of the carriageway beyond the bend may have made Unit 2 less visible on its approach.



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Figure H 14: Looking east across the bend with both vehicles in their final positions. The right B-pillar and door were removed from Unit 2 by the emergency crew.

Figure H 15: Looking west showing the tall grass across the bend. There is no centre line to guide vehicles through the bend.


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H.7 Rural Loss of Control

R205

The vehicle was travelling south west on a straight graded dirt road in wet conditions. The young driver had held a provisional licence for less than two months and was travelling at an estimated speed of 115 km/h. The vehicle drifted to the left with the left wheels travelling onto the loose gravel on the edge of the carriageway. The driver overcorrected the vehicle to the right and lost control. The vehicle yawed in a clockwise direction across the carriageway and ran up a slight embankment on the north western verge. The vehicle rolled over as it travelled up the embankment, colliding with large overhanging branches and a tree 4 metres from the carriageway. The vehicle came to rest on the south west side of the tree after landing on its roof, the front of the vehicle facing south west.

Figure H 16: Looking north east from the impact point. The vehicle came to rest this side of the tree after rolling over the embankment and colliding with the tree and its overhanging branches.


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Figure H 17: View of the front of the vehicle at the scene after first being returned to its wheels. The vehicle was extensively damaged across most panels as a result of the roll over and collision with the tree and large overhanging

branches.

H.8 Rural Manoeuvring for Private Access

R211

Unit 2 was travelling north at an estimated speed of 70 to 80 km/h, followed by Unit 1. The drivers of both vehicles travelled the road regularly. Approaching a crest in the road, the driver of Unit 1 turned her attention to a child in the rear seat who was attempting to remove the seat belt. When the driver redirected her attention to the carriageway, she was confronted with Unit 2 whose driver was at that time indicating and slowing to enter a private driveway to the left. The driver of Unit 1 braked but was unable to avoid a collision. The front of Unit 1 collided with the left rear corner of Unit 2 on the western edge of the carriageway. The impact pushed Unit 2 across the driveway, resulting in a secondary impact as the front of the vehicle collided with a strainer post at the driveway entrance. Unit 2 rotated anticlockwise around the post on impact, coming to rest over a drainage depression, facing south west. Unit 1 came to rest in the north bound lane following the impact.


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Figure H 19: Looking north towards the impact point (next to the driveway on the left) showing pre-impact braking undertaken by Unit 1


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H.9 Rural Speed

R119

Unit 2, a large truck, was travelling north west at a self reported speed of 15 km/h. The driver was carrying a load of bee hives and was travelling down the centre of the narrow carriageway to avoid hitting overhanging trees. As the truck came to the top of a crest, the driver was confronted with an oncoming vehicle (Unit 1); the truck driver attempted to veer left to allow room for the car to pass. Unit 1 was travelling at a speed in excess of 130 km/h when the driver was confronted with the truck straddling the centre of the carriageway. The driver of Unit 1 braked and veered right. The vehicle yawed in a clockwise direction across the carriageway and onto the western verge, narrowly missing the front of Unit 2. The left front corner of Unit 1 struck a large tree 4.5 metres from the carriageway. Unit 1 rotated approximately 270 degrees clockwise following the impact, coming to rest with the front left corner of the vehicle over the road surface, facing east. Both occupants were trapped in the vehicle.


R098

The vehicle was travelling west on a straight unsealed carriageway at an estimated speed of 120 km/h. The driver, who was not familiar with the road, lost control of the vehicle as it travelled through a slight dip. The vehicle swerved across the carriageway to the left, then to the right and then yawed back to the left for more than 100 metres before running onto the southern verge. The front of the vehicle collided with a tree located less than 2 metres from the carriageway. The impact caused extensive deformation of the front of the vehicle back to the firewall. The vehicle came to rest against the tree. The right rear passenger died at the scene.


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Figure H 21: View of the vehicle in its final position against the tree. There was extensive damage to the entire engine bay up to and including the fire wall.

INFORMATION RETRIEVAL

Austroads, 2010, Road Safety on Local Government Roads: Final Report, Sydney, A4, 156pp, AP-R359/10

Keywords:

Local road, local government, road safety, crash, accident

Abstract:

Local government roads form a significant part of the public road network, but little is known about crashes on these types of roads. This study involved a review of literature, crash data analysis, site investigations, in-depth crash analysis and stakeholder workshop to address this issue. It was identified that a significant proportion of road deaths and casualties occur on roads managed by local government. Information is provided on the types of crashes, and likely contributors to these. Information is also provided on likely barriers that may prevent improvements in safety on local government roads. A range of strategies are provided to address these barriers and improve the level of safety on local government roads.

local road safety report

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