Roadside Trees as a Road Safety Hazard in Poland

Transcription

1 TRB AFB(20) 2 Meeting on Road Side Safety Design 5 November 2014, Brussels Roadside Trees as a Road Safety Hazard in Poland Marcin Budzynski Kazimierz Jamroz Highway Engineering Department Gdansk University of Technology Poland

2 Presentation Plan o INTRODUCTION o METHODS OF PROBLEM SOLVING o EVALUATION OF THE GAMBIT RS PROGRAMME o STRATEGIC LEVEL o TACTICAL LEVEL o OPERATIONAL LEVEL o RESEARCH o CONCLUSIONS

3 The European Union as a world safety leader in all modes of transport aims to reach a fatality number close to zero in Taking the example of many other countries, Poland has adopted VISION ZERO as its road safety vision. INTRODUCTION The pace of road safety improvement in Poland is much slower than in other EU countries. The risk of being a fatality in relation to the population in Poland is still nearly twice as high as the average in the EU, and more than three times higher than in the UK, the Netherlands and Sweden

4 INTRODUCTION Ten years ago in 2004 (i.e. when Poland joined the EU) it was established that: the fatality rate was very high: o 5640 road deaths in 2003, o the road fatality rate was 149 fatalities per million of population, groups exposed to a particularly high risk of death in Poland included: vulnerable road users (pedestrians, cyclists), children and young drivers, the basic problems of road safety included: o dangerous road user behaviour, o lack of an efficient system of road safety management, o poor quality of road infrastructure, the EU requires its member states to achieve a significant road accident reduction.

5 In 2003 in Poland, collision with a tree was one of the major problems of road safety and the cause of: 11 % of accidents, 17 % killed (963 victims) 2 May bus accident near Gdansk 30 killed, 33 injured INTRODUCTION KJ GUT - 5

6 METHODS OF PROBLEM SOLVING Problem solving using a risk-based approach: risk management method was used to assess the level of risk and selection of activities consisting of the following steps: o risk identification, o evaluation and risk acceptance, o selection of effective action, o monitoring and reporting on risk, actions performed at three levels of management : o strategic, o tactical, o operational..

7 STRATEGIC LEVEL - Diagnosis The main factors at the strategic level: Historical conditioning alleys of trees. High-speed vehicles (especially young drivers). Rural roads [%] summed frequency [%] Speed [km/h]

8 STRATEGIC LEVEL - Diagnosis The main factors at the strategic level: Poland have not standards for road safety cross sections Conflict with ecology institutions and organisations (moss, osmoderma eremita etc.) Hermit beetle and moss in trees are more important than drivers and passengers life!!!. Why? How to solve the problem? pavement Carriageway Without obstacles Forgiving zone Safety zone

9 STRATEGIC LEVEL RS Programmes Twenty years ago efforts were undertaken in Poland to break the harmful trend of increasing road deaths (7901 deaths in 1991 year). The guidelines designed to halve the number of road deaths in two decades were formulated in the GAMBIT Road Safety Programmes (the strategic goal of the most recent GAMBIT 2005 was to reduce road deaths to 2800 in 2013). Two of the five strategic goals of action include activities related to the problem of collisions with trees: construction and maintenance of a safe road infrastructure, reducing the severity of accidents (including the development of a "soft" road environment and the construction of "forgiving" roads of driver mistakes).

10 STRATEGIC LEVEL RS Programmes In 2007, the next Road Safety Programme GAMBIT was developed. It was GAMBIT for National Roads. Goal number 3 of the programme read Reduce the number of road fatalities related to run-off-road collisions, which was to be achieved through the following strategic actions: 1. Providing visibility, legibility and uniformity of the road, 2. Keeping vehicles in lane, 3. Shaping safe road environment, 4. Protection against dangerous objects.

11 STRATEGIC LEVEL RS Programme s efficiency During 9 years of RS Programme implementation 2250 lives were saved

12 TACTICAL LEVEL - diagnosis The effect of trees on road safety at the tactical level : region, road category, length of road sections with trees type of section (straight and curves), night time Pomerania region % of trees on road section: national roads 20%, regional roads 40%, county roads 65 % (< 1,5 m)

13 TACTICAL LEVEL - Interventions The most frequently used measures: construction of a new road, cutting trees, the use of protective barriers, speed management, communication about the hazard.

14 OPERATIONAL LEVEL - Diagnosis The effect of trees on road safety at the operational level : narrowing gauge forcing vehicles to enter the opposite lane (head-on collision), limiting visibility at intersections and exits (side impacts), obscuring road signs (lack of legibility and visibility of the road), lack of space for pedestrians and reducing visibility at pedestrian crossings (collisions involving pedestrians), causing harm to road infrastructure. Road safety inspection

15 OPERATIONAL LEVEL - Interventions The most frequently used measures: Improved visibility through special markings or tree cutting in the area of limited visibility at intersections The speed limit Special markings - the least effective Application of section 2-1

16 RESEARCHES Roadside and road safety - density of victims (DV) Variables: V traffic volume (veh/24h), RC road category, T1 trees < 3,5 m (%), T2 trees > 3,5 m (%), S slopes (%), RC road category RB road barriers (%), FA forestarea(%) HS hard shoulder DV=a*V^b*exp(c*RC + d*t1 + e*t2 + f*s - g*hs - h*fa - i*rb) R 2 = 0,73 KJ - 16

17 RESEARCHES Roadside and road safety - density of victims (DV) T1 60 % T1 40 % T 1 60 % S 60 % T1 20 % T 2 60 % RB KJ - 17

18 RESEARCHES Pilot project 2 1 cross-section Length of section 5,3 km Traffic volume veh./24h Bicycle volume cycles/24h Average speed km/h Road wide 5,0 m Lane wide 3,0-3,5 m Hard strip - 0,75 1,0 m KJ - 18

19 CONCLUSIONS Over the last 25 years (after the political transformation) in Poland more than 20 thousand people were killed in traffic accidents related to the collision with a tree. The most important factors affecting the hazard posed by trees are: o historical conditions (regions), o road class (equipment and vehicle speed), o type and length of the road section. The most effective measures: o at the strategic level: legislation, road safety programmes, hazard information, o at the tactical level: identification of dangerous sections, infrastructure development, supervision of traffic, o at the operational level: a systematic inspection of road safety, removal of local sources of hazard, information about hazards.

20 CONCLUSIONS Unfortunately, the lack of appropriate regulations, road design standards and cooperation with environmental organisations often means that a tree is valued more than human life. In order to decrease the number of collisions with trees more efficiently the following actions should be undertaken: o conducting of research on the effectiveness of interventions, o development and implementation of safety standards in road crosssection at the legislative level, o development of rules of conduct (the standards of design, public consultation, selection of the best variant). Therefore, there is a need for cooperation between all institutions affecting the road and its environment, which may result in the agreement between the managements of different roads and relevant departments of environment protection on the undertaken actions.

21 CONCLUSIONS A very important factor to deal with this problem is the exchange of experiences and cooperation among the countries in which the problem of the trees along the road occurres. Gdansk University of Technology offers a research ground and willingness to cooperate in research projects and the exchange of experiences in the field of research on methods of identifying and responding to hazard by the roadside.

22 Thank you for your attention