Road Class and Large Truck Involvements in Fatal Accidents

摘要

The data that have been collected by the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute through a follow-up on large trucks involved in fatal accidents provide the opportunity to examine the relationship between road class and fatal accident involvement. The fatal accident involvement rate per mile travelled for combination trucks is calculated from University of Michigan and Federal Highway Administration data. The rate is higher on rural non-interstates than on the other road types. For the rest of the report, a four-way breakdown of road class is examined. This categorizes roads into urban and rural and divided and undivided. Significant differences in the distribution of accident factors are observed between road classes. This has important implications for the selection of accident countermeasures in that a countermeasure is unlikely to reduce involvements equally on all classes of road. Certain types of accident, seemingly involving fatigue, are observed to be relatively more common at dawn; however, this fatigue cannot be attributed to exhaustion after long hours of driving.