Complete Streets Safety Assessments

Complete Streets Safety Assessments (CSSA)

SafeTREC is offering Complete Streets Safety Assessments (CSSA), which are free and available to California City,  County, or Tribal implementing agencies (e.g., public works or transportation departments) as well as public universities. The CSSA is a comprehensive transportation safety assessment that focuses on pedestrian and bicycle safety. By participating, your community will gain expert insights into designing and implementing traffic safety solutions that protect all road users. 

In addition to our standard CSSA programming, SafeTREC will offer a Safe Speed Limits Assessment (SSLA) add-on, which provides technical assistance for context-sensitive speed limit setting. Guided by the Safe System Approach, this project builds off SafeTREC’s California Safe Speeds Toolkit, which details speed limit setting flexibilities under the existing California framework. 

Twelve sites will be selected for the CSSA and four sites will be selected for the CSSA with SSLA add-on, for a total of sixteen sites. Each selected site will be assigned a team of safety experts who will conduct an overview of the Safe System Approach and provide a review of crash history, a summary of current plans and policies, and a field audit of selected locations or corridors in the community. For sites selected for the SSLA add-on, the report will also include an Engineering and Traffic Survey (E&TS) review.

Program Commitment

Participant responsibilities for both programs consist of:

1. Attending a virtual kickoff meeting;
2. Participating in a policies and programs benchmarking survey;
3. Attending the in-person field assessment; and
4. Providing one round of consolidated feedback on the report. 

An optional debrief meeting can be scheduled upon the completion of the field assessment. To be considered for the CSSA+SSLA supplemental, local agencies must be able to provide their current and previous E&TS. 

Program Timeline

Apply now! Only a few slots remain open and applications will continue to be accepted on a rolling basis. 

Up to four sites can be completed by June 15, 2026 in alignment with ATP Cycle 8. Completion of additional reports by this date may be possible contingent on favorable scheduling and staffing from both the Project Team and applicant. If using the CSSA report as part of an ATP application, be sure to indicate you’re interested in this opportunity when applying for the program. 

All other reports will be completed by September 30, 2026. 

This program is funded by the California Office of Traffic Safety (OTS), through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). 

Resources

• Pairing Speed Limit Reductions and Infrastructure to Lower Fatal and Serious (FSI) Crashes. Noelani Fixler, Melie Ekunno (2025): This research brief from UC Berkeley SafeTREC discusses how speed limit reductions, when paired with infrastructure design, enforcement strategies, and contextual land-use planning, can more effectively lower FSI outcomes.

• California Safe Speeds Toolkit (2023): This toolkit is intended to help local jurisdictions across California set safer speed limits that accommodate all road users using Safe System principles. This toolkit consolidates key research on Safe Speeds, provides details on speed limit setting flexibilities under the existing California framework, highlights select speed limit setting case studies from cities across California, and points local jurisdictions toward next steps in pursuing safe speed limit setting.

• Complete Streets and their effect on increasing safety for all road-users (2018): This research brief from UC Berkeley SafeTREC highlights the Complete Streets concept and its effect on increasing  safety for pedestrians and bicyclists in communities.

• A Technical Guide for Conducting Traffic Safety Assessments for California Communities (2015): This document describes the California Traffic Safety Assessments (TSA) process and provides guidelines for safety evaluators to conduct these assessments. It synthesizes best practices and research on traffic safety applications. This guidebook targets California Communities, but the methods described are applicable for other states. 

• A Technical Guide for Conducting Pedestrian Safety Assessments for California Communities (2013): Pedestrian Safety Assessments (PSAs) are one approach to improving pedestrian safety within California communities, because a PSA enables local agencies to systematically identify the issues and problems and effective remedial options. This document describes the California PSA process and provides guidelines for evaluators to conduct PSAs. While this book is targeted for application within California, the methods described are applicable outside California. Users of this guidebook outside California should substitute national or locally adopted standards, practices, or references as needed. 

• A Technical Guide for Conducting Bicycle Safety Assessments for California Communities (2014): Improving bicycle safety has become increasingly important to California communities, yet remains a challenge for many agencies to accomplish. A Bicycle Safety Assessment (BSA) helps identify safety concerns and offers suggestions for improvement. This document describes the California BSA process and provides guidelines for BSA evaluators to conduct BSAs. It synthesizes current best practices and research on bicycling safety and provides guidelines for bicycling safety applications tailored to meet the needs of local communities in California.

Questions about the CSSA program?

Please contact us at cssa@berkeley.edu if you would like more information about the program or have any questions.

Frequently Asked Questions

Funding for this program is provided by a grant from the California Office of Traffic Safety (OTS), through the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).