Injury Exposure

Low Income Childhood Pedestrian Injury: Understanding the Disparate Risk

Johnson, Emily S.
Geyer, Judy A.
Rai, Nirmeet
Ragland, David R.
2004

A leading cause of death and injury to children is being struck by a motor vehicle. A disproportionate number of injured child pedestrians are of low socioeconomic status. The relationship between socioeconomic status and pedestrian injury is poorly understood. The existing literature is limited by the lack of pedestrian exposure data, a common measure of risk, and a clear conceptual framework for the interaction between socioeconomic status and pedestrian injury. Another issue is the limited availability of injury data. This paper proposes a model for understanding child pedestrian...

Evaluation of the California Child Passenger Safety Initiative

Cooper, Jill F.
MacLeod, Kara E.
Ragland, David R.
2004

Motor vehicle injuries are a leading cause of injury and fatality to children. Child restraint systems can reduce injury, and their use has been a long-time focus of policy and programmatic work. During this time, there has been a marked increase in the number of children restrained in vehicles and a steady decline in vehicle-related injuries and fatalities to children. However, data reveal that children of color, compared to white children, are at greater risk of injury in motor vehicle crashes. To address needs of “the children left behind” from safety advances, the California Child...

Space Syntax: An Innovative Pedestrian Volume Modeling Tool for Pedestrian Safety

Raford, Noah
Ragland, David R.
2003

This paper describes an innovative pedestrian modeling technique known as Space Syntax, which was used to create estimates of pedestrian volumes for the city of Oakland, California. These estimates were used to calculate pedestrian exposure rates and to create a Relative Risk Index for the city’s first pedestrian master plan. A major challenge facing planners, transportation engineers, and pedestrian-safety advocates is the lack of detailed and high quality pedestrianexposure data. Exposure is defined as the rate of contact with a potentially harmful agent or event. Pedestrian exposure is...

Pre-Intervention Assessment: UC Davis Medical Center and California Health Care Safety Net Institute Child Passenger Safety Initiative

Cooper, Jill F.
Ragland, David R.
MacLeod, Kara E.
Jameson, Wendy
2002

Proper use of child passenger safety (CPS) systems is highly effective in reducing injury and fatality in traffic crashes. While use of CPS systems is increasing, use is not universal, and there is a high level of improper use. The Child Passenger Safety Initiative is an innovative program to provide education and training in proper CPS system use to adults with children attending public hospitals and clinics. The initiative will provide education and resources to these adults. A preintervention baseline study with a sample of adults and children at four participating hospitals and clinics...

Driver/Pedestrian Understanding and Behavior at Marked and Unmarked Crosswalks

Mitman, Meghan F.
Ragland, David R.
2008

Pedestrian injuries at crosswalk locations represent a significant problem. In 2002, 22.7 percent of US pedestrians involved in collisions were in a crosswalk at the time of the collision, and over 96% of these occurred at an intersection. Almost all crosswalk collisions resulted in pedestrian injury or fatality (98.6 percent), and about one-third resulted in severe or fatal injury (National Automotive Sampling System (NASS) and General Estimates System (GES) 2002). As the owner of the California State Highway System, Caltrans is responsible for providing access to safe and...

Evaluation of Traffic and Environment Effects on Skid Resistance and Safety Performance of Rubberized Open-grade Asphalt Concrete

Oh, Soon Mi
Ragland, David R.
Chan, Ching-Yao
2010

Wet pavement-related collisions represent a significant traffic safety concern, due in part to the lack of adequate friction between tire and pavement, known as skid resistance. State agencies employ a skid number (SN) system, based on a standard test procedure in which a locked wheel is towed at 40 mph and the skid number (SN40) is calculated from the measured resistance. SN40 is used as a reference value for speeds both greater than and less than 40 mph. For most Departments of Transportation (DOTs) in the nation, excluding California, pavements for which the SN40 is below 30 are deemed...

Roadway and Infrastructure Design and Its Relation to Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety: Basic Principles, Applications, and Benefits

Ragland, David R.
Grembek, Offer
Orrick, Phyllis
Felschundneff, Grace
2012

Road deaths are forecast to double by 2020, with the burden falling most heavily on low- and middle-income countries and, within those countries, on the most vulnerable and poorest road users. Half of the 1.2 million people killed and 50 million injured in road crashes each year are pedestrians, motorcyclists, bicyclists, and users of unsafe public transport; and more than 90 percent are from low- and middle-income countries. Because these are the areas where rapid motorization is taking place, the issue of safety in increasingly multi-modal environments is now of critical importance...

Estimating Pedestrian Accident Exposure: Protocol Report

Greene-Roesel, Ryan
Diogenes, Mara Chagas
Ragland, David R.
2007

Walking is a healthful, environmentally benign form of travel, and is the most basic form of human mobility. Walking trips account for more than 8 percent of all trips taken in California, making walking the second most commonly used mode of travel after the personal automobile (Caltrans, 2002). In addition, many trips made by vehicle or public transit begin and end with walking.

In spite of the importance and benefits of walking, pedestrians suffer a disproportionate share of the harm of traffic incidents in California. As noted above...

Integration of Light Rail Transit into City Streets

Korve, Hans W.
Farran, Jose I.
Mansel, Douglas M.
Levinson, Herbert S.
Chira-Chavala, T.
Ragland, David R.
1996

This report addresses the safety and operating experience of light rail transit (LRT) systems operating in shared (on-street or mall) rights-of-way at speeds that do not exceed 35 mph. It is based on agency interviews, field observations, and accident analyses of 10 LRT systems in the United States and Canada. These systems—in Baltimore, Boston, Buffalo, Calgary, Los Angeles, Portland, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, and San Jose—provide a broad range of current LRT operating practices and problems.

The report provides information to facilitate the safe, orderly, and...

Relative Vulnerability Matrix for Evaluating Multimodal Traffic Safety

Grembek, Offer
2015

The multimodal transportation network includes a mix of inherently different modes. In addition to differences in price, range, and comfort of travel, these modes differ in mass and velocity, which correspond to different orders of magnitude in the kinetic energy carried. This discrepancy in kinetic energy affects both the level of protection of each mode, and the level of damage it can inflict on users of other modes. Unfortunately, accounting for both sides of a crash is often overlooked. While the quantities and variables of collected data continue to increase, the analyses conducted...