IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v12y2020i19p7976-d420042.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Investigation of the Relationship between Rainfall and Fatal Crashes in Texas, 1994–2018

Author

Listed:
  • Zhongyu Han

    (Civil and Environment Engineering, University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX 78249, USA)

  • Hatim O. Sharif

    (Civil and Environment Engineering, University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX 78249, USA)

Abstract

Understanding how crash factors are impacted by rain is critical to road safety planning and management. This study assesses the impact of rain on traffic safety by conducting an analysis of the fatal crashes related to rain in Texas from 1994 to 2018. The fatal crash data was gathered from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) database maintained by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Environmental variables used in the analysis include month of the year, time of the day, temperature, and weather condition. The roadway-related factors identified include the posted speed limit, the number of lanes, route sign, and Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT). The driver-related factors identified include age, gender, and the number of licensed drivers in total. Relative risk analysis was performed to statistically quantify the impact of rainy conditions at the hourly and monthly time scales. On average, rain-related fatal crashes represented about 6.8% of the total fatal crashes. However, the proportion shows higher variability at the annual, monthly, and hourly time scales and seems to be influenced by other factors such as the age and gender of the driver, type of the road, and posted roadway speed limit. Total and rain-related crashes show statistically significant decreasing trends when normalized by the total number of licensed drivers or vehicle miles travelled. The relative risk of a fatal crash during rainy conditions was always greater than 1.0 at hourly, monthly, and annual time scales. However, it shows significant variability at the monthly (1.07 to 2.78) and hourly scales (1.35 to 2.57). The relative risk is higher in less urbanized and drier counties, in general. Gender and age analysis reveals that male and young drivers are more likely to be involved in a fatal crash but less likely to be killed in the crash.

Suggested Citation

  • Zhongyu Han & Hatim O. Sharif, 2020. "Investigation of the Relationship between Rainfall and Fatal Crashes in Texas, 1994–2018," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(19), pages 1-19, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:19:p:7976-:d:420042
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/19/7976/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/19/7976/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rajagopal, 2014. "The Human Factors," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Architecting Enterprise, chapter 9, pages 225-249, Palgrave Macmillan.
    2. Andrey, Jean & Hambly, Derrick & Mills, Brian & Afrin, Sadia, 2013. "Insights into driver adaptation to inclement weather in Canada," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 192-203.
    3. Wilson, F.A. & Stimpson, J.P., 2010. "Trends in fatalities from distracted driving in the United States, 1999 to 2008," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 100(11), pages 2213-2219.
    4. Andrey, Jean, 2010. "Long-term trends in weather-related crash risks," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 247-258.
    5. Jean Andrey & Brian Mills & Mike Leahy & Jeff Suggett, 2003. "Weather as a Chronic Hazard for Road Transportation in Canadian Cities," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 28(2), pages 319-343, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Khondoker Billah & Hatim O. Sharif & Samer Dessouky, 2021. "Analysis of Pedestrian–Motor Vehicle Crashes in San Antonio, Texas," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(12), pages 1-23, June.
    2. Min Zhang & Yufu Liu & Wenqi Sun & Yixiong Xiao & Chang Jiang & Yong Wang & Yuqi Bai, 2021. "Impact of Rainfall on Traffic Speed in Major Cities of China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(16), pages 1-17, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Black, Alan W. & Mote, Thomas L., 2015. "Effects of winter precipitation on automobile collisions, injuries, and fatalities in the United States," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 165-175.
    2. Islam, Mazharul & Alharthi, Majed & Alam, Md. Mahmudul, 2018. "The Impacts of Climate Change on Road Traffic Accidents in Saudi Arabia," OSF Preprints 2p5aj, Center for Open Science.
    3. Andrey, Jean & Hambly, Derrick & Mills, Brian & Afrin, Sadia, 2013. "Insights into driver adaptation to inclement weather in Canada," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 192-203.
    4. Angus Eugene Retallack & Bertram Ostendorf, 2020. "Relationship Between Traffic Volume and Accident Frequency at Intersections," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(4), pages 1-22, February.
    5. Daniel Burow & Christopher Atkinson, 2019. "An examination of traffic volume during snow events in northeast Ohio," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 99(2), pages 1179-1189, November.
    6. Ludwig Dumetz & Jean-François Audy & Mikael Rönnqvist & Riadh Azouzi, 2024. "Simulation-based evaluation of road transportation logistics in a dry port with topographic challenges," Journal of Shipping and Trade, Springer, vol. 9(1), pages 1-18, December.
    7. Derrick Hambly & Jean Andrey & Brian Mills & Chris Fletcher, 2013. "Projected implications of climate change for road safety in Greater Vancouver, Canada," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 116(3), pages 613-629, February.
    8. Lesley Strawderman & Daniel W. Carruth & Kathleen Sherman-Morris & Philip Menard & Merrill Warkentin & Karen S. McNeal, 2018. "Individual transportation decisions under conditions of risk and uncertainty," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 92(2), pages 927-942, June.
    9. Hyuk-Jae Roh, 2020. "Modelling chronic winter hazards as a function of precipitation and temperature," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 104(2), pages 1723-1745, November.
    10. David Jaroszweski & Lee Chapman & Judith Petts, 2013. "Climate change and road freight safety: a multidisciplinary exploration," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 120(4), pages 785-799, October.
    11. Sharaf AlKheder & Abdullah AlOmair, 2022. "Urban traffic prediction using metrological data with fuzzy logic, long short-term memory (LSTM), and decision trees (DTs)," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 111(2), pages 1685-1719, March.
    12. Bartosz Bursa & Markus Mailer & Kay W. Axhausen, 2022. "Intra-destination travel behavior of alpine tourists: a literature review on choice determinants and the survey work," Transportation, Springer, vol. 49(5), pages 1465-1516, October.
    13. Rahman, Shaikh Moksadur, 2020. "Relationship between Job Satisfaction and Turnover Intention: Evidence from Bangladesh," Asian Business Review, Asian Business Consortium, vol. 10(2), pages 99-108.
    14. Wang Kai, 2019. "Towards a Taxonomy of Idea Generation Techniques," Foundations of Management, Sciendo, vol. 11(1), pages 65-80, January.
    15. Bridgelall, Raj & Stubbing, Edward, 2021. "Forecasting the effects of autonomous vehicles on land use," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 163(C).
    16. Bevilacqua, Maurizio & Ciarapica, Filippo Emanuele, 2018. "Human factor risk management in the process industry: A case study," Reliability Engineering and System Safety, Elsevier, vol. 169(C), pages 149-159.
    17. Naveena Prakasam & Louisa Huxtable-Thomas, 2021. "Reddit: Affordances as an Enabler for Shifting Loyalties," Information Systems Frontiers, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 723-751, June.
    18. Colin Jerolmack & Alexandra K. Murphy, 2019. "The Ethical Dilemmas and Social Scientific Trade-offs of Masking in Ethnography," Sociological Methods & Research, , vol. 48(4), pages 801-827, November.
    19. Valeriy Makarov & Albert Bakhtizin, 2014. "The Estimation Of The Regions’ Efficiency Of The Russian Federation Including The Intellectual Capital, The Characteristics Of Readiness For Innovation, Level Of Well-Being, And Quality Of Life," Economy of region, Centre for Economic Security, Institute of Economics of Ural Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences, vol. 1(4), pages 9-30.
    20. Zhao, Jing & Knoop, Victor L. & Wang, Meng, 2020. "Two-dimensional vehicular movement modelling at intersections based on optimal control," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 138(C), pages 1-22.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:19:p:7976-:d:420042. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.