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District Variations in Road Curvature in England and Wales and their Association with Road-Traffic Crashes

Author

Listed:
  • Robin Haynes
  • Andrew Jones
  • Victoria Kennedy
  • Ian Harvey

    (School of Medicine, Health Policy and Practice, University of East Anglia, Norwich NR4 7TJ, England)

  • Tony Jewell

    (Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire Strategic Health Authority, Victoria House, Capital Park, Fulbourn CB1 5XB, England)

Abstract

Bends in roads are known to cause road-traffic crashes, but do areas with many road bends have more collisions than areas with straighter roads? A geographical information system was used to generate indicators of average road curvature from a road-network dataset of England and Wales at the local-authority district level. The indicators were the number of bends per kilometre, the ratio of road distance to straight distance, the proportion of road lengths that were straight, the cumulative angle turned per kilometre and the mean angle of each bend. Generally the five measures were associated. Road curvature was highest on minor roads and least on major roads, and metropolitan districts had straighter road networks than nonmetropolitan districts. Counts of the number of road-traffic crashes resulting in fatalities, serious injuries, and slight injuries in each district were obtained from police ‘Stats 19’ records. The association between each of the curvature measures and the number of fatal, serious, and slight collisions in each district was determined by negative binomial regression analysis. Collision numbers were negatively related to road curvature after adjusting for other risk factors, so districts with straighter roads had more crashes. The cumulative angle was the curvature measure most strongly related to fatal road crashes. An increase of 1° per km was associated with approximately a 0.5% reduction in crashes, enough to explain more than a two fold difference in collision rates over the range of the data. Separate analysis of crashes on major roads, ‘B’ class roads, and minor roads confirmed the conclusion. Although individual road bends may be hazardous, these results suggest that road curvature at the district scale is protective.

Suggested Citation

  • Robin Haynes & Andrew Jones & Victoria Kennedy & Ian Harvey & Tony Jewell, 2007. "District Variations in Road Curvature in England and Wales and their Association with Road-Traffic Crashes," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 39(5), pages 1222-1237, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envira:v:39:y:2007:i:5:p:1222-1237
    DOI: 10.1068/a38106
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Daniel J. Graham & Stephen Glaister, 2003. "Spatial Variation in Road Pedestrian Casualties: The Role of Urban Scale, Density and Land-use Mix," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 40(8), pages 1591-1607, July.
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    Cited by:

    1. Alfredo Marvão Pereira & Rui Marvão Pereira & João Pereira dos Santos, 2017. "For Whom the Bell Tolls: Road Safety Effects of Tolls on Uncongested SCUT Highways in Portugal," GEE Papers 0074, Gabinete de Estratégia e Estudos, Ministério da Economia, revised Jul 2017.
    2. Zhang, Yuanyuan & Bigham, John & Ragland, David & Chen, Xiaohong, 2015. "Investigating the associations between road network structure and non-motorist accidents," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 34-47.
    3. Wang, Chao & Quddus, Mohammed & Ison, Stephen, 2009. "The effects of area-wide road speed and curvature on traffic casualties in England," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 385-395.
    4. Huang, Helai & Song, Bo & Xu, Pengpeng & Zeng, Qiang & Lee, Jaeyoung & Abdel-Aty, Mohamed, 2016. "Macro and micro models for zonal crash prediction with application in hot zones identification," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 248-256.

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