Before and After Safety Evaluation of California’s and San Diego's Active Transportation Projects

Details

• Creators:
  Appleyard, Bruce S. ; Honey, Megan ; Ahangarfabrik, Nell ; Carbajal, Mario ; Cooksy, Wesley ; Crist, Katie ; Swayne, Madison
• Corporate Creators:
  Center for Pedestrian and Bicyclist Safety (CPBS) Tier-1 University Transportation Center (UTC) ; San Diego State University
• Corporate Contributors:
  United States. Department of Transportation. University Transportation Centers (UTC) Program ; United States. Department of Transportation. Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  Before And After Studies Bicycle Counts Bikeways Nonmotorized Transportation Safety Transportation Safety
• Publication/ Report Number:
  23SDSU02
• DOI:
  https://doi.org/10.21949/8xkc-vm31
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  United States;California;San Diego (California)
• Edition:
  Final Report (June 2023-May 2024)
• Corporate Publisher:
  Center for Pedestrian and Bicyclist Safety (CPBS) Tier-1 University Transportation Center (UTC)
• Abstract:
  Some regions have invested heavily in pedestrian and bike improvements, including sidewalks, protected cycle tracks, bike lanes and other infrastructure improvements to enhance the user experience and promote safety, yet many lack comprehensive research on both usage and safety associated with such investments, limiting our understanding of their effectiveness and impact of these improvements. Quasi-experimental longitudinal studies using pre/post data surrounding new project implementation are particularly lacking, often confounded by the lack of proper control sites, adequate data, and controlling for counts of exposure. While the implementation of such projects has received widespread support, there is a need to critically examine their benefits, including bike and pedestrian trips, safety, and the reduction of collision rates throughout the San Diego region. This project employed longitudinal analyses of bicycle counts and crashes around recently built bicycle projects in San Diego finding, for the most part, that the projects likely led to increased bicycle ridership. We then turned to conducting an analysis on how the projects affected safety outcomes through an exploration of different methods and approaches. We found that understanding the safety benefits of bicycle projects is a more complex undertaking. Future research could build on this study by applying control groups to more of the study sites, monitoring the post-construction safety conditions over a longer period of time, and introducing additional variables into the analysis, including before and after traffic volumes and speed limits. Nevertheless, considering all the current limitations of our study, our findings suggest that overall, bicycle projects encourage riding and likely improve safety and street livability.
• Format:
  PDF
• Funding:
  69A3552348336
• Collection(s):
  University Transportation Centers
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:182c1a18acbd3a0ce318d64349f29fe2bb207a0d9a32bda8186441020333bc0db89c744fa011063e277ed719282cb357e5f08115a622911e7d71d07066f5f695
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/86233/dot_86233_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 1.29 MB ]