SHRP 2 Safety Brief: December 2008

Safety research in SHRP 2 will apply advanced technologies to understand how drivers interact with and adapt to a variety of factors—the vehicle, the traffic, the roadway characteristics, traffic control devices, and the environment—and to assess the changes in collision risk associated with each factor. Continuous collection of a vast array of data from approximately 4,000 volunteer drivers located in multiple sites throughout the United States over a two-year period will support a study of the entire driving process, including near-collisions, critical incidents, traffic conflicts,and event-free driving. One goal is to develop surrogate risk estimates for specific traffic maneuvers. With design phases of this naturalistic study of driving behavior nearly complete,study site selection and data collection preparations are the current focus of the Safety program.