Search Results (4)

Safety Service Patrols (SSPs) are highway assistance programs that provide rapid response to crashes, disabled vehicles, and other incidents, helping to reduce congestion and improve roadway safety. Effective SSP coverage planning is important because timely deployment can facilitate quicker incident clearance and reduce the potential for secondary crashes. However, current SSP operations often rely on fixed patrol routes, which may not fully reflect where crash concentrations vary across time, weather, lighting, and roadway surface conditions. This study develops a data-driven framework to identify candidate priority SSP routes using historical crash records. Major interstate corridors in New Jersey, US, within the SSP coverage area were divided into uniform 1-mile roadway segments, and crashes were matched to segments using spatial proximity, roadway name, road system classification, and travel direction. Segment-level crash frequencies were then evaluated under 1152 scenario combinations defined by time of day, day of week, season, surface condition, weather condition, and lighting condition. Each corridor was represented as a directed graph, and feasible direction-specific routes were ranked based on cumulative crash frequency. The results show that crash concentration is spatially clustered, direction-dependent, and sensitive to operational conditions. Some candidate routes remained stable across scenarios, while others shifted with changes in weather, lighting, surface condition, and temporal period. Validation of the proposed route identification framework using recent crash data produced route overlap scores (ROS) of approximately 74 to 95 percent, indicating that many historically identified high-crash routes remained spatially consistent in the validation period. The framework provides a practical planning tool for SSP route reassessment, shift-level planning, and scenario-based patrol prioritization within existing service areas. Full article

On heavily traveled highway corridors, traffic congestion, lane merges, toll facilities, and complex interchanges frequently trigger sudden and aggressive deceleration, commonly referred to as harsh braking (HB). Such maneuvers reflect near-miss driving conditions that may precede crashes. Traditional traffic safety analyses rely primarily on historical crash records, a reactive approach that limits agencies’ ability to identify and address emerging risks in a timely manner. Because HB events are continuously captured by connected-vehicle telematics, they provide an opportunity to evaluate roadway safety risk more proactively. This study investigates the applicability of harsh braking events as a surrogate indicator of crash risk on New Jersey interstate highways. The analysis uses more than 8.5 million connected-vehicle telemetry records from Drivewyze and approximately 45,000 police-reported crashes collected between July and December 2024. HB events were identified using a deceleration threshold of 6 ft/s² (approximately 0.2 g) and spatially matched to one-mile highway segments along with crash data. Spatial analysis shows that both HB events and crashes are highly concentrated along major corridors, including I-95, I-80, I-78, and I-287, with notable clustering near toll plazas and complex interchange areas. Temporal patterns indicate that harsh braking activity increases substantially during late fall, likely reflecting seasonal congestion and adverse weather conditions. To quantify the relationship between HB events and crash frequency, Negative Binomial (NB) and Zero-Inflated Negative Binomial (ZINB) regression models were estimated at the segment level. Results reveal a positive and statistically significant association between HB events and crash counts. In the preferred ZINB model, each additional HB event is associated with approximately a one percent increase in expected crash frequency. While the effect of individual events is small, repeated harsh braking activity corresponds to a meaningful increase in crash risk; for example, an increase of 10 HB events corresponds to an expected crash frequency of about 10% higher. Overall, the findings suggest that connected-vehicle HB data can complement traditional crash records by providing early indications of elevated risk. Incorporating HB monitoring into highway safety programs may support proactive identification of hazardous locations and more timely deployment of targeted countermeasures. Full article

Historic linear corridors in living-heritage settings concentrate identity, everyday mobility, and visitor experience. Balancing authenticity, adaptability, and publicness therefore benefits from evidence that jointly characterizes long-term physical change, network accessibility, and eye-level interface conditions. Existing assessments often focus on façades or single time slices, leaving limited evidence that relates decades of built-fabric reconfiguration (changes in building footprints, street edges, and open-space fragmentation) to multi-scale accessibility and pedestrian-facing qualities. We propose an integrated and interpretable workflow for the Beishan Street corridor in the West Lake World Heritage core (Hangzhou) over 1929–2024. Scale-sensitive morphological metrics, multi-radius network measures (integration and centrality), and street-view semantic segmentation are aligned at corridor-segment resolution and examined together with segment-level functional intensity derived from POIs using transparent linear models. The results indicate a long-term shift from a lakeshore-led to a road-led spatial logic, followed by post-2000 stabilization near saturation. Average integration increases, while the high-integration tail becomes thinner. In connector-removal scenarios, the eastern segment shows a relative accessibility decline, and a central hinge node emerges as a vulnerability hotspot (bottleneck) where through-movement concentrates. Eye-level profiles differ by segment: the west exhibits maximal canopy and lower sky visibility, the center shows stronger continuous walls around compounds with intermittent forecourt openings, and the east is characterized by compact residential heritage frontage with low vegetation. Segment-level associations suggest that address and wayfinding density tends to co-occur with clearer frontages, wider sky cones, and stronger tree cover. Transportation-related and access/passage facilities tend to co-occur with higher ground-plane legibility, measured as wider and more continuous road and sidewalk surfaces. Medical and government clusters tend to co-occur with lower sky openness. Recommended actions include the following: (1) mesh-aware protection of key connectors and the hinge, (2) segment-specific targets for façade share and ground cues with planned punctuations, (3) tailored interface standards for institutional clusters, (4) scalable address and wayfinding systems, and (5) event staging that preserves effective roadway and sidewalk capacity. Full article

The study has developed an online geospatial database for assessing the complexity of roadway heritage, overcoming the limitations of traditional heritage catalogues and databases: the itemization of heritage assets and the rigidity of the database structure. Reflecting the current openness in the field of heritage studies, the research proposes an interdisciplinary approach that reframes heritage databases, both conceptually and technologically. Territorial scale is key for heritage interpretation, the complex characteristics of each type of heritage, and social appropriation. The system is based on an open-source content-management system and framework called ProcessWire, allowing flexibility in the definition of data fields and serving as an internal working tool for research collaboration. Accessibility, flexibility, and ease of use do not preclude rigor: the database works in conjunction with a GIS (Geographic Information System) support system and is complemented by a bibliographical archive. A hierarchical multiscalar heritage characterization has been implemented in order to include the different territorial scales and to facilitate the creation of itineraries. Having attained the main goals of conceptual heritage coherence, accessibility, and rigor, the database should strive for broader capacity to integrate GIS information and stimulate public participation, a step toward controlled crowdsourcing and collaborative heritage characterization. Full article