Os acidentes com produtos químicos e seus riscos para sociedade, principalmente quando estes são classificados como perigosos para transporte pela ONU, são o objeto deste estudo descritivo da atividade de transporte rodoviário no Estado de São Paulo. Os dados estudados foram as ocorrências registradas pela Setor de Atendimento à Emergências da Companhia Ambiental do Estado de São Paulo (CETESB) em seu Sistema de Informações de Emergência Químicas (SIEQ). Neste foram analisados 2.432 eventos na atividade de transporte rodoviário do início de 2005 ao final do ano de 2015. A metodologia contou com a pesquisa e revisão bibliográfica de normas técnicas e legislações de destaque, materiais impressos e digitais (manuais, guias e Fichas de Informações de Segurança de Produtos Químicos), sistemas de informações sobre produtos químicos e emergências ambientais disponíveis na internet, bem como as dissertações e teses acadêmicas relacionadas ao objeto deste estudo. Como resultado da análise dos dados constatou-se que 59,6% dos acidentes ocorreram nas atividades de transporte, sendo que 53,6 %, no transporte rodoviário. Os produtos de maior ocorrência foram os líquidos inflamáveis (classe 3) com 47,5 %, as substâncias corrosivas (classe 8) com 14,1% e os não classificados como perigosos com 28,3 %. O número de vítimas no período (505) foi alto para este tipo de acidente, correspondendo a 8,7% do total de vítimas das emergências químicas no Estado de São Paulo. Os resultados finais mostraram que apesar da importância fundamental do transporte rodoviário de produtos químicos para a indústria química e a economia do país, há riscos significativos inerentes a essa atividade, os quais não podem ser negligenciados, devem ser conhecidos e divulgados à sociedade, devendo ainda ser alvo de políticas públicas específicas. Para facilitar a divulgação desses riscos junto à população, foram estudados mecanismos de comunicação. O produto final obtido foi uma plataforma digital composta por página no Facebook, aplicativo (celulares e tablets) e blog contendo informações simplificadas e fichas sobre os riscos dos principais produtos químicos envolvidos nestas ocorrências rodoviárias. / Accidents with chemical products and their risks to society, especially when classified as dangerous for transport by the UN, are the object of this descriptive study of road transport activity in the State of São Paulo. The data studied were the occurrences recorded by the Emergency Operations Division of the Environmental Company of the State of São Paulo (CETESB) in the Emergency Chemical Information System (SIEQ). In this system 2,432 events were analyzed on the activity of road transportation from the beginning of 2005 to the end of the year 2015. The methodology included the research and bibliographic reviews of technical standards and prominent legislation, printed and digital materials (manuals, guides and chemical safety data sheets), chemical and environmental emergency data systems available on the internet, as well as dissertations and academic theses related to the object of this study. As a result of these data analysis, it was found that 59.6% occurred in transportation activities, 53.6% in road transport. The most frequent products were flammable liquids (class 3) with 47.5%, corrosive substances (class 8) with 14.1% and those not classified as dangerous with 28.3%. The number of victims in the period (505) was high for this type of accident, corresponding to 8.7% of the total number of chemical emergencies in the State of São Paulo. The final results showed that despite the fundamental importance of road transport of chemical products to the chemical industry and the economy of the country, there are significant risks inherent to this activity, which can\'t be neglected, must be known and disseminated to society, and specific public policies. To facilitate the dissemination of these risks to the population, communication mechanisms were studied. The final product was a digital platform composed of a Facebook page, an application (cell phones and tablets) and a blog containing simplified information and safety data sheets containing the risks of the main chemicals involved in these road events.

The United States averages 40,000 traffic fatalities annually. The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) Roadside Design Guide cites run-off-the-road crashes as contributing greatly to this statistic, with about one-third of all traffic deaths [1]. This number has remained relatively constant over the past four decades, and despite a major increase in vehicle miles traveled (VMT), the rate of fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles traveled has declined. However, this relatively large number of run-off-the-road crashes should remain a major concern in all roadway design. The Highway Safety Act of 1966 marks a defining moment in the history of roadside safety [ ]. Before this point, roadways were only designed for motorists who remained on the roadway, with no regard for driver error. As there was no legislation or guidelines concerning roadside design, roadways constructed prior to 1966 are littered with fixed objects directly off of the edge of pavement. Fortunately, many of these roads have reached their thirty year design lives and have become candidates for improvement. The following report examines roadside crashes on nine Atlanta urban arterial roadways. Accident type, severity, and location for all crashes on these were evaluated. It is found roadside collisions with utility poles and trees were more prone to occur at intersection locations than midblock locations. Also for the studied roadway corridors, on average, roadside collisions were more likely to result in serious injury or fatality. Based on these findings initial recommendations are offer for improving clear zone requirements.

Les enjeux humains liés à l’accidentologie routière et les coûts qu’ils font supporter à la collectivité sont tels qu'ils rendent obligatoire la mise à disposition d'une batterie d'outils la plus complète et complémentaire possible afin de comprendre au mieux la problématique du risque routier. L’enjeu de cette thèse est justement de proposer de nouveaux outils capables de mieux apprécier ce phénomène et, in fine, d'orienter et d'appuyer les décisions des pouvoirs publics en la matière. Ils ont été développés en modélisant successivement le kilométrage parcouru qui formalise l’exposition au risque, les nombres d’accidents corporels, de tués, de blessés ainsi que les taux de gravité associés en privilégiant une longue période d’analyse (janvier 1970-décembre 2013) et une fréquence mensuelle. Ceci en tenant compte, au niveau du panel des variables exogènes testées, de la très forte pluri-dimensionnalité (motifs de déplacement, météorologie, structure du parc automobile et de la population, environnement économique, facteurs comportementaux, etc… ) intrinsèque à cette problématique. En rupture avec les modèles conventionnels du risque routier, les outils proposés par le modèle MIRR sont matérialisés, pour toutes les variables analysées, par des équations économétriques de long terme couplées à des équations de court terme autorisant ainsi deux visions complémentaires liées au risque routier. Ce, au profit d’une meilleure compréhension de cette problématique et d’une perception améliorée des enjeux à venir. / Human and social challenges related to the road safety including the costs for the society, are so important that they require a diversity of complementary analysis tools in order to better understand the road risk problem. The issue of this thesis aimed precisely at offering new tools to assess, in the best possible way, this phenomenon and to ultimately guide and support government decision-making in this field. These tools have been developed by modelling successively the mileage driven which formalizes the risk exposure, the injury accidents, the fatalities, the injuries and the two associated severity rates, using a long period and a monthly frequency. This was made by taking into consideration the multidimensional aspect, regarding the tested exogenous variables (motives for movement, meteorology, structure of the vehicle fleet and of the population, economic environment, behavioural factors, etc..), intrinsic to this issue. Breaking with conventional road accident models, the tools proposed by the MIRR model use, for every analysed variable, long-term econometric equations coupled with short-term ones. These approaches thus allow two complementary views of the road risk for a better understanding of this issue as well as an improved perception of future challenges.

Os acidentes com produtos químicos e seus riscos para sociedade, principalmente quando estes são classificados como perigosos para transporte pela ONU, são o objeto deste estudo descritivo da atividade de transporte rodoviário no Estado de São Paulo. Os dados estudados foram as ocorrências registradas pela Setor de Atendimento à Emergências da Companhia Ambiental do Estado de São Paulo (CETESB) em seu Sistema de Informações de Emergência Químicas (SIEQ). Neste foram analisados 2.432 eventos na atividade de transporte rodoviário do início de 2005 ao final do ano de 2015. A metodologia contou com a pesquisa e revisão bibliográfica de normas técnicas e legislações de destaque, materiais impressos e digitais (manuais, guias e Fichas de Informações de Segurança de Produtos Químicos), sistemas de informações sobre produtos químicos e emergências ambientais disponíveis na internet, bem como as dissertações e teses acadêmicas relacionadas ao objeto deste estudo. Como resultado da análise dos dados constatou-se que 59,6% dos acidentes ocorreram nas atividades de transporte, sendo que 53,6 %, no transporte rodoviário. Os produtos de maior ocorrência foram os líquidos inflamáveis (classe 3) com 47,5 %, as substâncias corrosivas (classe 8) com 14,1% e os não classificados como perigosos com 28,3 %. O número de vítimas no período (505) foi alto para este tipo de acidente, correspondendo a 8,7% do total de vítimas das emergências químicas no Estado de São Paulo. Os resultados finais mostraram que apesar da importância fundamental do transporte rodoviário de produtos químicos para a indústria química e a economia do país, há riscos significativos inerentes a essa atividade, os quais não podem ser negligenciados, devem ser conhecidos e divulgados à sociedade, devendo ainda ser alvo de políticas públicas específicas. Para facilitar a divulgação desses riscos junto à população, foram estudados mecanismos de comunicação. O produto final obtido foi uma plataforma digital composta por página no Facebook, aplicativo (celulares e tablets) e blog contendo informações simplificadas e fichas sobre os riscos dos principais produtos químicos envolvidos nestas ocorrências rodoviárias. / Accidents with chemical products and their risks to society, especially when classified as dangerous for transport by the UN, are the object of this descriptive study of road transport activity in the State of São Paulo. The data studied were the occurrences recorded by the Emergency Operations Division of the Environmental Company of the State of São Paulo (CETESB) in the Emergency Chemical Information System (SIEQ). In this system 2,432 events were analyzed on the activity of road transportation from the beginning of 2005 to the end of the year 2015. The methodology included the research and bibliographic reviews of technical standards and prominent legislation, printed and digital materials (manuals, guides and chemical safety data sheets), chemical and environmental emergency data systems available on the internet, as well as dissertations and academic theses related to the object of this study. As a result of these data analysis, it was found that 59.6% occurred in transportation activities, 53.6% in road transport. The most frequent products were flammable liquids (class 3) with 47.5%, corrosive substances (class 8) with 14.1% and those not classified as dangerous with 28.3%. The number of victims in the period (505) was high for this type of accident, corresponding to 8.7% of the total number of chemical emergencies in the State of São Paulo. The final results showed that despite the fundamental importance of road transport of chemical products to the chemical industry and the economy of the country, there are significant risks inherent to this activity, which can\'t be neglected, must be known and disseminated to society, and specific public policies. To facilitate the dissemination of these risks to the population, communication mechanisms were studied. The final product was a digital platform composed of a Facebook page, an application (cell phones and tablets) and a blog containing simplified information and safety data sheets containing the risks of the main chemicals involved in these road events.

Left-hand drive (LHD) vehicles share higher road accident risks under left-hand traffic because of blind spot areas. Due to low import prices, the number of wrong-hand drive vehicles skyrockets in emerging countries like Georgia, Kyrgyzstan and Russia. I identify the causal effect of wrong-hand drive vehicles on road safety employing a new “backward version” of the synthetic control method. Sweden switched from left-hand to right-hand traffic in 1967. Before 1967, however, almost all Swedish vehicles were LHD for reasons of international trade and Swedish customer demand. I match on accident figures in the period after 1967, when both Sweden and other European countries drove on the right and used LHD vehicles. Results show that right-hand traffic decreased road fatality, injury and accident risk in Sweden by approximately 30 percent. An earlier switch would have saved more than 4,000 lives between 1953 and 1966.

Abstract Master thesis is focused on The Application of Data from Vehicle Electronic Control Units in the Analysis of Road Accidents. The theoretical part deals with the electronic systems of vehicles and their control units, diagnostic processes, retrieving accident data from the controls unit and the need for these data in the analysis of road accidents. The experimental part focuses on obtaining data for crashed vehicles, interpretation of such data and assessment of their usefulness for analyzing road accidents. It also focuses on the procedures and methods on how to retreive accident data.

The previous research available to predict travel speed is wide and has been extensively studied. What currently is missing from the previous work is to estimate the travel speed when different non-recurrent events occur, such as car accidents and road maintenance work. This research implements a machine learning model to predict the average speed on a road segment with and without road accidents. The model would assist in (1) planning the most efficient route which could reduce CO2 emissions and travel time (2) the drivers in traffic could get an estimate of when the traffic will open up again (3) the authorities could take safety measures if drivers are expected to be stuck for too long. In our work, we conducted a review to determine some of the optimal machine learning models to predict on time series data. What we found by comparing GRU (Gated Recurrent Unit) and LSTM (Long Short Term Memory) on travel speed data over a road in Sweden provided by the Swedish Transport Administration, is that there is no major difference in performance between the LSTM and GRU algorithms to predict the average travel speed. We also study the impact of using weather, date and accident related parameters on the model’s predictions. What we found is that we obtained much better results when including the weather data. Furthermore, the inclusion of road events vaguely hints that it could improve performance, but can not be verified due to the low number of road accidents in our dataset.

Both traffic congestion and road accidents impose a burden on society, and it is therefore important for transport policy makers to reduce their impact. An ideal scenario would be that traffic congestion and accidents are reduced simultaneously, however, this may not be possible since it has been speculated that increased traffic congestion may be beneficial in terms of road safety. This is based on the premise that there would be fewer fatal accidents and the accidents that occurred would tend to be less severe due to the low average speed when congestion is present. If this is confirmed then it poses a potential dilemma for transport policy makers: the benefit of reducing congestion might be off-set by more severe accidents. It is therefore important to fully understand the relationship between traffic congestion and road accidents while controlling for other factors affecting road traffic accidents. The relationship between traffic congestion and road accidents appears to be an under researched area. Previous studies often lack a suitable congestion measurement and an appropriate econometric model using real-world data. This thesis aims to explore the relationship between traffic congestion and road accidents by using an econometric and GIS approach. The analysis is based on the data from the M25 motorway and its surrounding major roads for the period 2003-2007. A series of econometric models have been employed to investigate the effect of traffic congestion on both accident frequency (such as classical Negative Binomial and Bayesian spatial models) and accident severity (such as ordered logit and mixed logit models). The Bayesian spatial model and the mixed logit model are the best models estimated for accident frequency and accident severity analyses respectively. The model estimation results suggest that traffic congestion is positively associated with the frequency of fatal and serious injury accidents and negatively (i.e. inversely) associated with the severity of accidents that have occurred. Traffic congestion is found to have little impact on the frequency of slight injury accidents. Other contributing factors have also been controlled for and produced results consistent with previous studies. It is concluded that traffic congestion overall has a negative impact on road safety. This may be partially due to higher speed variance among vehicles within and between lanes and erratic driving behaviour in the presence of congestion. The results indicate that mobility and safety can be improved simultaneously, and therefore there is significant additional benefit of reducing traffic congestion in terms of road safety. Several policy implications have been identified in order to optimise the traffic flow and improve driving behaviour, which would be beneficial to both congestion and accident reduction. This includes: reinforcing electronic warning signs and the Active Traffic Management, enforcing average speed on a stretch of a roadway and introducing minimum speed limits in the UK. This thesis contributes to knowledge in terms of the relationship between traffic congestion and road accidents, showing that mobility and safety can be improved simultaneously. A new hypothesis is proposed that traffic congestion on major roads may increase the occurrence of serious injury accidents. This thesis also proposes a new map-matching technique so as to assign accidents to the correct road segments, and shows how a two-stage modelling process which combines both accident frequency and severity models can be used in site ranking with the objective of identifying hazardous accident hotspots for further safety examination and treatment.

La consommation de cannabis et la conduite sous l’influence du cannabis sont des préoccupations grandissantes dans la société d’aujourd’hui. Le but de la présente étude est d’examiner plus en profondeur la relation entre la fréquence de consommation de cannabis chez les jeunes adultes et la prise de risque sur la route. Les participants (n=48) sont tous des hommes âgés de 18 à 26 ans. Ils ont complété une batterie de questionnaires ainsi qu’une tâche sur simulateur de conduite. Les résultats indiquent que la fréquence de consommation de cannabis est associée positivement avec la prise de risque auto rapportée et suggèrent une tendance positive avec les comportements risqués observés lors de la simulation de conduite en laboratoire. Lorsque les différents groupes de consommateurs sont comparés, ceux qui font un usage quotidien ou multihebdomadaire de cannabis semblent prendre plus de risques au volant que ceux qui consomment une fois semaine et moins ou encore une fois par mois et moins. De plus, il semble que plus les individus consomment fréquemment de la marijuana, plus ils ont tendance à adopter des attitudes permissives en lien avec la conduite sous l’influence de cannabis. Les implications quant à l’intervention sont discutées. / Cannabis use and driving under the influence of cannabis have become a growing concern in today’s society. The aim of the present study was to further examine the relationship between the use frequency of cannabis among young adults and on-road risk taking. Participants (n=48) were all men aged between 18 and 26 years old who were asked to complete questionnaires and to perform in a simulation task. Results indicate that the use frequency of cannabis is positively associated with self-report of risky driving and suggest a trend with observed risk taking behaviour during the simulation. When comparing the different cannabis users, participants who consumed daily or multiple times a week seem to take more risk on the road than those who use cannabis once a week or less and less than monthly. Moreover, it seems that marijuana users who consume more frequently have a tendency of adopting more permissive attitudes toward smoking cannabis and taking the wheel. Implications for interventions are discussed.

La consommation de cannabis et la conduite sous l’influence du cannabis sont des préoccupations grandissantes dans la société d’aujourd’hui. Le but de la présente étude est d’examiner plus en profondeur la relation entre la fréquence de consommation de cannabis chez les jeunes adultes et la prise de risque sur la route. Les participants (n=48) sont tous des hommes âgés de 18 à 26 ans. Ils ont complété une batterie de questionnaires ainsi qu’une tâche sur simulateur de conduite. Les résultats indiquent que la fréquence de consommation de cannabis est associée positivement avec la prise de risque auto rapportée et suggèrent une tendance positive avec les comportements risqués observés lors de la simulation de conduite en laboratoire. Lorsque les différents groupes de consommateurs sont comparés, ceux qui font un usage quotidien ou multihebdomadaire de cannabis semblent prendre plus de risques au volant que ceux qui consomment une fois semaine et moins ou encore une fois par mois et moins. De plus, il semble que plus les individus consomment fréquemment de la marijuana, plus ils ont tendance à adopter des attitudes permissives en lien avec la conduite sous l’influence de cannabis. Les implications quant à l’intervention sont discutées. / Cannabis use and driving under the influence of cannabis have become a growing concern in today’s society. The aim of the present study was to further examine the relationship between the use frequency of cannabis among young adults and on-road risk taking. Participants (n=48) were all men aged between 18 and 26 years old who were asked to complete questionnaires and to perform in a simulation task. Results indicate that the use frequency of cannabis is positively associated with self-report of risky driving and suggest a trend with observed risk taking behaviour during the simulation. When comparing the different cannabis users, participants who consumed daily or multiple times a week seem to take more risk on the road than those who use cannabis once a week or less and less than monthly. Moreover, it seems that marijuana users who consume more frequently have a tendency of adopting more permissive attitudes toward smoking cannabis and taking the wheel. Implications for interventions are discussed.