STATUS REPORT ON APPLICATIONS OF ROAD SAFETY AUDITS IN THE UNITED STATES

Road safety audits are a proactive approach to improving transportation safety. With an estimated one million fatalities resulting from motor vehicle crashes each year, the road safety audit (RSA) concept is a new and powerful tool for addressing safety deficiencies. Initiated in Great Britain in the 1980s, the RSA concept has proven to be highly effective in identifying and reducing the crash potential in the planning and design of roadway projects. The road safety audit, when used for applications on existing roads, is more appropriately termed a road safety audit review (RSAR). This paper presents an overview of the concepts of road safety audits and road safety audit reviews. The current status of state and local efforts to incorporate RSAs and RSARs into their existing safety programs is discussed.