Identification and Analysis of High Crash Segments on Interstate, US, and State Highway Systems of Arkansas

This project report identifies the high crash locations on the Interstate, US, and State highway systems in the state of Arkansas. There are eight Interstate, nineteen US, and two hundred and thirty-nine State highways in Arkansas and all were considered in identifying the high crash locations. Based on a literature review three methods were selected for the identification and ranking of high crash locations: Empirical Bayes', Crash Rate, and Equivalent Property Damage Only. Three years of crash data, 2004 to 2006, were analyzed. The highway segments were ranked using the modified sum-of-the-rank method. This report identifies highway segments with high frequency and severity of crashes. It was observed that most of the crashes were on undivided sections of the highways on US and State highway networks. The frequency of crashes was higher when highways pass through the vicinity of major cities pointing to heavy vehicular movement as one of the reasons for higher frequency of crashes. The high crash locations have higher annual average daily traffic (AADT) but it is not always the case that higher AADTs lead to higher frequency of crashes. It is can be stated that AADT is not the only factor which can be related to high crash locations. A future report will identify the causes of crashes and propose remedial measures to minimize the number of fatalities and severity of crashes as well as propose measures to reduce the frequency of crashes.