Analysis of Temporal Stability of Contributing Factors to Truck-Involved Crashes at Work Zones in South Carolina

Abstract

This study examines factors that contributed to truck-involved work zone crash injury in South Carolina, a state which experienced a rise in the number of injury crashes from 2014 to 2018. The outcome of interest is injury or property damage only (PDO) crashes. A binary logit model is developed using South Carolina statewide work zone crash data from 2014 to 2018. It considers various factors, including vehicle, crash, roadway, environment, day and time, and driver-related characteristics. Of particular interest to this study is the temporal stability of the contributing factors from year to year so that a long-term mitigating strategy can be developed. To this end, the test for parameter transferability is used, and it confirms that separate models should be used for each year, except for 2014. The only factor found to be temporally stable across all years (i.e., statistically significant in 2015–2018 models) is airbag deployment. Given that nearly all the factors are temporally unstable, an importance measure is introduced to enable transportation agencies to rank factors and develop countermeasures that target persistent contributing factors. Based on the importance measure, the top three ranked factors that contributed to work zone truck-involved crash injury in South Carolina from 2015 to 2018 are: (i) airbags deployed, (ii) tie between rear-end crashes and crashes on primary roadways, and (iii) crashes in dark conditions.

Analysis of Injury Severity of Work Zone Truck-Involved Crashes in South Carolina for Interstates and Non-Interstates

“…Moreover, work-zone-related collisions resulted in an annual average of 13 people killed and 25 seriously injured from 2014 to 2019. The number of truck-involved collisions in work zones is significant, as shown in Figure 1b [3]. It increased from 189 in 2014 to 666 in 2019 (a 252.4% increase), with the peak occurring in 2018.…”

“…A similar trend is observed in the state of South Carolina. The number of work zone collisions increased from 1375 in 2014 to 2896 in 2019 (a 110.6% increase) with the highest occurring in 2018, as shown in Figure 1a [3]. Moreover, work-zone-related collisions resulted in an annual average of 13 people killed and 25 seriously injured from 2014 to 2019.…”