Factors Associated with Motorcylists' Safety at Access Points along Primary Roads in Malaysia
Author
Summary, in English
More than 50% of road accident fatality victims in Malaysia are motorcyclists, numbering more than
4,000 fatalities per year. The aim of this thesis is to investigate motorcyclists’ road safety problems in
general in Malaysia, and narrow down the focus to the most salient road infrastructure related risk factors.
After identifying access points on primary roads as hazardous sites, observations of road user behavior at
these sites have been carried out in order to establish behavioral and design factors associated with a
hazardous outcome of interaction between motorcyclists and other road users. The data collected for this
thesis ranges from accident records to on-site observational data including speed and behavior. The
method ranges from cross-sectional analysis of accident data to advanced statistical modeling. The thesis
finds that Malaysian road accident statistics suffer from disproportional underreporting of severe injuries.
A motorcycle Safety Performance Function estimates that an increase in motorcycle fatal accidents per
kilometer is highly associated with an increase of access points per kilometer and the average traffic
volume of motorcycles. The observational study has detected a hazardous right turning movement, i.e. the
Opposite Indirect Right Turn, which is performed by 18% to 26% of right turning motorcyclists entering
a primary road from an access point. Moreover, motorcyclists entering the primary road are involved in
serious traffic conflicts to the same extent as other vehicles. The advanced statistical analysis shows that
the outcome for motorcyclists involved in a serious traffic conflict is influenced by their manner of entry
into the primary road from the access point, their stopping behavior and the lane width of the primary
road. Overall, this thesis shows the importance of identifying motorcyclists’ behavior, as well as road
environment attributes, in order to understand the road safety situation of motorcyclists.
4,000 fatalities per year. The aim of this thesis is to investigate motorcyclists’ road safety problems in
general in Malaysia, and narrow down the focus to the most salient road infrastructure related risk factors.
After identifying access points on primary roads as hazardous sites, observations of road user behavior at
these sites have been carried out in order to establish behavioral and design factors associated with a
hazardous outcome of interaction between motorcyclists and other road users. The data collected for this
thesis ranges from accident records to on-site observational data including speed and behavior. The
method ranges from cross-sectional analysis of accident data to advanced statistical modeling. The thesis
finds that Malaysian road accident statistics suffer from disproportional underreporting of severe injuries.
A motorcycle Safety Performance Function estimates that an increase in motorcycle fatal accidents per
kilometer is highly associated with an increase of access points per kilometer and the average traffic
volume of motorcycles. The observational study has detected a hazardous right turning movement, i.e. the
Opposite Indirect Right Turn, which is performed by 18% to 26% of right turning motorcyclists entering
a primary road from an access point. Moreover, motorcyclists entering the primary road are involved in
serious traffic conflicts to the same extent as other vehicles. The advanced statistical analysis shows that
the outcome for motorcyclists involved in a serious traffic conflict is influenced by their manner of entry
into the primary road from the access point, their stopping behavior and the lane width of the primary
road. Overall, this thesis shows the importance of identifying motorcyclists’ behavior, as well as road
environment attributes, in order to understand the road safety situation of motorcyclists.
Department/s
Publishing year
2014
Language
English
Publication/Series
Bulletin
Volume
290
Full text
Document type
Dissertation
Publisher
Lund University
Topic
- Infrastructure Engineering
Keywords
- access point
- primary road
- motorcyclists’ behavior
- Safety Performance function
- Motorcycle accident fatality
Status
Published
Supervisor
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 1653-1930
Defence date
22 May 2014
Defence time
10:00
Defence place
In auditorium E:1406, E-building, John Ericssons väg 1, Lund University Faculty of Engineering
Opponent
- Stijn Daniels