Vermont 2007 Five Percent Report

This report is in response to the Federal requirement that each state describe at least 5 percent of its locations currently exhibiting the most severe highway safety needs, in accordance with Sections 148(c)(1)(D) and 148(g)(3)(A), of Title 23, United States Code. Each state's report is to include potential remedies to the hazardous locations identified; estimated costs of the remedies; and impediments to implementation of the remedies other than costs. The reports included on this web site represent a variety of methods utilized and various degrees of road coverage. Therefore, this report cannot be compared with the other reports included on this Web site.

Protection from Discovery and Admission into Evidence—Under 23 U.S.C. 148(g)(4) information collected or compiled for any purpose directly relating to this report shall not be subject to discovery or admitted into evidence in a Federal or State court proceeding or considered for other purposes in any action for damages arising from any occurrence at a location identified or addressed in the reports.

Additional information, including the specific legislative requirements, can be found in the guidance provided by the Federal Highway Administration,
http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/safetealu/fiveguidance.htm.

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Highway Segments Exhibiting the Most Severe Safety Needs in Vermont

Location	Mile Points	Potential Remedies	Estimated Costs	Implementation Impediments	Comments
VT 114, Canaan	5.98 – 6.10 (1.27 miles south of Wallace Rd)	Could possibly update signs.	$3,000	None	Route review to be done September 07 followed by work order for new signs as applicable.
Middle RD, Milton	2.61 - 2.85 (at Hobbs and Bombardier)	Go to all-way stop controlled at the intersection of Middle Rd, Hobbs and Bombardier to eliminate the right angle crashes.	$1,000	None	Work already completed by the Town of Milton.
VT 107, Stockbridge	6.52 - 6.69 (2.2 miles south of Crossroad Rd)	Improve the delineation of the curve.	$1,000	None	Work already completed.
VT 114, Lyndon	2.08 – 2.18 (1/3 miles south of TH 40)	Widen the narrow bridge to eliminate sideswipe and head-on crashes on the bridge.	$2,160,613	None	Project BRS 0269(8)S to widen the structure, from about 20’ to 30.5’ curb to curb, was completed in Fall 2006.
VT 17, New Haven	6.27 – 6.49 (includes East St and Sawyer Rd)	1) Relocate East St to improve the sight distance to eliminate rear-end crashes 2) Shaving off the crest at the intersection of VT 17 and Sawyer St to eliminate rear-end and right angle crashes.	$,300,000	Possible difficulty of obtaining the ROW for the realignment of East St.	Design work to be pursued in FFY08.
VT 67, Shaftsbury	0.39 – 0.62 (at  Harrington Rd)	Curve is well signed. Off-road or head-on crashes on icy/snowy surface. 1) Upgrade signs to Fluorescent Yellow and add a large arrow WB. 2) Install Cargill SafeLane, an anti-icing overlay system between mm 0.64 and 0.52	Cargill, $55,000 Signs, $2000	Cargill, pending the Category II evaluation being conducted by VTrans.	Work Order for upgraded signs to be issued fall 07.
VT 15, Underhill	3.28 – 3.53 (beginning at Gert’s Knob Rd and going EB)	None			Mostly straight. No crash patterns identified.
VT 105, Sheldon	3.00 - 3.18 (beginning at Congress Hall Rd and going EB)	None			No crash patterns identified. Speed limit was reduced to 40 mph from 50 mph in 2005.
I-91, Fairlee	94.05 -94.35	None. Losses of control after passing, NB; Unrelated road surface SB off road crashes.			I-91 NB paved Fall 2005. Rumble strips exists in both directions.
Malletts Bay AVE., Winooski City	0.16 - 0.40 (Union St to Elm St)	1) Improve the tight radius at the intersection with Elm St. 2) Improve the Pedestrian Signal at Union Street. Repave the intersection and install crosswalks on all approaches using durable markings. Replace all ped lenses with LEDs and consider replacing the pedestals with new equipment.	$50,000	Under the Jurisdiction of the City of Winooski.	At Union St., an exclusive pedestrian phase currently exists. The pedestrian faces could be more conspicuous. There is no crosswalk on the south approach.

Date of Report:

August 31, 2007

Data Analysis Period:

2003 to 2005

Contact Person:

Mario Dupigny-Giroux
Traffic Safety Engineer
Traffic Operations
Vermont Agency of Transportation
1 National Life Building, Drawer 33
Montpelier, VT 05633
Phone: 802 828-0169
Email: mario.dupigny-giroux@state.vt.us

Extent of Public Road Coverage:

All Roads

Methodology:

In Vermont, crash reports are filed with the Department of Motor Vehicles by law enforcement agencies and are entered in the Accident Reporting System (ARS) database of the Vermont Agency of Transportation.

A separate list of major crashes (i.e., fatal and incapacitating injury crashes) for the period 2003-2005 for both federal aid and non-federal aid roads using the standard reports in the ARS system was generated.

Overall, there are about between 400 to 500 major crashes per year or about 1,500 major crashes for the three-year period. For the non-federal aid system, there are around a 100 major crashes per year.

It is assumed, based on the assumption that all major crashes have been reported and a report had been filed, that all public roads are being covered in this analysis.

For each road on the federal aid system, clusters of 2 or more crashes within a 0.3 mile segment using the mile marker system were manually identified. For non-federal aid system, clusters of 2 or more crashes were also identified. However, mile markers are not available for most town highways. There exists, however, a field in ARS that contains a description of the location in the form of a street address, an intersecting street or a landmark. This field was used to make the clusters. GIS was also used to see how close some locations were to each other.

Using these two approaches, 123 locations having 2 or more major crashes were identified. Taking the minimum 5% reporting requirement translates into a minimum of six locations to be analyzed and reported on. To identify these six locations, the first cut off used was "at least 3 major crashes". Then, these locations were further ranked according to their major crash rate per million vehicle miles traveled.

Note: While this methodology conforms to the FHWA guidelines for determining "most sever needs", Vermont's low incidence of major crashes makes it impossible to make statistically valid selections. The six locations identified may not be considered high priority safety concerns by local officials.