Development of Risk Assessment Model for Waterway Safety

Abstract

Inland waterways are one of the transportation alternatives available to the congested, highly crash-prone roads in Kerala. Though accidents are less compared to the road sector, several high-profile fatal boat accidents involving passenger boats, barges, and inland fishing boats have occurred recently. The major factors that cause risks to the safety of passengers and vessels are environmental conditions, nature of operations, human error, and lack of safety standards. This paper analyzes the factors involved in the safety of operation of inland waterways in Kerala and attempts to develop a waterway safety assessment model for categorizing the waterways for prioritization. The details of boats and accident data were collected, and a questionnaire survey was conducted at the major active zones of water transport. The different safety-related issues and their consequences were also studied. The analyzed information is used to prepare a waterway risk assessment model. The structure of the risk assessment model includes a linear combination of attributes, similar to a linear-additive value function, where each attribute is multiplied with a weight reflecting the importance of that attribute. After establishing the parameters for each risk-inducing factor, waterway-specific risk value is estimated by putting the risk values for that waterway for each variable into the risk model. This model can be used to categorize each waterway according to the safety and risks involved and thus to prioritize the waterway improvement decisions. Such a model is helpful to decision-makers who otherwise would make comparative judgments about risk informally.KeywordsInland waterwaySafetyRisk assessment model