Abstract
Intersections present a big safety problem in traffic since there has been an increased risk of crashes because of conflicts in the flows intersecting. A great number of studies done in the world show that roundabouts are safer than conventional intersections since it has been recorded that after the conversion to roundabouts the number of crashes has been decreasing. The research on applying Empirical Bayes (EB) method has been conducted by using 15 two-lane intersections in the city of Niš (Serbia), which have been converted into large compact two-lane roundabouts during the period of 2005-2013. The results show that the conversion of conventional intersections into roundabouts has positive effect on reducing the number of crashes. For all intersections, the reduction of crashes is estimated at around 76% for all crashes, i.e. 80% for the crashes with injuries. For different groups of intersections the effects are determined separately.
Highlights
Intersections safety is a serious safety concern worldwide [1]
When comparing results of this research with the results of previous studies done in the world which used Empirical Bayes (EB) method, it can be concluded that the reduction of crashes with injured shown in this paper is in accordance with several studies shown in [4] and [12], and it is closest to those obtained in France and in the USA
The aim was not just to show the overall results in safety effectiveness of converting intersections in to roundabouts, and to show the effects that conversion of different type of intersections into roundabouts has on traffic safety
Summary
Intersections safety is a serious safety concern worldwide [1]. Serbia is in a similar predicament, where 7,050 crashes happened at intersections in urban areas, and where there were 54 fatalities, and 4,024 slightly or severely injured in 2012 [2]. There is a general consensus that roundabouts are safer than conventional intersections, so in many countries it is common practice to build different types of roundabouts. In countries where roundabouts were not typically built in the past (like in Serbia), these types of intersections are becoming increasingly popular [3,4,5,6,7,8]. After the adoption of new laws in the field of traffic infrastructure in 2005, in Serbia many conventional intersections were converted into roundabouts. There are no precise data how many conventional intersections have been converted into roundabouts in Serbia, but their number is constantly increasing [2]. There are no precise data as to how much safer roundabouts are in Serbia in comparison to conventional ones
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