Authors:
Yonggang Wang; Heng Zhang; Ning Shi;
Abstract:
To understand heavy truck crash severity, a total of 1,818 sample crashes occurring over a six-year period (2011-2016) were recorded on four typical expressway segments in mountainous regions of Jiangxi and
Shaanxi, China. The crashes were investigated using an ordered logit approach to determine the significant variables contributing to truck crash severity. Elasticity analysis was then used to measure the pseudoelasticity of each independent variable. A total of 12 explanatory variables, including less than three years driving
experience of truck driver, type of commercial transport task of the vehicle, brake failure, speeding behavior, overloading condition, steep downhill grade of the road and slippery surface condition, hours between midnight and dawn, winter season, adverse weather, and head-on and rear-end collision types, were found to be statistically significantly correlated with the severity of truck crashes occurring on Jiangxi and Shaanxi mountainous expressways. Only truck drivers older than 55 years of age, presence of tunnel and runoff collision
type were identified to have a significant and positive effect on the severity of truck crashes on Shaanxi expressways. Taken together, these findings provide useful guidance to develop safer design standards, stricter regulations and more efficient technical countermeasures in order to reduce or prevent the occurrence of serious heavy-truck crashes on mountainous expressways in China.
Keywords:
Truck crash, Injury severity, Mountainous expressway, Ordered logit model, Pseudoelasticity