01373597

Component

Despite the significance of crashes involving buses and the assumption that public transport improves road safety by reducing vehicular traffic, few studies are available in the literature on crash data involving buses. With the goal of evaluating the effectiveness of different approaches and systems that can be applied by company management to address higher safety standards, this paper integrates the available literature with a poll among bus safety managers about the factors affecting safety. The panel of expert participants was selected from the managers of Italian public transport companies, engaged in providing urban bus service. A Delphi process was used to examine the level of concordance among the participants. The experts were asked to respond to twelve questions related to bus safety, subdivided into three main areas: (A) driver training, skills, and performance; (B) traffic conflict and urban road environment; and (C) vehicle maintenance and devices, including advanced technology. The results show that, in general, the majority of the proposed items were considered highly effective for bus safety. A consequence of this homogeneous consensus was a less univocal ranking of the top items. The use of the Delphi technique and the Kendall test of concordance were appropriate and effective for addressing and evaluating the maximum level of agreement among participants in the pool. The final results of the investigation show that start inhibition, automatic door opening, and bus materials and internal architecture are unanimously considered the top safety items for bus passenger safety. Brake assistance and vehicle monitoring systems are also generally considered very effective. Bus driver inattention/fatigue is considered, above all, to be the first cause of road crashes. With respect to vulnerable users, data indicate that passenger unloading and pedestrian crossing near bus stops are the most dangerous actions.

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AP050 Bus Transit Systems

01362476

12-0773

English

13p

2012

Transportation Research Board 91st Annual Meeting

Digital/other

Figures; References; Tables

Bus crashes; Bus transit operations; Crash analysis; Crash causes; Delphi method; Questionnaires; Safety factors; Safety management

Expert opinion

Italy

Passenger Transportation; Public Transportation; Safety and Human Factors; I80: Accident Studies; I91: Vehicle Design and Safety

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2012 Paper #12-0773

TRIS, TRB

Feb 8 2012 4:57PM