Safety and Incident Prevention Program Area

Safety and Incident Prevention includes a wide range of solutions that all contribute to the common goal of improving vehicle and pedestrian safety. These systems have a direct impact on diminishing both the number and severity of crashes, which reduces injuries, fatalities, and societal costs. Examples of these systems include: queue warning systems, speed warning systems, truck rollover warning systems, red-light running cameras, intersection crossing warning systems, and over-height detection systems.

NRO plans to improve safety by providing motorists with warnings about adverse driving conditions, upstream disruptions in traffic, and the presence of incidents through DMS and recorded messages. The ability to quickly respond to an incident can reduce the likelihood of a secondary incident. NRO also is particularly focused on safety and incident prevention at work zones, especially given the planned construction in the region. To combat the high fatality rates on some VDOT highways, the highway safety corridor program was established in 2003. The multi-agency program provides highly visible signage, targeted enforcement and increased fines for safety violations on specific sections of the highway. In NRO, an 11–mile stretch of I-95 between Route 619 and Route 123 has been designated as a ”highway safety corridor.”

NRO is also looking at technological solutions to improve road safety including truck roll over warning systems, pedestrian countdown signals, bridge anti-icing systems, red-light running cameras, etc. Several of these will be implemented at targeted locations in order to address identified, site-specific safety concerns.

The following strategies carry out safety and incident prevention related activities:

1. Over-Height Detection System
2. Pedestrian Countdown Signals
3. Speed Harmonization
4. Weather Related Warning Systems
5. Queue and Disabled Vehicle Warning Systems
6. Traffic Engineering Strategies

Market Packages

Currently, there are no market packages in the regional architecture directly addressing this topic.