FRT 241, Wildlife Vehicle Collision Safety Analysis

Abstract FRT 241, Wildlife Vehicle Collision Safety Analysis KTC will enhance the wildlife crash dataset for the past five years through crash narrative mining to provide a more accurate representation of crashes involving wildlife that may not be coded as such. These efforts will place an emphasis on collisions with deer but will include other wildlife common in Kentucky. KTC will prioritize the wildlife crash data enhancements for crashes occurring on the I-64 and US-60 corridors between Jefferson County and Franklin County to ensure timely delivery of the necessary crash data to the consultant KYTC selects to conduct Kentucky’s WVC Reduction Plan. However, efforts will be made to enhance the wildlife crash data statewide, allowing for future investigations of wildlife crossing in other parts of the state. KTC will investigate the practicality of developing safety performance functions (SPFs) to estimate wildlife crashes statewide. The development of these SPFs may not be feasible depending on the amount and distribution of wildlife crashes across Kentucky’s roadway network. At a minimum, KTC researchers will analyze the enhanced five-year wildlife crash dataset statewide to identify hot spots for WVCs, both along the I-64 and US-60 corridors in the study area and statewide. The hot spot analysis will evaluate the distribution of WVCs by rural/urban designation, roadway type, speed limit, time of year, and any other relevant roadway or crash characteristic to target locations suitable for targeted WVC countermeasures. KTC will help with FHWA reporting by calculating baselines and to identify WVC Crash Modification Factors (CMFs) that can be used to develop crash predictions for the end of reporting. Lastly, KTC will look into KYTC’s historic Waze data to identify animal collision events as a potential source for wildlife collisions not reported in the state’s crash database.