Safety Effects of Intersection Lighting

As a result of enhanced safety measures in both highway and vehicle features, the number of highway crashes in the U.S. has been continuously decreasing in the past ten years in spite of the increasing vehicle miles traveled (VMT). However, the records showed that the fatal crashes at the roadway intersections have not decreased. A study was conducted to analyze the nighttime crashes at the roadway intersections in Indiana. This paper describes the methods utilized in the intersection crash analysis and presents the findings in terms of the effects of intersection lightings on travel safety. Two methods, the before-and-after method and the cross-sectional method, were applied to analyze the intersection crashes. The before-and-after method was used to analyze the crash patterns at the selected intersections with recorded crashes a few years before and after the lighting conditions changed. The cross-sectional method was used to examine the lighting effects with less detailed crash data of large number of intersections. This paper presents analysis process with the two methods and discuss the effects of intersection lighting on nighttime traffic safety.