Web portal to paint BIG PICTURE of Wisconsin traffic safety
 unique website that pools information from many
databases will help public audiences and Wisconsin transportation officials
gain a broader perspective on traffic safety issues and needs.Researchers
in the Wisconsin
Traffic Operations and Safety Laboratory (TOPS) at the University
of Wisconsin-Madison developed the WisTransPortal,
a data warehouse at transportal.cee.wisc.edu.
“Identifying the safety problems isn’t simply identifying
the locations where there were ‘X’ number of crashes,”
says Assistant Professor David
Noyce, TOPS co-manager. “We think there’s a lot more
to that, and that’s why we wanted to incorporate information from
several sources that are not traditionally included.”
Among its information, the WisTransPortal will include
Wisconsin crash data and health outcomes, crash costs, road weather
information, citation data, emergency vehicle run data, lane and ramp
closure data, and traffic detector data. “What’s unique
about what we’re doing is that we’re pooling all this information—and
that’s a model that no one has yet established in making transportation
safety investments,” says Noyce.
The WisTransPortal crash-data component opened in
2006 and has received a steady increase in outside queries each month,
says Noyce. When additional databases come online in early 2007, the
site will enable users to combine information that traditionally resides
in databases at various individual agencies to paint a more accurate
picture of the economic and societal effects of traffic safety issues,
and of the costs and benefits of safety-related improvements.
Already, transportation officials around the country
use such information to help them identify and address key problem areas.
Created in response to demand from Wisconsin transportation officials
for a better system, the WisTransPortal is valuable because 2005 federal
legislation mandates that states report their highest five percent of
locations with safety issues annually, says Noyce.
Each state uses different criteria to identify those
problem areas; the portal will enable Wisconsin officials to take a
more holistic approach, he says. “For example, a spot where there
have been few crashes, but perhaps is remote and difficult for emergency
responders to get to—there are substantial costs associated with
that,” says Noyce. “Just because the frequency of safety-related
issues isn’t there, it still may be a spot where an investment
needs to take place to proactively improve safety and prevent crashes
from happening.”
Beyond the federal reporting requirement, the portal
will help transportation officials identify and address safety issues
during road construction or reconstruction, he says. That means correcting
existing safety problems, ensuring that safety problems aren’t
inadvertently introduced, and ensuring that traffic and workers are
safe during construction. “So not only before and after the project,
but during the project, we maximize the safety of the location and understand
what methodologies work best in maintaining traffic flow, yet minimize
safety impacts,” says Noyce.
Data users’ initial response to the portal
has been overwhelmingly positive, he says. “Not too long ago,
those who needed this information essentially had to visit in person
or call an office to get this information, and depending upon that person’s
workload, it took some time,” says Noyce. “Now they literally
can get online and in a matter of seconds get access to the basic queries
that they want to make. Through one source, one portal, they will have
access to many different sources of information that they have never
had access to before.”
Although the portal is Wisconsin-specific, the researchers
hope someday to expand it to include information that helps them to
study traffic safety at an interstate or regional level.
Funding for the project, which includes TOPS co-manager
and Professor Bin Ran and IT Project Manager Steven Parker, comes from
the Wisconsin Department of Transportation, the Federal Highway Administration,
and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
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