Incident Management in the United States: a State-Of-The Practice Review
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FINAL REPORT INCIDENT MANAGEMENT IN THE UNITED STATES: A STATE-OF-THE PRACTICE REVIEW for Korea Road Traffic Safety Association from Texas Transportation Institute November 1997 INCIDENT MANAGEMENT IN THE UNITED STATES: A STATE-OF-THE-PRACTICE REVIEW Prepared for Korea Road Traffic Safety Association Seoul, Korea by Jim Cullison Assistant Research Scientist Texas Transportation Institute Lewis Nowlin Assistant Research Scientist Texas Transportation Institute Kay Fitzpatrick Associate Research Engineer Texas Transportation InsJitute Mike Ogden Associate Research Engineer Texas Transportation Institute NOVEMBER 1997 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page CHAPTER 1. OVERVIEW .................................................. 1-1 1.1 INTRODUCTION ..................................................... 1-1 1.2 NATIONAL ACCIDENT TRENDS . .. 1-2 1.3 INCIDENT CHARACTERISTICS ........................................ 1-4 1.4 INCIDENT MANAGEMENT PROCESS. .. 1-9 1.5 PROGRAM INITIATION .............................................. 1-10 CHAPTER 2. DETECTION AND VERIFICATION ............................. 2-1 2.1 INTRODUCTION ..................................................... 2-1 2.2 NON-AUTOMATED TECHNIQUES ..................................... 2-2 2.3 ELECTRONIC SURVEILLANCE ........................................ 2-8 CHAPTER 3. EMERGENCY RESPONSE ..................................... 3-1 3.1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................... 3-1 3.2 RESOURCE ALLOCATION .............................................. 3-2 3.3 TRANSPORTATION .................................................... 3-7 CHAPTER 4. SITE MANAGEMENT .......................................... 4-1 4.1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................... 4-1 4.2 INTERAGENCY COORDINATION ........................................ 4-2 4.3 TRAFFIC CONTROL ................................................... 4-7 CHAPTER 5. INCIDENT CLEARANCE ....................................... 5-1 5.1 INTRODUCTION .................................. " ................... 5-1 5.2 ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION ............................................ 5-2 5.3 INCIDENT REMOVAL .................................................. 5-8 CHAPTER 6. MOTORIST INFORMATION ................................... 6-1 6.1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................... 6-1 6.2 PRE-TRIP INFORMATION .............................................. 6-2 6.3 EN ROUTE INFORMATION ............................................. 6-7 CHAPTER 7. CASE STUDIES ............................................... 7-1 7.1 INTRODUCTION ....................................................... 7-1 v TABLE OF CONTENTS (continued) 7.2 BALTIMORE, MARYLAND ............................................. 7-1 7.3 PHOENIX, ARIZONA ................................................... 7-4 7.4 ATLANTA, GEORGIA .................................................. 7-6 7.5 BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS ........................................... 7-10 7.6 NORTHERN VIRGINIA ................................................ 7-12 7.7 DETROIT, MICHIGAN ................................................. 7-13 7.8 SEATTLE, WASHINGTON ............................................. 7-15 7.9 SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA .......................................... 7-16 7.10 NEW JERSEY TOLL AUTHORITY ...................................... 7-17 7.11 SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS .............................................. 7-19 7.12 TRANSCOM ........................................................ 7-20 7.13 1-95 CORRIDOR COALITION .......................................... 7-22 7.14 HOUSTON, TEXAS ................................................... 7-25 CHAPTER 8. SUGGESTED READINGS ...................................... 8-1 REFERENCES ....... ..................................................... R-l APPENDIX A. DATA REPORTING ELEMENTS FOR POLICE ACCIDENT REPORT FORMS. .. A-I APPENDIX B. POLICE ACCIDENT REPORT FORMS ......................... B-1 APPENDIX C. ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION REPORT FORMS ................ C-l VI SUMMARY The roadway system in the United States has allowed the emergence of the motor vehicle as the primary mode of transportation. Unfortunately, the high level of mobility provided by the U.S. roadway system is not without negative consequences. Each year, nearly 42,000 motorists are killed during travel on U.S. highways and an additional 3.5 million are injured. Traffic congestion is also a problem, annually costing society billions of dollars in lost productivity, delayed goods movement, wasted fuel, and increased pollution levels. Typically, traffic congestion occurs as a result of events that temporarily reduce roadway capacity below the level of demand or increase traffic demand above the level of capacity. Such events include traffic accidents, roadway construction, special events, disabled vehicles, and other non-recurrent problems. The impact from a non-recurrent incident on the roadway system is a function of traffic demand and incident duration. When demand exceeds capacity, excessive traffic is stored on the roadway and a traffic queue forms. Each minute required to remove the incident can add several minutes to the duration of traffic congestion. Controlling the impact of incidents, therefore, involves application of techniques to limit traffic demand levels and reduce the time needed to detect, verify, respond to, and restore the roadway to normal operating conditions. For highway safety, limiting incident duration is also critically important. The time interval between incident occurrence and the delivery of medical care has a direct impact on the probability of fatality and long term injury. In addition, incident related congestion violates driver expectancy, increasing the probability of secondary traffic accidents. Incident management is the term used to describe the coordination of personnel and equipment from one or more emergency management agencies to handle unexpected or non recurrent problems on the roadway. Tasks that comprise the incident management process include: • Incident detection - the determination that an incident of some nature has occurred. • Incident verification - the determination of the precise location and nature of the incident, and the communication of this information to the appropriate emergency management agencies. • Emergency response - the activation and transport of the appropriate emergency management personnel and equipment to/from the incident scene. • Incident clearance - the removal of wreckage, debris, and spilled materials to restore the roadway to its pre-incident capacity. • Site management - the application of traffic control measures at the incident scene and the on-scene coordination and control of emergency resources. • Motorist information - the dissemination of accurate and timely information to the motoring public concerning traffic conditions at the incident scene and suggested diversion routes. Vll This report provides a state-of-the-practice review of efforts aimed at controlling the impacts of incidents on U.S. roadways and improving the delivery of medical care to injured motorists. The review provides descriptions of numerous incident management strategies and lists techniques capable of enhancing operational procedures within each task of the incident management process. Throughout the report, reference is made to application of emerging technologies from the Intelligent Transportation System. This initiative provides advanced technologies capable of reducing incident detection/verification and response time and allowing the dissemination of real-time traveler information to the motoring public both en-route and prior to trip departure. Since mitigation efforts typically involve the resources of many agencies, the report emphasizes the importance of interagency coordination to overall incident management operations. A suggested procedure for formulating a comprehensive incident management program is also provided in the report. Vlll Chapter 1. Overview CHAPTER 1. OVERVIEW Figure 1-1. An Accident Scene 1.1 INTRODUCTION productivity, and increased vehicle emissions and pollution levels. Studies by the Texas Roadway travel is the primary means of Transportation Institute have estimated the transportation in the United States. While average annual social cost of traffic u.s. roadways provide an unprecedented congestion among 50 major U.S. cities at degree of mobility, motor vehicle accidents $960 million. (2) Residents in the metropolitan are a leading nationwide cause of death and areas of Phoenix, Atlanta, Houston, San injury. In 1996 alone, 41,907 motorists were Francisco, and Washington, D.C. have killed in traffic accidents and 3,511,000 were identified traffic congestion as their most injured.(I) These statistics correspond to an serious regional problem.(3) average of 115 roadway related deaths per day or one fatality every 13 minutes. An Major efforts have been undertaken in the additional 4,548,000 accidents in 1996 U.S. to improve the delivery of medical care involved property damage only. to injured motorists and reduce the impact of incidents on traffic congestion. These efforts Along with safety, traffic congestion is also a have been primarily aimed at: major concern on U.S. highways. Congestion occurs when traffic demand levels exceed • Improving the timeliness of emergency available roadway capacity. This impedes response. mobility leading to motorist delay, lost • Reducing the overall duration of incidents. 1-1 Incident Management in the United States: