STATISTICAL CHALLENGES WITH MODELING MOTOR VEHICLE CRASHES: UNDERSTANDING THE IMPLICATIONS OF ALTERNATIVE APPROACHES By Dominique Lord Associate Research Scientist Center for Transportation Safety Texas Transportation Institute Texas A&M University System 3135 TAMU, College Station, TX, 77843-3135 Tel. (979) 458-1218 E-mail:
[email protected] Simon P. Washington Associate Professor Department of Civil Engineering & Engineering Mechanics University of Arizona Tucson, AZ 85721-0072 Tel. (520) 621- 4686 Email:
[email protected] John N. Ivan Associate Professor Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering University of Connecticut 261 Glenbrook Road, Unit 2037 Storrs, CT 06269-2037 Tel. (860) 486-0352 E-mail:
[email protected] March 22nd, 2004 Research Report Center for Transportation Safety Texas Transportation Institute Texas A&M University System 3135 TAMU, College Station, TX, 77843-3135 An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 83rd Annual Meeting of Transportation Research Board A shorter version of this paper with the new title “Poisson, Poisson-gamma and zero-inflated regression models of motor vehicle crashes: balancing statistical fit and theory” will be published in Accident Analysis & Prevention ABSTRACT There has been considerable research conducted over the last 20 years focused on predicting motor vehicle crashes on transportation facilities. The range of statistical models commonly applied includes binomial, Poisson, Poisson-gamma (or Negative Binomial), Zero-Inflated Poisson and Negative Binomial Models (ZIP and ZINB), and Multinomial probability models. Given the range of possible modeling approaches and the host of assumptions with each modeling approach, making an intelligent choice for modeling motor vehicle crash data is difficult at best.