Selecting emerging safety hot spots for priority funding

The Laredo District enhanced its project selection process by incorporating advanced data analysis to better identify emerging roadway safety risks. By combining crash trend analysis with connected vehicle data, the district can more effectively prioritize locations where safety improvements will have the greatest impact. This approach shifts focus from isolated incidents to patterns of increasing risk, improving decision-making and resource allocation. The innovation supports proactive safety improvements and helps reduce crashes at high-risk locations.

Challenge

The Laredo District’s traditional project selection process relied on identifying locations with high numbers of crashes, which often highlighted low-volume areas with isolated incidents rather than areas with growing risk. This limited the district’s ability to prioritize projects with the greatest potential safety impact, improve identification of high-risk locations through trend-based analysis, and allocate resources effectively. A more advanced approach was needed to better identify locations where crash risks were increasing and where targeted improvements could reduce future incidents.

Solution

The district implemented a two-stage, data-driven approach using crash trend analysis to identify locations with increasing severe crash rates over time and integrating connected vehicle data to enhance the analysis and prediction of future crash hot spots. This combined approach enables a more comprehensive understanding of safety risks and better informs district project prioritization.

Benefits

Improves ability to identify and predict high-risk roadway locations
Increases efficiency in project prioritization and funding allocation
Focuses resources on locations with increasing crash risk
Supports more effective crash reduction strategies
Strengthens data-driven decision-making processes

Additional key information

Features

Integration of crash trend analysis and connected vehicle data to enhance project selection
Focus on identifying and monitoring severe crash trends over time
Data-driven framework for prioritizing safety investments using multiple data sources (CRIS, district data, connected vehicle data)

Implementation

Developed and documented enhanced, data-driven project selection methodology
Piloted approach during 2022 and 2023 project selection cycles
Applied analysis to identify, evaluate, and prioritize safety projects
Summarized findings to support future decision-making with TxDOT safety and traffic operations teams