2.3.8 CRIS

Historical crash records are used to perform a safety analysis. Crash data can be obtained from TxDOT’s CRIS database. Crash data available on CRIS are collected from reports from the Texas Peace Officer’s Crash Reports (CR-3) and processed by TxDOT. The CRIS database has information related to the location of crashes, type of crash, conditions, date, and other pertinent information. This data can be queried and used in conducting various types of crash analysis. A CRIS database query allows the user to find crashes based on time and location. Once the user determines the location of interest and the range of years, they select attributes from three different fields: crash, unit, and person.
  • The crash field has attributes related to roadway type and conditions, crashrelated factors, crash severity, pedestrian and bicyclist-related crashes, contributing factors, traffic count, and location.
  • The unit field has attributes related to vehicles (e.g., make, model), commercial motor vehicle-specific attributes, and damage associated with the vehicles.
  • The person field has attributes related to the people involved in the crash, such as gender, ethnicity, and drug usage (related to the crash).
Users select the different attributes of interest, download the raw data, and analyze it in many ways, such as creating crash heat maps, generating graphs or infographics, identifying crash patterns based on certain criteria, and much more.
The user can also review queried results with preset data processing. These include a query results map, which has some predefined filters and map modes in place, such as:
  • Standard view, which shows individual crashes denoted by different crash types;
  • Cluster view, which combines crashes by area and shows an overall number of crashes by location; and
  • Heat Map view, which shows colorcoded crash areas based on density of crashes
These views are helpful for understanding where there is a higher frequency of crashes and the severities of these crashes, without having to download data or generate maps. The CRIS database also has a category of popular queries, which may be selected for screening and analysis purposes. For projects that need FHWA approval, it is recommended that crash data be obtained through the CRIS helpdesk or TxDOT’s TRF Division. For projects that do not need FHWA approval, crash data may be downloaded through the CRIS website. A link to the CRIS website is shown in
Appendix C, Section 6 – External References (Reference 4)
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MicroStrategy (MSTR) is a business intelligence software connected to the CRIS database. MSTR is used to pull crash data, generate reports, and create dashboards. Access to MSTR can be requested through TxDOT’s TRF Division.