Abstract: There were 1,020 fatal traffic accidents on California freeways in 1988. These resulted in the deaths of 1,126 people. This was an increase of 4 fatal accidents and a decrease of 24 fatalities from 1987. Freeway travel during the same time increased 6% to over 100 billion vehicle miles. The 1988 fatality rate of 1.12 people killed per 100 million vehicle miles (MVM) of travel was 7% lower than the 1.21 rate in 1987. Five accident types increased in 1988 and four decreased numerically. The major accident type increases involved construction zone (14), wrong-way (10), and rear-end accidents (10). The major reduction was 18 for miscellaneous accidents. There were 4 (1%) more hit-fixed-object accidents and few other changes from 1987. Travel on freeways increased 55% in the last 10 years, while the fatal accident and fatality rates declined 17% and 19%, respectively. The only accident rate increases since 1979 included pedestrian (7%), sideswipe (141%) and construction zone (400%) accidents. The six other accident types showed decreases from 47% to 16% in accidents per 100 MVM. The number of fixed-object accidents increased 26%, while the fixed object accident rate decreased nearly 19% per 100 MVM. Only three objects showed accident rate increases: curbs and dikes (150%), poles (15%), and all other (14%).
Publication Year: 1991
Publication Date: 1991-11-01
Language: en
Type: article
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