Lessons Learned from Virginia's Pilot Corridor Safety Improvement Program

About the report:

Doing more with less is a common theme at all levels of government in the United States today. Limited budgets and staff and rising costs have forced all areas of the public sector to use their resources wisely and efficiently. Thus, transportation agencies must focus on problems that have the greatest potential benefits relative to costs.

Corridor safety improvement programs (CSIPs) use an approach to traffic safety that emphasizes multidisciplinary cooperation as a means of identifying and targeting traffic safety problems and implementing corrective countermeasures. In 1990, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) began emphasizing CSIPs as a wise use of limited highway safety improvement resources and published guidelines for their implementation in 1991.

Rather than follow the FHWA guidelines explicitly, Virginia decided to try a slightly different approach to determine if the CSIP process could be enhanced. In particular, Virginia's pilots placed more responsibility for identifying problems and developing countermeasures on local multidisciplinary task forces than recommended by the FHWA guidelines. The procedures used in the rural and urban pilot projects were compared with each other and with the FHWA guidelines to determine the successes and shortcomings of the CSIP process as implemented in Virginia.

The report recommends that Virginia not continue the CSIP process unless the FHWA guidelines and other key recommendations are followed to establish a new pilot.

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