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The Traffic Safety Navigator is the 2020–2024 California Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP) e-newsletter. The newsletter provides SHSP updates along with insights into best practices for implementing strategies that reduce traffic fatalities and serious injuries on California’s roadways. |
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- Furthering the SHSP Mission, Vision, and Goal
- The Equitable Role of the 5 Es in the Safe System Approach (SSA)
- Implementation Strategies by Local Agencies
- Safety Spotlight: California Department of Public Health
- Get Involved and SHSP Resources
- What is the SHSP?
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Click here for a PDF version of this e-newsletter |
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FURTHERING THE SHSP MISSION, VISION, AND GOAL
The bi-annual SHSP Executive Leadership Meeting took place in March 2022. At this meeting, a number of key decisions were made to further the Mission, Vision, and Goal of the SHSP — by advancing discussions on implementing the Safe System Approach (SSA). This newsletter provides an update on implementing the SSA and defining how it relates to the SHSP’s four Guiding Principles and the 5 Es: Education, Enforcement, Engineering, Emergency Response, and Emerging Technologies. The proceeding articles explore the SSA implementation and provide case study approaches from leading California agencies.
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The SSA is a paradigm-shifting approach for traffic safety that has been very successful in other countries and is now being implemented in the United States. The SSA acknowledges that death within our transportation system is unacceptable and focuses on safe mobility of all road users. The SSA also strives to break down the functional silos that sometimes exist among the Es that are involved in improving traffic safety.
The SSA has six Principles:
- Death/Serious Injury is Unacceptable
- Humans Make Mistakes
- Humans Are Vulnerable
- Responsibility is Shared
- Safety is Proactive
- Redundancy is Crucial
These six Principles are applied to the five SSA Elements:
- Safe Road Users
- Safe Vehicles
- Safe Speeds
- Safe Roads
- Post-Crash Care
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Over the last six months, the SHSP Steering Committee has been discussing how each of the five SSA elements relate to the 5 Es in the SHSP. After extensive conversations and through detailed review, it was determined that in each Safe System Element there is a role for all 5 Es, even though the extent of that role might differ for each element. Moreover, the Steering Committee also recognized that each of the 5 Es plays a key role in ensuring that the Guiding Principle of Integrate Equity is addressed in both the SSA and the California SHSP. For example, each of the 5 Es play a key role in considering not only geographic and modal equity, but also socioeconomic (i.e. income) and demographic (i.e. race, age, gender) equity. The Steering Committee analyzed the equitable role of each of the 5 Es in each SSA Element, and how an equity lens could be applied to each one. Fundamental equity-related considerations were identified, such as:
- Thinking through the application of engineering and enforcement strategies in both urban and rural contexts while considering impacts to vulnerable users and underserved communities
- Ensuring that educational strategies are context-sensitive, tailored to specific audiences, and are deployed in partnership with Community Based Organizations who often have established relationships and greater trust with those we are trying to serve
Please stay tuned as the Steering Committee and Executive Leadership continue the conversations about integrating equity while implementing the SSA in the California SHSP. This is an exciting area of development both statewide and nationally, so we will provide updates in future issues of the Traffic Safety Navigator.
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California SHSP Working Definition of Equity: Everyone has the right to travel safely on California’s public roads – regardless of race, socioeconomic status, gender, age, and ability. When developing and implementing the SHSP, equity means taking into account any historical, present-day, and systemic biases so that safety is improved for all groups, particularly our most vulnerable and traditionally underserved populations. Equity will be integrated into all aspects of the SHSP, including the five key strategies of Engineering, Enforcement, Education, Emergency Response and Emerging Technologies, so that a comprehensive, inclusive and equitable approach can be taken to implement solutions to save lives on all of California’s public roads.
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Implementing the actions of the SSA elements require support from all five Es in varying measures to achieve the goal of zero deaths and serious injuries on all California roadways. Summary documents for implementing the SSA within the SHSP are forthcoming, stay tuned for updates! |
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Two of the four Guiding Principles of the California SHSP are Integrate Equity and Implement a Safe System Approach (SSA). Following are two case studies of how the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) and the Los Angeles Department of Transportation (LADOT) are striving to integrate equity and implement the SSA in their work.
SCAG
In July 2020, SCAG’s Regional Council adopted a resolution affirming its commitment to advancing justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion. The resolution called for the formation of a Special Committee on Equity & Social Justice to further develop SCAG’s response to advancing equity. The Committee met quarterly from September 2020 to March 2021, culminating in SCAG’s Regional Council adoption of the Racial Equity Early Action Plan (EAP) in May 2021. The EAP includes a definition of equity, goals and strategies, and internally and externally focused actions. The plan was crafted to ensure SCAG’s commitment to equity endures.
The EAP was grounded in SCAG’s understanding of regional conditions through the Racial Equity Baseline Conditions Report (and accompanying Story Map). The report assessed the racial inequities and disparities experienced in the region. The analysis was centered around four key themes: Economic Vitality, Healthy and Complete Communities, Mobility, and Environment. The mobility findings included analysis of transportation safety disparities. SCAG is in the process of preparing an update to this report and considering a performance dashboard to report on progress.
SCAG also developed the Building Equity Across the Region (BEAR) Equity Toolkit for Planning staff as they consider integrating equity into their work, including transportation safety projects. The tools are meant to prompt reflection and team discussions on a project’s potential impacts on racial equity and marginalized groups and motivate changes or adjustments to address issues. The Toolkit includes guidance on equity assessment, stakeholder analysis, data gathering/analysis, an equitable strategy with an action tool, stakeholder communications, and engagement and relationship building.
To learn more about SCAG’s equity efforts, please visit the Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Awareness (IDEA) website.
LADOT
In 2015, LADOT established a Vision Zero Division. This Division is responsible for implementing the Safe System Approach with an annual administration budget of $40 million, which includes installing low-cost proven safety countermeasure improvements. Their work plan focuses on a subset of their High Injury Network (HIN), where the greatest concentration of fatal and serious injury crashes occurred. Within these locations, the LADOT works to quickly install low-cost proven safety countermeasures, including:
- Pavement markings
- Bollards
- Adding/improving signage
- Speed feedback signs
- High-visibility crosswalks
- Intersection tightening
- Red curb (day lighting)
- Leading pedestrian intervals (LPIs)
Since 2017, LADOT has installed 5,500 individual treatments in Los Angeles County. Longer-term improvements are also considered and implemented, but LADOT cannot fully fund or install all these improvements. This requires strong partnerships with the Department of Public Works, Bureaus of Engineering Street Services and more as well as grant funding.
SCAG and LADOT emphasize that implementing equity and the SSA are an ongoing process, and there are many lessons to be learned along the way. However, these agencies are forging new ground and serve as role models for other agencies within California as they work to integrate equity and implement the SSA.
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SAFETY SPOTLIGHT: CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH
By Jeffery Rosenhall, California Department of Public Health (CDPH) SHSP Steering Committee member, with input and support from all CDPH SHSP members
CDPH is actively implementing outcomes from the Pivot to further implement a Safe System Approach. CDPH staff serve on the SHSP Executive Leadership and Steering Committees, as well as across eight different Challenge Areas. This article highlights a few of the ways CDPH prioritizes equity through its approach to public health and data as well as its programs.
CDPH staffs the Caltrans Active Transportation Resource Center (ATRC) and has successfully run a Disadvantaged Communities Technical Assistance (DAC TA) Program for many years. The program provides disadvantaged communities with extra support and capacity building skills to improve their competitiveness for the Active Transportation Program (ATP).
In addition, the CDPH Office of Health Equity’s Healthy Communities Data and Indicators Project (HCI) provides a standardized set of statistical measures, data, and tools on the social determinants of health in California. The goal of the HCI is to provide datasets and tools that a broad array of sectors can use for planning healthy communities and evaluating the impact of plans, projects, policy, and environmental changes on community health.
CDPH’s Crash Medical Outcomes Data (CMOD) team has been working for several years to process non-fatal hospital and emergency department data with the newer International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-10-CM) injury coding system; now that process is nearly complete, allowing the CDPH team to better track non-fatal transportation-related injuries and their causes from state emergency department and hospitalization data.
In August 2021 CDPH was awarded a Core Statewide Injury Prevention (SIPP) grant from the CDC; this will help transportation safety team members identify and address risk and protective factors shared across multiple injury causes, enabling CDPH to identify points of intervention to prevent a range of injuries. For more information, please email Jeffery Rosenhall.
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GET INVOLVED AND SHSP RESOURCES |
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WHAT IS THE SHSP?
The California Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP) is a comprehensive, statewide transportation safety plan which provides a framework for reducing fatalities and serious injuries across all travel modes and on all public roads. Started in 2005, the SHSP is updated regularly to ensure continued progress and to meet changing safety needs. Currently, over 580 safety stakeholders from over 230 public and private agencies and organizations work together on this effort under the guidance of the SHSP Executive Leadership and SHSP Steering Committees. The SHSP addresses the 5 Es: Education, Enforcement, Engineering, Emergency Response, and Emerging Technologies. In summer 2020, state transportation leaders recognized a bolder and more focused approach was necessary to combat the rise in fatalities and serious injuries that have occurred on California roadways since 2010. Four new Guiding Principles have been incorporated into the SHSP update process to further improve safety:
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- Integrate Equity
- Implement a Safe System Approach
- Double Down on What Works
- Accelerate Advanced Technology
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