Safety
In 2016, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) established five highway safety performance measures that state departments of transportation and MPOs must incorporate into their performance management processes. These five safety performance measures are:
1. Number of fatalities;
2. Rate of fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles traveled (VMT);
3. Number of serious injuries;
4. Rate of serious injuries per 100 VMT; and
5. Number of combined non-motorized fatalities and non-motorized serious injuries.
NCDOT establishes targets for these performance measures each calendar year which are based on 5-year rolling averages. Each year, Burlington-Graham MPO can either adopt the targets set by NCDOT or establish their own targets. The Transportation Advisory Committee (TAC) of BGMPO chose to adopt the most recent safety targets in its January 2021 meeting.
The Burlington-Graham MPO failed to reach each of its safety targets for the previous calendar year. Moreover, fatality and serious injury rates have been steadily increasing the last few years. As a result of these alarming trends, the BGMPO recently formed its Highway Safety Program to spread awareness of traffic safety and change public attitudes and behaviors to reduce accident rates and severity within the region. Development of the Highway Safety Plan, which will examine current safety conditions and propose recommended safety strategies, will be the first project of the Highway Safety Program.
Recent Safety Performance:
2021 MPO Safety Performance Targets:
