1372935 - Police injury severity in traffic crashes: A spatial analysis

Speaking of traffic safety, what people are most concerned about is damages and injuries sustained by road users, including vehicle occupants, pedestrians, and cyclists. Traffic incident management (TIM) responders would, in fact, confront more frequent and severe hazards when responding to traffic incidents or providing roadside assistance. TIM responders include fire, police, ambulance, and towing and recovery professionals. Traffic incidents are the leading cause of injuries and deaths for TIM responders in the US. Limited research has been done to investigate the characteristics of traffic incidents or crashes that involve TIM responders. The study aims to cover the under-explored traffic safety topic focusing on traffic crashes that involve police vehicles. Considering the inherent spatial patterns of traffic crashes, this study conducts a spatial analysis to identify the contributing factors of police injuries in traffic crashes. Specifically, this study employs the Geographically Weighted Ordered Logistic Regression (GWOLR) approach to quantify the correlates of police injury severity in crashes.
The GWOLR approach leverages the space-referenced traffic crash data to estimate the local relationships between injury severity and contributing factors. In the spatial analysis, the non-stationarity tests are performed to examine whether the local relationships vary scientifically across space. This study explored five years of crashes (N =5098) that involved police vehicles in the State of Alabama. Results showed that some variables, such as crash location, pre-crash behaviors, and seatbelt usage, passed the non-stationarity tests, indicating significant spatial variations in their relationships with police injury severity in traffic crashes. The local correlates of police injury severity are valuable information for law enforcement agencies to localize strategies for improving officer safety on the road. For example, Mover Over Laws may need to be enhanced in northeast Alabama and the Birmingham Metropolitan Area, where failing to yield (to police) seems to lead to increased injury severities to police compared to other areas in Alabama.