Effects of pavement skid resistance on traffic accidents

Abstract EN

The Ministry of Transport (MOT) in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia had collected a massive amount of friction measurements using a Mu-meter covering most of the major highway network in the kingdom.

Traffic accident data of 89 high accident rate locations from four main different highway classes were extracted from the MOT accident records.

Pavement skid resistance for the selected locations was determined from the pavement skid resistance records.

The objective of this paper is to utilize these data to investigate the effects of pavement skid resistance on traffic accidents.

The analysis included establishing relationships between skid resistance and accident number, accident significance and accident density.

It was determined that a decreasing skid resistance leads to an increase in traffic accidents.

Acritical value of skid resistance was also established based on number, significance and density of accidents.