Department of Geography and Environmental Management, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada; Meteorological Research Division, Environment and Climate Change Canada, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Department of Geography and Environmental Management, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Accid Anal Prev. 2019 Jun;127:186-197. doi: 10.1016/j.aap.2019.02.027. Epub 2019 Mar 18.
Past research has shown that winter precipitation is an important environmental factor that increases the frequency of motor vehicle collisions that cause personal injury and property damage. Questions remain about the magnitude of winter storm effects on collision occurrence, changes in risk over time, and the role of driver behaviour in conjunction with other factors (e.g., winter maintenance by road authorities) as it affects exposure and sensitivity to hazardous conditions. In response, a matched-pair, retrospective cohort method was used to estimate injury and non-injury collision risks for a mid-sized urban community based on a new definition of winter storm events that, relative to previous studies, captures a greater portion of time during which drivers respond to hazardous weather and road surface conditions. Winter storm definition criteria were applied to weather radar imagery and traditional surface station observations in a unique manner to classify and characterize a set of 196 variable-length storm events in terms of precipitation type and amount, visibility, temperature profile, presence of government-issued warnings, location, and temporal factors. Injury and non-injury collisions increased by 66 and 137 percent, respectively, during winter storms relative to dry weather conditions. Although these increases were higher than findings from similar studies of winter precipitation events conducted over the same timeframe (i.e., 2002-2016), they were found to have declined by a statistically significant amount over the course of the study period and disproportionately to collisions in general. Understanding why this is occurring, and then attributing improvements to specific winter road safety interventions and behavioural adjustments, is a key focus for future research and for informing future risk-mitigating investments.
过去的研究表明，冬季降水是增加机动车碰撞频率的一个重要环境因素，而机动车碰撞会导致人身伤害和财产损失。关于冬季风暴对碰撞发生的影响程度、风险随时间的变化、以及驾驶员行为与其他因素（例如，道路当局的冬季维护）结合对暴露和对危险条件的敏感性的作用，仍存在一些问题。有鉴于此，采用了配对回顾性队列方法，根据冬季风暴事件的新定义，对一个中等规模城市社区的伤害和非伤害性碰撞风险进行了估计，与以往的研究相比，该定义更能捕捉到驾驶员对恶劣天气和道路表面状况做出反应的大部分时间。冬季风暴的定义标准以一种独特的方式应用于天气雷达图像和传统的地面站观测，以便根据降水类型和数量、能见度、温度分布、政府发布的警报、位置和时间因素对一系列 196 个可变长度的风暴事件进行分类和特征描述。与干燥天气条件相比，冬季风暴期间伤害性和非伤害性碰撞分别增加了 66%和 137%。尽管这些增幅高于在同一时间段内进行的类似冬季降水事件的类似研究的发现（即 2002-2016 年），但在研究期间发现它们的数量呈显著下降趋势，且不成比例地低于一般碰撞。了解为什么会发生这种情况，然后将改进归因于特定的冬季道路安全干预措施和行为调整，是未来研究和为未来风险缓解投资提供信息的重点。
