Accident statistics

On the Carwoola Community Facebook (CCFB)page there is quite a bit of commentary about drivers' behaviour and road conditions.  I put up a post a couple of days ago alerting people to the closure of the Monaro Highway due to a particularly bad accident. One of the comments on this was:

"Lots of advertising about staying safe on the Kings Hwy but the Monaro seems just as dangerous yet nothing gets done."

This led me to ask whether there was anything published that compared the accident rates on these two roads.

They are both mainly 2 lane roads (plus some overtaking lanes) and have quite heavy traffic at times.  These days I drive to Cooma (Monaro Highway) more often than to Bateman's Bay (Kings Highway) but I would suggest that traffic is, on average, heavier on the Kings Highway but the Monaro Highway is generally wider and better alignment.

In my initial Googling I came up with a site that covered major National Highways (which included neither of those roads) but nothing else.  Eventually another member of the CCFB page gave me a link to an NRMA Report which referred to the NSW Centre for Road Safety which publishes statistics.  Their site contains two useful approaches to data:

1. a set of interactive crash statistics; and 
2. annual reports in .pdf format containing detailed tables on a wider range of variables.

The interactive statistics are very general but are worth checking.  For example over the period 2013 -2017, in all crashes leading to a fatality:

1. on country roads alcohol is a factor in 13.5 - 20.2% of crashes.  For metropolitan areas the equivalent range is 6.3 - 14.2%.
2. on country roads speeding  is a factor in 43 - 47.1%% of crashes.  For metropolitan areas the equivalent range is 31.5 - 43%

.While the report doesn't have a table of statistics comparing the two highways in question it does have a very good map (under the location tab) showing the location of serious crashes x LGA.  Here is a clip for QPRC, again for the 5 year period.

While all accidents are important to those involved those involving fatalities are the most serious.  So restricting the map to fatal accidents:

This shows some on the Kings Hwy and perhaps 1 on the Monaro.  It does show a surprising number on what appears to be the Tarago Rd but that is not what this post is about.

An immediate issue is that the maps above are restricted to QPRC.  To get a more complete picture of the Monaro Highway the map must be reset to cover Snowy-Monaro Regional Council.

 Several more accidents appear to be on the Monaro Highway (and again a surprising number to the West of Cooma).

Similarly the Kings Highway extends into Eurobodalla.  I have zoomed into the map and focussed on the area including the Kings Highway.  This brings up several fatal accidents on the Clyde and between Nelligen and Batemans Bay.

My overall conclusion based on these maps is that the two roads are about the same with possibly a slightly worse situation on the Kings Highway.  Possibly we hear more about the Kings Higway as our local media (and police) are more focused on the more local road.

The detailed report from the Safety Centre is interesting although voluminous (2.7Mb and 123 pages).

Looking initially at statistics for roads, it identifies data for the Monaro Highway but not for the Kings Highway: it seems not to have the status of State Highway.

It is interesting that it has a lot of information about the factors involved in accidents.  I had come up with a list of factors and emails suggested a few more.  The list is shown below together with the percentage of accidents in 2016 (latest year available) in which there is information on the factor being a cause.  The stats are for the State as a whole.

1. Bad Attitude: exemplified by the number of people involved in serious accidents whose licenses have been suspended or cancelled;
2. Amphetamines (the number of cases where the person is charged with dangerous driving etc and possession - often with point 1 getting a mention also);
3. Prescription drugs
4. Alcohol - possibly with points 1 and 2; (6,6% serious injury accidents)
5. Basic inability to drive a nail in a plank of wood in a law abiding manner;
6. Speed (22.8% serious injury accidents)
7. Falling asleep (given as fatigue (11.3% serious injury accidents))
8. Road design (drive according to the road design not how it happens to suit your "feelings")  There is lots of info about road features at the site of the accident but I haven't tried to summarise it;
9. Weather (ibid) (14.5% serious injury accidents)
10. Hitting animals (wildlife or stock) (1.1% serious injury accidents)
11. Poor maintenance of vehicle. (1.1% serious injury accidents)
12. Distraction inside vehicle (mobile phones? ) (2.9% serious injury accidents)
13. The report has a somewhat larger category "Distraction outside the vehicle" (10.9% serious injury accidents).  From reading  another paper by the Centre " This category includes situations such as view obscured by parked vehicle / congested traffic and vision reduced due to rising / setting sun."

 It is important to note that there could be several factors in an accident.  The tables presented only show 1 or 2 factors (fair enough in terms of volume of material, but it does limit understanding the situations involved).  Also the data does not rank these according to most important cause.  I suggest that because "speed" is easy to assess from skidmarks it is often included when it is not the main factor.

 Eg drunk, on a mobile phone, license suspended, going through a chicane in rain and hits a kangaroo while the car is doing 10kph over the speed limit - add 1 to speed.

I have a few questions that I will follow up with the Road Safety people but basically the existence of these data should be a great help in assessing road safety in our area.