The Safety of Pedestrian and Bicycle Travel in Minnesota: Inventory, Analysis, and Prospectus

Abstract

As attention in transportation circles, increasingly focuses on encouraging pedestrian and bicycle travel, it is important that planning initiatives be informed about the safety aspects of these modes. However, recent research suggests a limited understanding of the features that affect the pedestrian and bicycle travel, particularly when it comes to safety. The report examines the information that is collected regarding pedestrian and bicycle crashes in Minnesota in comparison to other states and looks a new ways in which this data can be used increase knowledge of pedestrian and bicycle crashes. To do this exercise exploits a database of crash report information for all pedestrian and bicycle crashes in the State of Minnesota from 1998-2002. Our analysis examines general trends of pedestrian and bicycle crashes. In addition, we demonstrate that pedestrian crashes tend to occur in different locations than bicycle crashes. The final part of the paper focuses on developing a method to identify where pedestrian and bicycle crashes are more likely to occur, Poisson regression to identify the relationships between crashes and neighborhood attributes.