Overview
Recognition and predictability are important requirements in a sustainably-safe road infrastructure. What has been done until now is mainly a case of making the traffic solutions for various road types uniform. It is clear that this way of working contributes to being able to distinguish the various road types. However, the recognition and predictability of roads have a second component, and that is the expectations of road users concerning one's own desired behaviour and that of other (types of) road users. These expectations will influence the behavioural choices of road users. Previous research has shown that the design guidelines used achieve insufficient recognition at this level, especially with regard to safe speeds, an utmost important behavioural component for road safety.
This project aims to investigate the way in which the physical and 'psychological' features of a road and its surroundings can increase the recognition and predictability in order to 'provoke' the desired (safe) behaviour and to make undesirable (unsafe) behaviour less likely. The knowledge from this project contributes to a further elaboration of the sustainably-safey principle of recognition/ predictability in design guidelines for streets and roads.
In the main, this project will consist of a series of three consecutive phases. The first phase involves a determination, by means of a theoretical analysis, of which behaviour (choices) can influence recognition and predictability. Then a practice-orientated analysis will determine which surroundings features require the most attention. Literature studies and meta-analyses will then make an inventory of the available knowledge about the relation between road features and relevant behaviour choices. This leads to hypotheses in a second phase that will be tested using driving simulator research. The third and last phase involves validating the effects of the most promising road features in a series of field studies. In principle, the project will concentrate on urban and rural roads with a distributor function. Before making the inventory of available knowledge, a theoretical analysis will determine which behaviour (choices) can be influenced by recognition and predictability. One thing and another will lead to an empirically founded and, where possible, quantified overview of (combinations of) road and surroundings features that influence motorists' behaviour.