BENGALURU: The maximum number of road crashes occur during evening peak hours, especially involving those aged between 21- 29 years and males above 40 years of age. The who-hit-whom matrix for Bengaluru also shows that women aged between 40-59 years are the most vulnerable. This is one of the findings of the Fatality Risk Analysis of Vulnerable Road Users (VRUs) in Bengaluru done by researchers at IISc to assess the road traffic fatalities.
The study found that globally, low and middle-income countries contribute to more than 90% share of total accidents. The accident data for Bengaluru city from FIRs over seven years was collected and analysed for the current study.
“The who-hit-whom matrices were developed for identifying VRUs. Further, a risk-based model was developed to estimate fatality risk, followed by sensitivity analysis for different transport scenarios,” said Prof Ashish Verma, Convener, IISc Sustainable Transportation Lab (IST Lab), Department of Civil Engineering, and author of the study.
The who-hit-whom matrix for Bengaluru signifies that two-wheeler riders, pedestrians and bicyclists account for nearly 90 per cent of the total fatal accident victims. The VRUs share the same road space with other motorized modes. This increased exposure raises the risk of fatality, the study says.
“The study highlighted that high bus scenario, with 80 per cent of total motorised distance travelled by bus, would reduce the risk of fatality to a larger extent. This calls for sustainable transport measures to push private vehicle users to shift to public transit services,” Verma said.
The major threats to VRUs are two-wheelers, cars, buses and heavy goods vehicles or lorries as they account for the maximum crash fatalities. Also, two-wheeler road users were observed to have faced risk from right-of-way elements including median, kerbs and electric posts. In case of pedestrian fatalities, the major threat is from two- wheelers followed by cars or jeeps.