Bellevue, WA is 1 of Just 7 Winners of National Roadway Safety Award

Video Analytics Traffic Safety Program Enables Rapid Changes that Reduce Crashes

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Oct 06, 2021, 10:20 ET

WASHINGTON, Oct. 6, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The City of Bellevue, WA was honored today with a 2021 National Roadway Safety Award for the success of its video analytics program, which is demonstrating major success in identifying roadway safety challenges and measuring the effectiveness of countermeasures.

A traffic cam captures an "almost crash," demonstrating how Bellevue's video analytics program identifies roadway safety hazards and implements countermeasures.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, speaking about Bellevue and the other winners, said: "Congratulations to today's seven honorees for the remarkable work they've done to protect the traveling public. They are proof that we have no shortage of willpower or good ideas for improving roadway safety."

The National Roadway Safety Awards are sponsored jointly by the Federal Highway Administration and the Roadway Safety Foundation. First presented in 1999, the biennial program recognizes safety achievements that move the nation toward zero deaths and serious injuries on U.S. roadways.

Bellevue's video analytics program takes a proactive approach to identify safety improvements by leveraging its extensive traffic camera network to study near-crash conflicts and identify potential countermeasures. This greatly reduces the amount of time required to identify safety hot spots and to evaluate possible remedies – often from a matter of years to a matter of days.

"Thank you to the Federal Highway Administration and Roadway Safety Foundation for this award. Video analytics is an important aspect of our Vision Zero effort to eliminate fatal and serious-injury collisions on Bellevue streets by 2030," said Bellevue Mayor Lynne Robinson. "Looking ahead, we believe the technology development partnerships we've forged and the resulting innovations mean the greatest rewards are yet to come – preventing destructive crashes and the heartache they cause people."

The program initially launched five years ago as a partnership with Microsoft and the University of Washington. The lessons learned from that pilot led to subsequent video analytics partnerships with Transoft Solutions Inc. and the Together for Safer Roads coalition, before evolving into the current collaboration with Advanced Mobility Analytics Group, Jacobs Engineering and a renewed collaboration with Microsoft.

The smart technologies convert raw video from existing traffic cameras into flow, speed and conflict event data to swiftly identify problems and countermeasures that produce measurable results. As an example of how the video analytics program boosts safety, Bellevue utilized it in implementing traffic signal operation changes at 124^th Avenue Northeast and Northeast Eighth Street, a high-volume intersection, and subsequently observed a 60 percent reduction in critical conflicts.

Initial data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and Federal Highway Administration show 38,680 people died nationwide in traffic crashes in 2020, despite a 13.2 percent decline in miles traveled due to the pandemic. Fatalities increased 7.2 percent from 2019 to the highest number since 2007.

"Bellevue's video analytics program saves lives by enabling swift identification of problem areas and rapid deployment of solutions," said Roadway Safety Foundation Executive Director Greg Cohen. "Future travelers in Bellevue, whose lives and limbs will be spared by this innovation, will owe an unknowing debt of gratitude to the City's transportation engineers and planners. We urge DOTs across the nation to look at Bellevue and other awardees' innovations and replicate them wherever possible."

The National Roadway Safety Award projects were evaluated on three criteria: Effectiveness, Innovation, and Efficient Use of Resources. Selected from a nationwide pool of applicants, the awards honor outstanding projects involving infrastructure, operational or program-related innovations. The other awardees are:

Broward Metropolitan Planning Organization for its Complete Streets Master Plan;
North Carolina Dept. of Transportation for its long-life pavement markings safety effort;
Village of Whitefish Bay, WI for its community-wide roadway safety improvements;
California Dept. of Transportation for its 2020-2024 Strategic Highway Safety Plan update;
Texas Dept. of Transportation's tool to assess the safety of rural highway design elements; and
Florida Dept. of Transportation for its use of smart work zone safety technologies.

Winners were selected by an expert panel of judges from a variety of disciplines. For complete details on each of the winners, and for more information on the national awards program, visit http://www.safety.fhwa.dot.gov/roadwaysafetyawards/.

The Roadway Safety Foundation is a 501(c) (3) charitable and educational organization. Our mission is to reduce the frequency and severity of motor vehicle crashes, injuries, and fatalities through improvements to roadway systems and their environment.

SOURCE Roadway Safety Foundation