Determinants of Pedestrian–Vehicle Crash Severity: Case of Saint Petersburg, Russia

Abstract

This article investigates factors that explain pedestrian injury severity levels in Saint Petersburg, Russia during the 2015–2021 period. The research takes into account such factors as weather conditions, infrastructure factors, human factors, and lighting conditions to assess their influence on pedestrian injury severity in pedestrian–vehicle crashes. The most influential factors are lighting conditions, particularly the lack of lighting when it is dark, which are associated with a 14.9% increase in fatal accidents. The greatest impact on the increase of fatal accidents due to road infrastructure conditions relates to road barrier shortcomings (4.7%). Such infrastructure road conditions as restraint system for pedestrians and horizontal markings also have a significant effect on fatal outcomes, increasing them by 1.4% and 0.7%, respectively. The obtained results may serve as a basis for St. Petersburg authorities to develop new road safety policies.

Keywords

• infrastructure factors
• ordered probit
• pedestrian–vehicle crashes
• road accident
• severity modeling