The influence of economic incentives linked to road safety indicators on accidents: The case of toll concessions in Spain

• Published in: Accident analysis and prevention 2013-10, Vol.59, p.529-536
• Main Authors: Rangel, Thais, Vassallo, José Manuel, Herraiz, Israel
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Accidents; Accidents, Traffic - mortality; Accidents, Traffic - prevention & control; Accidents, Traffic - statistics & numerical data; Biological and medical sciences; Concession contract; Economics; Environment Design - economics; Environment Design - statistics & numerical data; Heavy vehicles; Highways; Humans; Incentives; Interurban toll highway; Lanes; Medical sciences; Miscellaneous; Models, Statistical; Motivation; Negative binomial regression; Performance-based indicators; Prevention and actions; Public health. Hygiene; Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine; Public-Private Sector Partnerships - economics; Public-Private Sector Partnerships - statistics & numerical data; Regression Analysis; Road accident; Road safety; Road safety incentives; Safety; Spain
• ISSN: 0001-4575; 1879-2057
• DOI: 10.1016/j.aap.2013.07.014

•Safety based incentives are becoming popular to reward or penalize highway private operators in toll concession contracts.•Most concession contracts link incentives (bonuses and penalties) to indicators based on accidents, injuries and fatalities.•Safety incentives have a statistically significant influence on road safety.•Ceteris paribus, there are more accidents and injuries on highway segments without incentives than on highway segments with incentives. The goal of this paper is to evaluate whether the incentives incorporated in toll highway concession contracts in order to encourage private operators to adopt measures to reduce accidents are actually effective at improving safety. To this end, we implemented negative binomial regression models using information about highway characteristics and accident data from toll highway concessions in Spain from 2007 to 2009. Our results show that even though road safety is highly influenced by variables that are not managed by the contractor, such as the annual average daily traffic (AADT), the percentage of heavy vehicles on the highway, number of lanes, number of intersections and average speed; the implementation of these incentives has a positive influence on the reduction of accidents and injuries. Consequently, this measure seems to be an effective way of improving safety performance in road networks.