Is freeway traffic safety addressed by the recommended plan?
Yes. Freeway traffic safety is addressed primarily in two ways by-addressing design deficiencies and by addressing freeway traffic congestion. The freeway system was built in the 1950’s, 60’s and 70’s, and since that time, there have been decades of experience with, and research on, freeway operations and safety. In fact, national design standards have been developed. While there will be a significant cost associated with improving the design of the freeway system, the design improvements were recommended because of the benefits were viewed as outweighing the cost. The recommended plan also addresses safety through the additional freeway capacity. The rear-end crash rates on the most congested freeway segments are 5 to15 times higher than on uncongested freeway segments, and rear-end collisions represent about 70 percent of all crashes on some congested freeway segments. Failure to address freeway traffic congestion would mean a failure to address congestion-related safety problems.