Review and Comment on the Draft Regional Road Safety Action Plan
There are around 800 crashes each year on roads in the SLO Region. Of these, around 30 people lose their lives each year, and an additional 160 people suffer serious injuries. SLOCOG has long been committed to making the streets of the SLO region safer for everyone, and in October 2023 solidified this by announcing a goal of eliminating traffic-related deaths and serious injuries by 2050.
To support this vision, SLOCOG secured a Federal Safe Streets for All (SS4A) grant to develop a Regional Road Safety Action Plan (RSAP). This RSAP builds on direction from the Board and Road Safety Steering Committee as well as the US DOT safety programs, a stakeholder & data-driven campaign aimed at eliminating traffic fatalities and serious injuries in our region. Following inclusive public outreach and community engagement process, as well as, rigorous technical work and new tools such as the Road Safety Dashboard and the High Injury Network, the Draft 2025 Regional Road Safety Action Plan is ready for public and stakeholder review and can be accessed here >>
Staff will present the Draft 2025 Regional Safety Action Plan for approval. Approval of the plan at this time is a necessary step to apply for the coming 2025 Federal Safe Streets for All grant cycle. The Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) is anticipated to be released end of March 2025, and there is a review process by the US DOT expected in mid-April to certify regional road safety plans in order to apply for implementation and construction funding.
- The Draft 2025 Regional Road Safety Action Plan is available here>>
- Access the project website is www.slocogroadtozero.org
Background
The 2025 Regional Safety Action Plan is a critical component in evolving our road network into a safe mobility network. The Plan is helping us formulate the best approaches, philosophies, and programs to meet our current and future road safety needs, while making crucial safety investments. While it likely is not possible to prevent all crashes from occurring, the focus of our efforts is to prevent the fatal and severe injury crashes from occurring so that our friends, family, and community members make it home. The Plan will also identify non-infrastructure safety measures to promote education, enforcement, outreach, and other strategies to eliminate fatal and severe injuries in traffic.
Goal: Regional Safety Plan to carry forward the visioning established by SLOCOG and its member agencies to eliminate deaths and serious injuries countywide.
Required US DOT SS4A Action Plan Components:
- Leadership Commitment and Goal Setting – Completed
- Planning Structure – Completed
- Safety Analysis – Completed
- Engagement and Collaboration- Completed
- Equity Considerations- Completed
- Policy and Progress Changes – On going
- Strategy and Project Selections – On going
Purpose of the Regional Safety Action Plan
Eliminating fatal and serious injuries on our streets requires a comprehensive and coordinated approach. As the regional planning agency, SLOCOG helps to facilitate collaboration between member agencies to address issues that cross jurisdictional boundaries. SLOCOG members include the cities of Arroyo Grande, Atascadero, Grover Beach, Morro Bay, Paso Robles, Pismo Beach, and San Luis Obispo, as well as unincorporated areas of San Luis Obispo County.
The SLOCOG RSAP outlines a regionwide vision and goals aligned with FHWA’s Safe System Approach to
foster a culture of road safety within the region. The RSAP includes the following components:
» Historical crash data analysis to identify where crashes are happening, associated risk factors, and contributing crash factors;
» Propose evidence-based countermeasures to reduce the potential for crashes to happen and the severity when they do; and
» Highlight supportive non-infrastructure safety strategies to educate and engage the community towards achieving the safety objectives.
Community involvement played a crucial role in developing the RSAP, integrating public feedback to better understand road safety related experiences and concerns. An additional component of the RSAP includes a public facing Safety Dashboard and dynamic map to provide crash data information in support of continued efforts and collaborative information sharing.
Key partners/stakeholders in the RSAP’s development include County Public Works and Public Health departments, local law enforcement agencies, the California Highway Patrol (CHP), CalFire, emergency response (EMS) teams, safety advocates, and local agency planning and engineering staff.
Together, these stakeholders will collaborate to meet the goals outlined in the RSAP.
The Plan includes a systemic safety analysis to support adoption of the Safety Systems Approach to build a culture of safety within our region and work towards eliminating fatal and severe injury crashes. The Plan utilizes a systemic safety process and assess historical crash data to identify crash types and risk factors contributing to fatal and severe injury crashes, especially those located within unincorporated county which adequate lack safety plans; and develop a rating system representing crash potential throughout the roadway network. Once analyzed this will ensure countermeasures are implemented at locations with future crash potential, as opposed to relying on high-volume locations alone.
To explore crash statistics in greater detail, visit the data dashboard. The interactive dashboard includes ten worksheets each highlighting specific crash trends. Users can filter data by year, severity, crash type location, and the demographics of those involved. >>> Access Dashboard Here
As part of the technical assessment, a geospatial High Injury Network (HIN) based on crash trends and statistical analysis has been created to inform safety champions and SLOCOG member agency staff of the regional safety context. Although the data is protected by 23 U.S.C.~ 407, “and shall not be subject to discovery, nor admitted as evidence in any applicable legal proceedings.” partners are proceeding with caution and are not releasing the spatial information to the public at this time.