Effects of Street Pattern on Frequency of Traffic Crash

Traffic accidents have become a leading cause of death on streets, and this phenomenon has spread across the entire world. The number of deaths due to crashes of two vehicles or one vehicle hitting a pedestrian or a cyclist has grown at a staggering pace in the past, and this is a concerning issues for governments all around the world. While the subject has been mostly looked through the lens of alcohol influence on drivers and traffic rules violations, the present research will go through the lens of road infrastructure. The study will compare different types of street patterns on the district level to see of there exists an association with the frequency of road accidents. Moscow has been used as the study area for the current research. Moscow is one of the largest and most populous cities around the world and it is characterized by evident problems of traffic jams and deaths due to road crashes. A data of 438 panel observations of traffic accidents frequency in Moscow districts from 2015 to 2017 has been collected and analyzed in the study using the Poisson Regression Model and Least Squares Regression Model. The degenerate grid and mixed street patterns were found to decrease the number of road accidents, while the other patterns are not safer than the quasi grid pattern which was chosen as the reference category.