Motorcycle Crash Patterns Along Exclusive Motorcycle Lanes In Malaysia

Motorcycle crashes are being notified as the main contributor to road fatality in our country. Motorcyclists, as the vulnerable road user, are not protected while traveling along the traffic. The exclusive motorcycle lanes have been introduced to tackle the problem by segregating the motorcycle from the main traffic. However, motorcycle accident are still occurring on the exclusive motorcycle lanes. In this study, motorcycle crashes occurred along the exclusive motorcycle lanes in Malaysia was investigated. This study has been focusing on crashes which are roadside object related. The motorcyclists are exposed to roadside hazards while travelling along the pathways. The study has been focused to determine possible risk factors causing fatalities in motorcycle crashes along exclusive motorcycle lanes, to identify the harmful roadside objects to motorcyclist along exclusive motorcycle lanes and to determine the multivariate relationships between the injury severity and other factors of motorcycle crashes along the exclusive motorcycle lanes. The study unveiled that the fatality risk factors for overall motorcycle crashes along exclusive motorcycle lanes in Malaysia are the road geometry of the crash location, the brightness condition during the crash and finally, the roadside object involvement in the crashes. Fatality risk is found to be higher while colliding with roadside objects, at straight section on the lanes, and crashing during night-time. Furthermore, roadside object is approximately 2.0 times more likely to cause fatality in motorcycle crashes along the exclusive motorcycle lanes. Guardrail has recorded as the most being struck object which represented 20.6% of all roadside object related crashes and 23.5% of all fatal cases were guardrail related. However, narrow surface objects, (e.g. tree trunks, traffic sign posts, streetlighting poles) were determined 2.3 times more likely to cause severe injury compared to non-narrow surface objects (e.g. guardrails, tunnel walls). Therefore, guardrail should be provided to protect the motorcyclist from colliding narrow surface object as initial impact. The study further established that guardrail as one of the factors to cause fatality. Thus, a new guardrail design should be introduced to the exclusive motorcycle lane. Lateral offsets of the collided objects were found to be correlated to injury severity (p < 0.10). From the overall roadside object related motorcycle crashes, 85% involved object planted at an offset distance 155 cm or less from the roadside. Furthermore, multivariate analysis has verified that a higher injury severity if motorcycle crashes involved narrow surface object occurred at location where the lane width is more than 300 cm and the narrow object is planted at the offset distance 151.3 cm or less from roadside. Another multivariate analysis performed on wide surface object crashes has shown that higher injury severity to motorcyclist if crashes involved guardrail, crashes during night-time, involved wide surface object that planted at offset distance 75 cm or less from roadside and it is a single motorcycle crash Therefore, the existing design criteria of roadside object needed to be reviewed and improved in order to achieve a safer exclusive motorcycle lane in Malaysia

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