Impacts of Alternative Yield Sign Placement on Pedestrian Safety

Abstract

Although pedestrian crashes account for only 1% of reported motor vehicle crashes in the United States, pedestrian crashes account for 14% of fatal crashes. Pedestrians are at a higher risk of fatalities than are automobile operators when crashes per traveling distance are considered. Because of the high societal costs of pedestrian crashes, measures designed to reduce their frequency and severity should receive high priority. Additional countermeasures such as crosswalks and signs need to be devised to decrease pedestrian–automobile collisions. The main objective of this study was to investigate the effects of yield signs on yielding for pedestrians and on traffic speed and the implication of these effects for pedestrian safety. The city of Grand Forks, North Dakota, and the University of North Dakota campus were used as test sections. Data were collected on yielding for pedestrians and on traffic speed without and with a yield sign. The two-proportion z-test and an independent t-test were used to investigate the effect of the sign on yielding for pedestrians and on traffic speed, respectively. Placing a yield sign at the crosswalk is the most effective way of increasing yielding for pedestrians. The percentage of drivers not yielding for pedestrians and of pedestrian–driver conflicts are significantly lower in the presence of the sign. The presence of the sign results in lower average traffic speed, which implies that the risk to pedestrians will be lower if there is a crash.