Proposed New Access Density Definition and Its Correlation with Crash Rates

Access management is an important contributor for highway safety. The objective of this study is to propose a new access density definition and demonstrate its correlation with crash rates. Nine different access types were considered. Access types, number of lanes, speed limit, and level of service were used in the traffic simulation. Access weight was extracted from the simulation results, and access density was calculated based on access weight. Each access type has 36 categories; the total number of access weight types is 324. The crash data analysis results show that crash rates are more correlated with the proposed access density of this study than that in previous literature.