Would the creation of complete streets around Springfield decrease fatality rates for new drivers?
Issues on the Road
Real World Problems/ Applications
Background Context on Complete Streets
In Huang's article on Urban Street Design, mentions that the evaluation of Shashen Road needs significant improvements in several aspects, such as walking infrastructure, cycling lanes, public transport facilities, and the livability of the streets. Addressing these are important for enhancing road safety and decreasing fatality rates among teenagers, as it can create a more pedestrian- and road friendly environment while ensuring public transportation options and reducing the likelihood of accidents. Given this, they believed that complete streets would be the solution to their problems and they apply it.
In terms of analysis, this piece demonstrates an example of how the complete streets technique worked in a real place. This technique made things safer and gave a wide-spread of more opportunities/ space on the road. Supports my research because it shows that the complete streets design did work to help make the streets on Shashen Road, which leads to yes- complete streets would decrease fatality rates for new drivers- as it overall improves safety.
Pan's article from the Boston Globe, mentions that the roads have become more dangerous than usual in Massachusetts- as expressed by the alarming increase of teenage fatality rates. They've noticed the problem and especially noticed a larger increase after the COVID-19 pandemic ended.
Mental Health and Driving Behavior on Teens
In "The Influence of Sensitivity to Reward and Punishment, Propensity for Sensation Seeking, Depression, and Anxiety on the Risky Behaviour of Novice Drivers...", the article mentions the relationship between psychological traits and risky driving behavior among young novice drivers. It mentions that depression, reward sensitivity, and sensation-seeking propensity predict risky behavior. Gender and anxiety levels also play a role in risky driving. The passage suggests that interventions should consider these variables to improve road safety outcomes for both young and older drivers.
In "Complete Streets, Prioritizing Safety for All Road Users:" they use California as an example of implementing the compete streets technique. Complete Streets: Prioritizing Safety for All “Our complete streets work is imperative to ensuring safe, accessible, connected transportation options for all Californians." Meaning that this was designed to help Californians on the road, and it did.
This article also mentions the death of 4 teenage crashes within a short time span. Which emphasizes the normalization of teen fatality rates and how much of a problem it is.This article gives me data to use towards my research question by providing evidence among these high rates, allowing people to understand that this problem needs to be solved.
Pan's article from the Boston Globe also mentions that there has also been a noticed of anxiety and depression increasing over the course of the pandemic. Teenagers are the most common to be struggling with anxiety and depression, which can be a cause of their high fatality rates, mentioned by a mental aguish- these mental conditions may be playing a factor on the road.
Connecting "The Influence The Influence of Sensitivity to Reward and Punishment, Propensity for Sensation Seeking, Depression, and Anxiety on the Risky Behaviour of Novice Drivers..." and "I think this is going to be a bad year" by Pan, both articles mention how a teenagers mental health can affect their driving behavior, which eventually leads to issues on the road- which explains why their fatality rates are so high. Pan's article focuses on the alarming concern of the high statistics and mentions issues that could have caused these, while pyschological influences on risky behaviors mentions why teenagers may be having trouble overall.
The US Department of Transportation defines complete streets as being designed to create safety for everyone. They'll help make traveling more efficient by providing better plans for the roads. Along with reducing motor vehicle crashes and pedestrian risk.
This connects to my research because it shows how complete streets would work which allows me to think how this could possibly decrease teenage fatality rates. It states that complete streets can reduce motor vehicle crashes and pedestrian risk. which helps support my research because it proves that complete streets makes roads a better place and can decrease crashes (in this case- I'm thinking teenage crashes are still crashes so this factors into this scenario)
This connects to my research by allowing new drivers/teenagers to feel safer on the road and less stressed about their new journey. It is also mentioned here that complete streets have the potential to narrow fatality rates to zero, which strongly supports my research as well.
In Complete Streets: Prioritizing Safety for All Road Users, they claim that the complete streets design approach focuses on making roads safe and convenient for everyone. It involves careful planning to control speeds, separate different types of road users like walkers, bikers, and those using public transportation, and enhance accessibility, especially for people with disabilities. Indicating that this will promote safety in the streets.
Both sources on complete streets connect because they both talk about how designing streets with safety in mind, known as complete streets and how it can make roads better and reduce accidents. DPOT mentions that complete streets can decrease crashes and risks for pedestrians. Road users goes into more detail, explaining that complete streets involve careful planning to control speeds, separate different types of road users, and make roads accessible for everyone. Both sources support my research by showing that complete streets can make roads safer, especially for new drivers like teenagers, and have the potential to reduce the number of accidents and fatalities.
Real World Applications and the background on Complete Streets connect to one another because both sources on CS demonstrate their design structure and how it can be used to increase, meanwhile the Urban Streets Design based in China article does a good job on presenting how the complete streets technique actually fell into place when used. In other words, the complete streets background was just put into application to show how it really can help improve the safety on the road.
This supports my research by emphasizing the approach to take teenage mental health into more consideration, and paying more attention to their application on the road/driving behavior.
By addressing these factors, we become more aware of trying to navigate for a solution to solve with teenagers behind the road. We now realize that the driving behavior from teens can most likely be caused by the mental health/ illnesses. But we now wonder if complete streets would be the solution to this and if it would help decrease the anxiety they may be facing on the road.
Pan also mentions that teenage brains are also less developed which allows them to take more risks- causing them to be in more danger on the road. This is a real problem, because what can be done to help this? Should there be adjustments in what ages can drive? Should teens have a curfew on the road? Can complete streets help fix this issue?