A Methodology to Define the Level of Safety of Public Transport Bus Stops, Based on the Concept of Risk

SRM is the Public Transport (PT) Authority of Bologna, managing PT 37 Mkm/year service contract and taking also care of the safety of the whole bus stops network, consisting of 6.700 stops.Most of bus stops have been established more than 30 years ago. During decades, PT network, number of users and road characteristics changed a lot and some bus stops are now less safe than before.A specific instrument was therefore needed in order to define a list of priority, also on the basis of what foreseen by the Regulation on service quality (ISO 13816).In 2010 a survey on all the PT stops was carried out, collecting about 120 information each (concerning geometric features as user waiting area conditions, user's accessibility, road characteristics, GPS location, etc) and pictures. A database was fed by all these information.At the same time, an algorithm able to calculate the Level of Safety of bus stops was defined, starting from the concept of Risk as a combination of Probability and Damage. The algorithm can now assign a mark from 1 (worst) to 10 (best) to bus stops, on the basis of all collected data and of external factors such as vehicular traffic, vehicles speed, number of users per day at the bus stop, number of buses per day. Also the statistic data of car accidents occurred close to stops in the last 8 years were taken into account.Finally, a sort of catalogue of possible and standardized measures was produced in order to make a stop safer or to build a new safe bus stop. This catalogue can be also used to identify the maintenance works to be done to allow a bus stop to reach a predefined condition or mark. These features are now included in a specific software owned by the Authority, who is committed to spread information among administrations and operators.