Title

Modeling road traffic crashes with zero-inflation and site-specific random effects

Authors

Authors

H. L. Huang;H. C. Chin

Comments

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Abbreviated Journal Title

Stat. Method. Appl.

Keywords

Traffic safety; Crash prediction model; Bayesian inference; Zero-inflated count model; Random effects; POISSON REGRESSION-MODELS; MOTOR-VEHICLE CRASHES; ACCIDENT FREQUENCIES; BAYESIAN-ANALYSIS; EXCESS ZEROS; COUNT DATA; DENSITIES; Statistics & Probability

Abstract

Zero-inflated count models are increasingly employed in many fields in case of "zero-inflation". In modeling road traffic crashes, it has also shown to be useful in obtaining a better model-fitting when zero crash counts are over-presented. However, the general specification of zero-inflated model can not account for the multilevel data structure in crash data, which may be an important source of over-dispersion. This paper examines zero-inflated Poisson regression with site-specific random effects (REZIP) with comparison to random effect Poisson model and standard zero-inflated poison model. A practical and flexible procedure, using Bayesian inference with Markov Chain Monte Carlo algorithm and cross-validation predictive density techniques, is applied for model calibration and suitability assessment. Using crash data in Singapore (1998-2005), the illustrative results demonstrate that the REZIP model may significantly improve the model-fitting and predictive performance of crash prediction models. This improvement can contribute to traffic safety management and engineering practices such as countermeasure design and safety evaluation of traffic treatments.

Journal Title

Statistical Methods and Applications

Volume

19

Issue/Number

3

Publication Date

1-1-2010

Document Type

Article

Language

English

First Page

445

Last Page

462

WOS Identifier

WOS:000281401700008

ISSN

1618-2510

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