Exam Format and Content

Road Safety Professional Level 1 - Saudi Arabia

 

 

Domain 1: Foundations of Road Safety

Define road safety by using an approved reference source (e.g., Highway Safety Manual, highway safety plans).
Definition of road safety
Sources of road safety information (e.g., literature, contacts in government and professional organizations, peers)
Critiquing road safety definitions
Describe evidence-based road safety, including the distinction of nominal vs. substantive safety, by using road safety literature (e.g., ITE Handbook).
Nominal vs. substantive safety
Sources of road safety information (e.g., literature, contacts in government and professional organizations, peers)
Critiquing various sources of road safety literature
Interpreting and applying source information when applicable
Describe the contributing factors of traffic crashes and the impact of collision types and multidisicplinary characteristics on crash severity 
Sources of road safety information specific to crash causation
Collision characteristics (e.g., speed, multimodal crashes)
Relationship of severity to collision types
Various disciplines involved in road safety
Critiquing various sources of road safety literature
Considering diverse perspectives of various disciplines in determining crash causation
Describe vehicle characteristics and safety features, road users behaviors, ability and errors and their impacts on the selection of safety countermeasures
Sources of road safety information (e.g., literature, contacts in government and professional organizations, peers)
Road user behaviors
Road user ability
Road user vulnerability and frailty
Propensity for road user error
Propensity for road user adaptation
Vehicle physical and performance characteristics
Vehicle safety features (active and passive)
Focusing on relevant information from vast available information sources
Selecting the most relevant road safety information to the countermeasure under consideration
Identify partners in road safety by listing disciplines and agency types that have a role to play in preventing crashes and reducing their severity.
Sources of road safety information (e.g., literature, contacts in government and professional organizations, peers)
Multidisciplinary approach to road safety management
Who makes decisions affecting road safety
Facilitating collaboration between multidisciplinary stakeholders
Identifying organizational cultures of key stakeholders
Recognizing different professional responsibilities and perspectives on road safety
Describe different approaches to road safety management (e.g., traditional 4E, Haddon’s matrix, safe systems approach, Vision Zero).
History of the development of road safety management as well as emerging approaches (e.g., literature, contacts in government and professional organizations, peers)
Zeroing in on required information
Describe how to balance safety with other transportation goals (e.g., environment, congestion, mobility) by evaluating safety benefits and costs for comprehensive comparison and decision-making (e.g., benefits and cost analysis).
Sources of road safety information (e.g., literature, contacts in government and professional organizations, peers)
How safety competes with other priorities
Budget priorities
Approaches to estimate economic value of collision reduction
Approaches to estimate economic value of transportation costs and benefits (e.g., environment, travel time, connectivity)
Capital and operating costs of transportation infrastructure
Zeroing in on required information
Describe the elements of a culture that promotes road safety within an organization or discipline and how to achieve it.
Safety culture components
Road safety definition
Organizational behavior
Principles of leadership
Clear mission and vision statements
Strategic and comprehensive road safety plans
Identifying the changes required to promote a safety culture
Applying basic leadership principles
Promoting organizational change
Fostering a spirit of safety
Promoting the inclusion of a safety culture in all programs, policies, and project development
Discuss developments in policy and technology that will influence future decisions and actions in road safety.
Policy development in road safety
Trends in technology that impact road safety
Synthesizing future trends into policy in road safety
Implementing policy
 

Domain 2: Measuring Safety

Identify types, applications, and users of safety data, and discuss the challenges, limitations, and ways to mitigate them by using nontraditional safety data.
Types of safety data
Sources of safety data
Typical users of safety data
Difference between qualitative and quantitative data
Difference between traditional and nontraditional safety data
Limitations of different types of safety data
Distinguishing qualitative from quantitative safety data
Collecting and applying nontraditional safety data
Combining and analyzing sources of traditional and nontraditional safety data
Discuss how the quality of safety data can lead to more effective programs, projects, and initiatives and investments.
Analytical needs of the users of safety data
Components of safety data quality (e.g., NHTSA 6-pack)
Role of safety data in guiding safety programs, projects, and initiatives and investments
Evaluating the quality of safety data
Recognizing how data quality can influence outcomes
Conducting data-related process reviews
Explain how key factors (e.g., speed, volume, time of day) could affect the types, frequency, severity of crashes.
Physics of moving objects (i.e., mass and velocity)
Relationship between traffic volume and crash frequency (e.g., nonlinear)
Relationship between time of day and predominant crash types
Relationship between speed and crash severity
Assessing the key factors that affect crash frequency and severity at a specific safety concern or location
Describe definitions and primary components of quantitative safety analysis (e.g., SPFs and CMFs).
Definition of safety performance functions (SPFs)
Definition of crash modification factors (CMFs)
Describing the components of SPFs and how they are used
Describing the development of CMFs and how they are used
Describing the differences between SPFs and CMFs
Identifying the data needed to use SPFs and CMFs for evaluating safety performance
Explaining the difference between predicted and observed crash frequency
Describing the pitfalls of nonreliable estimates of CMFs (i.e., countermeasure effectiveness)

Domain 3: Human Behavior and Road Safety 

Identify key characteristics and limitations of human behavior that influence how road users interact with the roadway environment.
Human factors for road systems
Operation of the visual system
Attention, distraction, and information processing capabilities
Perception-reaction times
Basic elements of the driving task
Influence of road design on driver workload
User expectation
User adaptation
Identifying how human characteristics lead to road user error
Describe multidisciplinary safety strategies to modify human behavior.
Multidisciplinary approaches to addressing road user behavior (e.g., education, enforcement, engineering)
Common strategies that address human behavior within each discipline
Strategic or comprehensive highway safety plans
Key stakeholders within each discipline
Human behavior in the safety context
Interpreting safety data to identify underlying safety issues
Linking identified safety issues to appropriate multidisciplinary strategies
Coordinating multiple stakeholders to implement strategies
Describe the key characteristics of effective educational strategies (e.g., informational/awareness campaigns) and discuss their benefits and limitations in modifying human behavior.
Effective educational strategies
Data-driven approach to selecting strategies
Population demographics
Social norms
Pros and cons of venue, media, platform, etc.
Identifying a target audience
Developing appropriate safety messages
Applying marketing techniques
Evaluating a communication plan’s effectiveness
Evaluating short-, medium-, and long-term outcomes
Describe the key characteristics of effective enforcement campaigns and discuss their benefits and limitations in modifying human behavior.
Effective enforcement strategies
Data-driven approach to selecting strategies
Population demographics
Statutory/policy influences and limitations
Identifying enforcement locations and user groups
Crafting effective enforcement campaigns (e.g., scale, scope, timing, duration)
Evaluating strategy effectiveness
Interpreting data
Evaluating methods
Describe and give examples of how roadway infrastructure features and elements (e.g., traffic control devices, road alignment, cross section) affect human behavior.
Safety literature
Human factors for road systems
Driver adaptation and road elements (e.g., sight distance, alignment elements, resurfacing, illumination)
Driver adaptation to countermeasures (e.g., resurfacing, illumination)
Driver (or user) expectation based on roadway elements
Predominant crash types for roadway types (e.g., rural vs. urban, freeway vs. local road)
Interaction of road design and driver workload
Evaluating literature
Analyzing safety data to identify contributing factors related to roadway infrastructure
Evaluating short-, medium-, and long-term outcomes due to changes to or differences in roadway features and elements
Describe how human factors are considered in the process of planning, design, and operations to increase the safety of all road users.
Human physical, perceptual, and cognitive limitations
Probability and consequences of human error (especially injuries and fatalities)
Adaptation of drivers to road design
Road planning, design, and operations processes
Active transportation user needs and challenges
Interpreting human error vs. adaptation
Evaluating the impact of roadway features and elements on human behavior
Applying road planning design and operations processes
Describe how applying positive guidance principles to road elements can be used to affect road user behavior and improve safety performance.
Principles of positive guidance for road systems
Applications of positive guidance
Applying or selecting positive guidance strategies to specific safety concerns
Define and apply the driving task model (e.g., workload elements) to the process of identifying contributing factors to road user error.
Components of road user cognitive workload (e.g., signs, road alignment, internal and external distractions, other users)
Driving task hierarchy
Basic driver capabilities and limitations in performing the driving tasks
Vehicle, infrastructure, and road user interaction
Identifying and analyzing workload elements (e.g., driver attention and information processing ability, vision capability, perception-response time, speed choice)
Assessing driver, vehicle, and roadway interactions
 

Domain 4: Solving Safety Problems

Identify and describe the steps in a safety management process that uses effective data-driven procedures and methods to reduce fatalities and injuries caused by traffic collisions.
Safety management process (e.g., identification of sites with promise, diagnosis, countermeasure selection, cost-benefit analysis, project selection and prioritization, safety effectiveness evaluation)
Data sources
Different methods of assessing safety performance
Diagnostic tools
Managing data
Analyzing road safety data
Interpreting data
Identifying multidisciplinary road safety interventions
Diagnosing problems
Selecting evidence-based appropriate countermeasures
Assessing project and program costs
Evaluating outcomes
Identify and describe a systemwide (countermeasure-oriented) approach.
Safety management process (e.g., identification of countermeasures with promise, diagnosis, countermeasure selection, cost-benefit analysis, project selection and prioritization, safety effectiveness evaluation)
Data sources
Systemic assessment methods
Effective multidisciplinary countermeasures
Analyzing and interpreting road safety data
Identifying system-level crash trends and conducting systemic analysis
Selecting appropriate evidence-based countermeasures
Assessing project and program costs
Conducting an evaluation of effectiveness
List reliable sources of multidisciplinary countermeasures to reduce fatalities and serious injuries.
Primary safety disciplines
Sources of high-quality road safety literature
Multidisciplinary countermeasures and their impacts
Locating relevant literature
Evaluating the quality of literature
Applying multidisciplinary countermeasures
Describe tools and techniques used to diagnose safety problems and describe their specific advantages and disadvantages.
Crash data elements (e.g., crash type, crash severity, time of day)
Diagnostic techniques
Diagnostic tools
Surrogate safety measures
Interpreting crash data
Conducting safety analysis
Articulating safety analysis results and findings
Describe multidisciplinary approaches that can be used to evaluate and deploy the most effective solutions.
Multidisciplinary approaches
Evaluation methods
Recognizing appropriate solutions
Evaluating solutions
Understand collision patterns and crash contributing factors by analyzing safety data 
Crash type
Crash report elements (e.g., location, time of day, weather conditions)
Crash contributing factors
Analyzing crash data
Identifying patterns (collision diagramming)
Describe user-specific interventions targeted for different population demographics.
Population demographics
Types of user-specific interventions
Analyzing population-based data
Differentiating traits, vulnerabilities, and risks of different user populations
Selecting multidisciplinary population-based interventions
Identify how countermeasure costs and benefits can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of program and project investments.
Techniques to estimate costs and benefits
Evaluation processes
Program and project investments
Assessing investment opportunities
Producing a cost-benefit analysis
Evaluating outcomes
Identify the elements of a countermeasure evaluation by using data to determine its impacts (e.g., positive and negative impacts).
Evaluation methods
How to measure safety impacts
Data sources
Identifying and acquiring sources of data
Interpreting data
Assessing safety impacts
Identify techniques for estimating and comparing the safety performance of different project alternatives.
Safety performance measures
Development of project alternatives
Analyzing safety performance of project alternatives
Comparing safety performance
 

Domain 5: Implementing Road Safety Programs

Describe how strategic safety plans are prepared and used.
Basic highway safety strategic plans (e.g., SHSP, HSP, TRCC Strategic Plan, AASHTO, GHSA, Road Safety Action Plans, UN Decade Action for Road Safety)
Describing the essential components of a strategic safety plan
Listing the key stakeholders who should be involved in creating a safety strategic plan
Describing how strategic safety plans influence the use of safety funding and resources
Evaluating results of the strategies and overall program, including implementation and monitoring
List important elements of successful road safety policies and programs.
Past successful and unsuccessful policies and programs (e.g., decrease/increase of speed limits, traffic control, automated enforcement tools, adoption of cable medium barrier)
What determines the success of a safety policy/program
Common attributes of effective safety policies and programs (e.g., data-driven, multidisciplinary, training, strategic planning, research)
Identifying the “cause and effect” link between the problem and the policy/program
Determining the practicality of implementation
Choosing the appropriate data system(s) on which to build the policy/program (e.g., crash, roadway, driver, vehicle, citation/adjudication, EMS/injury surveillance)
Identifying multidisciplinary stakeholders appropriate for the policy/program (e.g., behavioral specialists, engineers, educators, law enforcement, medical personnel)
Conducting or applying research to shape the policy/program (e.g., TRB, NHTSA, FHWA, state research programs, IIHS, AAA)
Explain the role and value of leaders, safety champions, and coalitions in influencing road safety policies and programs.
Various types of  leaders, safety champions, and coalitions (e.g., elected officials, advocacy groups, industry professionals, internal organizational)
What  leaders, safety champions, and coalitions contribute
Developing appropriate platforms to support  leader, safety champion, and coalition involvement
Facilitating collaboration with multidisciplinary multi-agency stakeholders
Identify elements of successful communication and outreach strategies for road safety initiatives 
Basic outreach strategies (e.g., advertising, public meetings, PSAs, safety fairs)
Identifying a target audience
Choosing strategies appropriate for the audience
Developing compelling safety messages
Building and fostering relationships
Describe how multidisciplinary teams and partnerships can achieve road safety goals.
Roles of various disciplines (e.g., engineering, planning, education, enforcement, public health, emergency services) in road safety leadership
Existing guides or platforms that facilitate road safety action plans
Benefits and strengths of multidisciplinary teams
Building and fostering relationships
Leveraging resources
Applying guides or platforms used to facilitate road safety action plans
Describe safety program evaluation and explain how results influence future program delivery.
Availability and limitations of program-level data
Program (or process) review steps
When and how to conduct a program evaluation
The product of a program evaluation
Different evaluation methods (e.g., process, outcome)
Conducting a process or program evaluation
Identifying key components for the program evaluation
Interpreting program evaluation results to inform changes
Updating or adjusting the plan based on evaluation feedback