(intense music)
- [Narrator] Safety experts are trying to find
innovative solutions to the number of Texas crashes
located at flagger stations,
which are set up during road construction or maintenance.
They know lives can be saved at these locations,
especially if they get motorists to slow down sooner.
- One of the things that TxDOT identified
was that in work zones at flagger stations,
that there's the end of the queue where traffic backs up,
that we were noticing a bunch of crashes
happening in that area,
and we wanted to look at ways to reduce that.
- When drivers approach these types of work zones,
they've already passed through several warning signs
that alert them to the work zone coming up ahead.
So we tried to look at ways to enhance that series of signs,
which included adding a flashing warning beacon
to the be prepared to stop sign,
and we also tried to add LED lights
to the border of the sign as well.
We also replaced the be prepared to stop sign
with a larger electronic message
and also used alternative language to state
stopped traffic ahead.
- They found very negligible changes in speed
for the adding LED strips to the warning sign,
adding the warning beacon lights to the sign,
adding the portable changeable message signs.
There was just very little change.
- So we came back in with another strategy,
which would include using the portable traffic signals
that TxDOT already has approved for use
in these same type of situations.
So we found that when the portable signal
was used versus having a human flagger,
the speed profile showed that people slowed down sooner
as they approached the stopping point
for the work operation.
- [Rafael] One of the things that we think happened
was that possibly since it sits higher,
people can see it from further away,
that they know what's coming up.
- Even though it's a limited amount of data,
those decelerations that we saw may help to reduce problems
with queued traffic.
- So our plan is to let the districts know,
let the design division, construction division,
maintenance division, let them know
the results of this study,
that we found that at flagger stations,
if they're having trouble with rear-end collisions
at the back of the queue, to look at putting
portable traffic signals.
- [Narrator] For more information,
and to find the publications for this project,
please visit the TxDOT Research Library
at the link shown below.