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- [Announcer] It's becoming
much more dangerous

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to walk on our nation's streets.

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In Texas, today's pedestrian deaths

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account for an estimated 20%
of all traffic fatalities.

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That's almost double from
the 12% of all deaths

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just 10 years ago.

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- Being a pedestrian is
like 50 times as dangerous

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as being inside a vehicle

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because you don't have
that huge motorized shell

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to protect you.

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You're a very vulnerable user

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and yet it's a really healthy
mode of transportation

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and we absolutely want
to see a lot more of it.

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- They looked at 10 years
worth of pedestrian crash data

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throughout the entire state

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and so I think in that the
scale of that is different

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than other research projects that have

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focused on pedestrian and bicycle crashes.

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- [Announcer] From the
analysis, researchers were able

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to identify the most dangerous

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pedestrian corridors in the state

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based on the crashes
over a 10 year period.

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Five corridors in Austin were
deemed the most dangerous

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and four Houston corridors
were also in the top 10.

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San Antonio was the
other metropolitan area,

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with the top ranked dangerous corridor.

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The researchers also revealed
the most dangerous areas

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in each of the five biggest
regions of the state.

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Houston, Dallas Fort Worth, San Antonio,

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Austin and El Paso.

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- These crashes occur all over the place.

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They often occur late at night

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and so they can be in various positions

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on this extensive network
that we have here.

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And so we're layering all
that information together

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for hundreds of thousands of crashes

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and then we're going in deep
on the pedestrian crashes

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and looking for those
really dangerous corridors

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and intersections to see if we can suggest

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really cost effective treatments

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to bring those numbers down.

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- [Announcer] The research
revealed vital information,

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including that 50% of the
pedestrian deaths in Austin

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were of people who were homeless.

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Weekend nights, early mornings
were especially deadly

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and alcohol was a major contributor.

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Also, elderly pedestrians
were much more likely to die

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from a vehicle strike than
were young pedestrians.

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- That's part of the
product that we've provided

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at TxDOT is a whole list of treatments

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and some are very easy to imagine

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and others you have to
be much more specific

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and everything is site specific.

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So there's some places where pedestrians

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heavily use the northbound crosswalk

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or the east side crosswalk and
so you really have to zoom in

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on each site specifically and
we took the time to do that

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for 10 or more of the most dangerous sites

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and we hope through an
implementation project

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to be doing another a hundred or so sites

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and that will be a nice list of places

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just to go either as a DOT or a city

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or a county transportation official

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and help make those improvements.

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- I think in general,
there's been more of a focus

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on pedestrian crashes and specifically

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because they make up
such a outsize portion

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of overall roadway crashes.

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And so I think with that additional focus

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on reducing these type of crashes

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and designing better pedestrian facilities

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so that these crashes happen less often,

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I'm optimistic that the
timing of this research

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will really assist with
some of the initiatives

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that are going on throughout TxDOT.

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- [Announcer] For more information

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and to find the publications
for this project,

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please visit the TxDOT research library

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at the link shown below.