Safety Performance

Current federal surface transportation legislation continues the Highway Safety Improvement Program to achieve a significant reduction in traffic fatalities and serious injuries on all public roads, including non-state-owned public roads and roads on tribal lands. The program requires a data-driven, strategic approach to improving highway safety on all public roads that focuses on performance.

The Federal Highway Administration published the HSIP Final Rule and Safety Performance Management Measures Final Rule on March 15, 2016 with an effective date of April 14, 2016. The Colorado Department of Transportation was required to report its first round of safety targets to FHWA by August 31, 2017. DRCOG had until Feb. 27, 2018 to report its first round of safety targets to CDOT. Since the initial round of targets, CDOT and DRCOG are expected to establish and report safety targets annually using a five-year rolling average. DRCOG can agree to CDOT's measures or establish its own target specific to its planning area.

In a reflection of the importance of safety to the DRCOG Region, the DRCOG Board elected to establish safety performance measures specific to the DRCOG Region for the first round of safety targets and has continued that approach moving forward. Below are the current adopted targets for the Denver region

Safety Performance Measures

5-Year Rolling Average
Baseline  Targets
Number of fatalities Pending 249
Rate of fatalities per 100 million VMT Pending 0.915
Number of serious injuries Pending 1,703
Rate of serious injuries per 100 million VMT Pending 6.247
Number of non-motorized fatalities and serious injuries Pending 361