Safety Processes

Implementing Highway Safety Manual Workflow

The Tennessee Department of Transportation uses AASHTOWare Safety to streamline its team’s workflow, specifically in centralizing key processes from the Highway Safety Manual into the application.

Implementation Effort

• Requires moderate effort
• Timeline between 4-6 weeks*

* Assuming an agency has an existing, configured AASHTOWare Safety instance and all required data

Required Data

• Crash Data
• Roadway Data
• Countermeasures

Focus Areas

• Highway Safety Manual
• Roadway Safety Management Process
• Project Development Process
• Network Screening

Process Overview

The Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) is passionate about improving processes to ensure their approach to road safety is effective and efficient. That’s why the department set out to find a more efficient way to streamline its existing internal roadway safety management processes.   

TDOT bases its safety analysis procedures on the Roadway Safety Management Process outlined in the Highway Safety Manual Part B. Since adopting AASHTOWare Safety, TDOT has centralized its processes in the software, making it easier to conduct its roadway safety analyses.

(Conducting a Network Screening)

Using AASHTOWare Safety, the TDOT team can seamlessly move between the different steps of the Roadway Safety Management Process.

(A sample analysis in Safety Analysis which recommends countermeasures and calculates benefit/cost)

Users can start the safety cycle by completing network screenings to identify roadways for potential safety improvement, diagnose problems, and identify focus areas.

(An example query diagnosing crash patterns at a given roadway)

Additionally, TDOT employees can select countermeasures, complete economic appraisals, prioritize projects, and eventually evaluate safety effectiveness—all within the same platform.

(A sample SPF for a given roadway grouping)

All of the tools needed to complete each stage of the Roadway Safety Management Cycle are available within AASHTOWare Safety.

With these improved operations, TDOT can ensure that everyone follows the same standards and uses the correct data to complete accurate and consistent safety analyses—all while increasing efficiency. 

“We set a goal to improve how we approach roadway safety management. We needed a more efficient way to integrate the Highway Safety Manual guidelines into our workflow. Thanks to AASHTOWare Safety, we’ve improved our internal processes and ensured everyone uses the same data and methodology to keep Tennessee’s roads safe.”

–Jeff Murphy, Tennessee Department of Transportation

More information on this topic can be found below:

• https://www.tn.gov/tdot.html