DESTINATION SAFE’S SAFETY BLUEPRINT, TOWARD ZERO DEATHS

The Kansas City Regional Transportation Safety Blueprint has been developed by Destination Safe, the region’s multidisciplinary transportation safety coalition, as a guide and reference document for decisionmakers who see reduction of roadway fatalities in the Kansas City region. This document provides information about the current state of roadway safety in the region, sets a regional goal for fatality reductions, identifies priorities and focus areas for improvements, and presents strategies for reducing fatalities in each of the focus areas.

Recognizing that the decision-making and funding mechanisms for transportation — specifically transportation safety — projects in the region are different in Missouri, Kansas and individual counties and cities in the region, this Blueprint presents crash data by state and county as well as for the entire region. Ideally, transportation safety partners can use this document to help identify the priorities for safety improvement in their own jurisdictions.

The Kansas City Regional Transportation Safety Blueprint, Toward Zero Deaths, 2013–2017, Destination Safe’s blueprint, is modeled primarily after the Missouri’s Blueprint to Save More Lives — 2012–2016 and the report’s focus area. However, the data presented in this document was provided by both MoDOT and KDOT, and the strategies presented for each focus area were taken from multiple sources, including the two state Strategic Highway Safety Plans and various resources from AASHTO and FHWA.

Destination Safe, like MoDOT and KDOT, has adopted a “Toward Zero Deaths” philosophy of transportation safety. The “Toward Zero Deaths” mindset acknowledges the importance of every life lost on roadways and that we should work tirelessly to reach a goal of no deaths on our region’s roadways. While the ultimate goal is zero deaths, we also recognize the importance of setting benchmark goals along the way to measure progress toward our ultimate goal. The study period in this plan, 2008–2012, averaged 211 fatalities annually for the region, with a high in both 2008 and 2012 of 232, and a low in 2011 of 182. Recognizing yearto-year variability in transportation-related fatalities, Destination Safe has set a goal of achieving an average of 180 or fewer roadway fatalities annually over the period of this plan — years 2013 to 2017. The new goal represents a 15 percent reduction in the five-year average. A steady decline of ten fatalities each year from the previous five-year average, beginning in 2013 is the approximate equivalent to a goal of 160 fatalities or fewer by 2017. Measured from the base year of 200 in 2013 to 160 fatalities in the final year represents a 20 percent reduction. This will significantly move both Missouri and Kansas toward their reduction goals. Figure 1 provides a visual representation of the region’s fatality reduction goal.

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