Tulare County is recognized as one of the areas with the highest economic growth in the country. Visalia-Porterville alone is widely known for its strong agricultural region. However, because of its business bloom, Visalia has become a high traffic area. USATODAY has reported Visalia’s traffic fatalities per 100,000 people were at 15.5, amongst the worst in the country. UC Berkley’s SafeTREC interactive map has been able to track the number of traffic accidents in the city. In 2017, the top intersections with the greatest number of accidents in the Visalia area, included:
- Ben Maddox Way/ Houston Ave.
- Ben Maddox Way/Noble Ave.
- Ben Maddox Way/Douglas Ave.
- Ben Maddox Way /Goshen Ave.
- Caldwell Ave/County Center Dr.
- Demaree St/ Tulare Ave.
- Locust St./Oak Ave.
The U.S. Federal and Highway Administration (FHWA) has previously briefed on the importance of intersection safety and mentioned some of the factors that can contribute to intersection accidents. Those factors involve human error and poor decision making. Those can be split between the driver of the vehicle and the designer or engineer of the specific road. The behavior of the driver is always impactful, because a driver’s inattention can contribute to an accident at large. Behaviors such as distracted driving or impaired driving can hinder a driver’s ability to gage his surroundings widely and in a timely fashion enough to avoid an accident.
The FHWA further evaluates the road designers and engineers’ ability to understand human factors when looking at road conditions that are no not attributed to the driver but instead to the poor features and signalizations of the established road. Designers and engineers have the job of measuring a human’s perception to make informed decisions on the placement of road signals and features.
If you suffered an accident, it is important to consider road conditions just as driver behavior. Contact Yarian & Associates, APC. for legal counsel if you were involved in a car accident near Visalia, CA.
