When Hamilton County sought to improve roadway safety and create a strategic path toward reducing traffic-related deaths and serious injuries, B&N was engaged to lead the development of a Comprehensive Safety Action Plan (CSAP) through the federal Safe Streets and Roads for All (SS4A) Grant Program.
The CSAP serves as a foundational step in identifying safety priorities and creating an implementation-ready roadmap for improving safe travel conditions for residents and visitors across the county. B&N is providing transportation safety planning, stakeholder and public engagement, data analysis, implementation strategy development and potential priority project layouts.
A key component of the project is the integration of the Safe System Approach (SSA), a framework that recognizes human error as inevitable and focuses on reducing the likelihood that mistakes result in severe injuries or fatalities. Using systemic safety analysis, the project team evaluates roadway conditions, crash patterns and risk factors to identify opportunities for proactive safety improvements. A unique feature of this project was its focus on horizontal and vertical roadway alignment to identify higher-risk areas for roadway departure crashes. B&N’s Geospatial and Data Services team developed methodologies to evaluate the curvature and terrain steepness to predict where future crashes may be more likely to occur.
B&N's approach emphasizes implementation from the outset. The team is developing recommendations that can advance into future funding opportunities and construction projects, helping Hamilton County move from planning to action. To further strengthen implementation potential, the CSAP is being aligned with the Ohio Department of Transportation's Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP), creating consistency with statewide safety priorities and supporting future grant competitiveness.
The planning process incorporates input from stakeholders, community members and agency partners to ensure proposed strategies reflect local needs and priorities. Combined with data-driven analysis and national experience delivering SS4A safety plans, this collaborative approach will help Hamilton County establish a clear, actionable framework for improving roadway safety.
By combining technical expertise, community engagement and implementation-focused planning, the project supports Hamilton County's long-term vision of eliminating roadway fatalities and serious injuries while creating a safer transportation network for everyone who travels throughout the county.