Traffic Safety Study at Calgary Elementary Schools

University of Calgary

Status: Withdrawn

Conditions: Motor Vehicle Injury

Treatments: Other: Traffic Calming Curbs; Other: In-Street Pedestrian Sign

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT04956250

REB19-1455

Details and patient eligibility

About

Installing specific traffic calming features designed to reduce vehicle speed and volume around schools may lead to a reduction in injury risk for child pedestrians and bicyclists, and may increase numbers of children walking and bicycling to school. Therefore, this study seeks to evaluate the effectiveness of specific built environment features at influencing traffic speed and volume, and active transportation, both immediately following installation and months later.

Full description

Background Collisions with motor-vehicles are a leading cause of severe child bicyclist and pedestrian injuries in Canada. Injury rates and severity are associated with traffic speeds and volume but may be moderated through traffic calming.

Objective To assess the association of specific traffic calming measures on changes in traffic speed and volume, and active transportation prevalence, around Calgary, Alberta, Canada elementary schools.

Design This modified stepped-wedge randomized controlled trial was conducted at a sample of public elementary schools, from July 2020 to May 2021. Schools had either traffic calming curbs or in-street signs installed at an intersection within 100 m of the main entrance. The primary outcome was speed of vehicles driving towards or away from intervention. Secondary outcomes were traffic volume driving past the intervention and counts of children using active transportation at the intervention crosswalk.

Sex: All

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion and exclusion criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• No individual participants are recruited.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Sequential Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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0 participants in 2 patient groups

Traffic Calming Curb Group

Experimental group

Description:

Traffic calming curbs are yellow concrete slabs designed by the City of Calgary to be the same height as other roadside curbs and improve safety by reducing the street width, similar to curb extensions.

Treatment:

Other: Traffic Calming Curbs

In-Street Sign Group

Experimental group

Description:

In-street pedestrian signs are regulatory signs placed along the centre line of the street, to remind road users of a pedestrian right-of-way at the marked/unmarked crosswalk.

Treatment:

Other: In-Street Pedestrian Sign