Driving simulation for road safety studies

The paper examines the outstanding potential of an innovative and useful technique, the utilization of driving-simulation systems, for road safety studies. The results of the studies carried out using the CRISS (Inter-University Research Center for Road Safety) advanced interactive fixed-base driving simulator have been reported. These studies were effectuated in order to: verify the CRISS driving simulator’s usefulness at a tool for speed research on two-lane rural roads; as well as to evaluate the extent to which cross-sections affects driver speeds. The study’s results demonstrate that: a) the CRISS fixed-base driving simulator affords us a reliable tool for the speed analysis of two-lane rural roads with alignment configurations that do not induce drivers to adopt high speeds; b) the width reduction of the cross-section brings about a decrease in speeds, but fails to alter the way in which the driver modifies his speeds as regards the different geometrical elements of the alignment. The results confirm that interactive driving-simulation offers us quite promising perspectives for road safety design.