Crash Reports

The Indiana University Public Policy Institute (PPI) collaborates with the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute (ICJI) to analyze annual crash data and assist with the State of Indiana’s policy-making process.

Designing and implementing effective traffic safety policies requires data-driven analyses of traffic collisions and their causes. These data and statistical analyses inform the public, practitioners, as well as state and national policy makers on matters of road safety. They also serve as the analytical foundation of traffic safety program planning and design in Indiana. 

The Problem Identification chapter of these annual reports provides an explanation of the goal setting process where the Traffic Safety Division of the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute develops a set of benchmarks to assess the state of traffic safety in Indiana as part of the Triennial Indiana Highway Safety Plan (HSP3). These benchmarks correspond to priority program areas established by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and target fatal and injury collisions as they relate to overall injuries, impaired driving, seat belt use, young drivers, motorcycle safety, dangerous driving, child passenger safety, and non-motorist injuries in collisions. Within each area, ICJI establishes specific annual data-driven goals and performance measures that address Indiana’s traffic safety problem areas.

The Indiana Department of Transportation's Office of Traffic Safety (https://www.in.gov/indot/traffic-engineering/traffic-safety-office/) administers traffic safety programs that strive to meet state and federal safety goals of reducing the risk of death, or serious injury resulting from traffic crashes. Traffic Safety works to reduce the frequency and severity of crashes for all users of Indiana’s streets, roads, and highways on both the state highway system and local roads. 

Indiana’s Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP) is a federally required statewide, comprehensive safety plan that provides a coordinated framework around which safety stakeholders can unite to reduce highway fatalities and serious injuries on all public roads. The Indiana’s SHSP is data-driven and establishes the goals, objectives, and strategies to advance the vision of zero fatalities and serious injuries (https://highways.dot.gov/safety/zero-deaths).

Indiana’s Strategic Highway Safety Plan, as required by title 23 U.S.C. § 148, identifies critical highway safety problems and opportunities for saving lives, reducing suffering, and economic losses resulting from traffic crashes. It also serves to coordinate the traffic safety activities of state agencies, municipal entities and private highway safety organizations. Indiana continually evaluates and periodically revises the SHSP.

The SHSP documents coordination of purpose, common data sources, cooperative problem identification, emphasis areas, and partnerships. The lead state agencies evaluate implementation action plans annually as part of federally required highway safety action plans and reports.

• Highway Safety Improvement Program (Per 23 CFR 924)
• Highway-Rail Grade Crossing Safety Action Plan (Per 49 U.S.C. § 202)
• Highway Safety Plan (Per 23 U.S.C. § 402)
• Commercial Vehicle Safety Plan (Per 49 CFR 350)

As called for by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), Indiana’s Vulnerable Road User (VRU) assessment examines the safety challenges faced by road users categorized as vulnerable, such as bicyclists, pedestrians, micro-mobility users, and other users of non-motorized vehicles (i.e., horse drawn conveyance). The Indiana VRU Assessment is Indiana’s newest plan to provide all local and state agencies a framework to address the safety needs of our most vulnerable road users such as pedestrians, pedalcyclist’ s, micro-mobility users and people using horse drawn conveyances.