Research Papers (2009 – 2013)

Abstract

To implement a road network, one must decide a uniform road traffic flow. Vehicles will either travel on the right side or on the left side of the road depending on the country making the decision. Typically, a vehicle’s steering wheel is located on the opposite side of the flow of traffic. In Québec, Canada, this translates into a fleet nearly exclusively composed of vehicles with the steering wheel on the left hand side. However, due to the increased presence of right-hand drive vehicles in recent years in Québec, we wished to assess the accident risk for those vehicles and compare it with the accident risk for comparable left-hand drive vehicles. This was accomplished through a relative risk analysis. The analysis of the data on vehicles licensed in Québec and on accidents, the elimination or control of the main confounding effects and the performance of complementary analyses showed that vehicles in the “Sports – Right-Hand Drive” category presented an increased risk of 32% when compared with vehicles in the “Comparable – Left- Hand Drive” category.

François Tardif et Mark Baril