New York Department of Transportation

Data Integration in CLEAR 

New York State’s Safety Management Tool

SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY 

FHWA-SA-20-060 

Federal Highway Administration Office of Safety 

Roadway Safety Data Program 

http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/rsdp
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

Notice 

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appear in this report only because they are considered essential to the objective of the document. 

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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

1. Report No.

FHWA-SA-20-060

2. Government Accession 

No.

3. Recipient's Catalog No.

 

4. Title and Subtitle

Data Integration in CLEAR

New York State’s Safety Management Tool

5. Report Date

November 2020

6. Performing Organization Code

7.Author(s) 

Matt Albee, Ian Hamilton, and Catherine Chestnutt

8. Performing Organization Report No.

9. Performing Organization Name and Address

Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, Inc (VHB)

940 Main Campus Drive, Suite 500 

Raleigh, NC 27606 

10. Work Unit No.

11. Contract or Grant No.

DTFH61-16-D-00052

12. Sponsoring Agency Name and Address

Federal Highway Administration Office of Safety 

1200 New Jersey Ave., SE

Washington, DC 20590

13. Type of Report and Period

Case Study, January 2020-January 

2022

14. Sponsoring Agency Code

FHWA

15. Supplementary Notes

The contract managers for this report was Esther Strawder and Jerry Roche. 

16. Abstract

The New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) has a broad-reaching goal to provide safe and efficient 

roadways throughout the State. This case study presents NYSDOT’s significant advancement in safety data integration and 

analysis. NYSDOT is developing a State-specific safety management system known as the Crash Location and Engineering 

Analysis Repository (CLEAR). Funded through State Planning and Research funds, CLEAR will replace three existing 

legacy systems, meet all safety performance legislation and federal standards for reporting, and support the six-step 

roadway safety management process outlined in the Highway Safety Manual. A geographic information systems-enabled 

crash geocoding engine will automate several steps in the geolocation process, as well as support accurate and timely 

delivery of crash data between the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles and NYSDOT. CLEAR will enhance 

safety analysis workflows, reinforce existing safety analysis standards, and increase user access to advanced analytical 

tools.

17. Key Words: 

Data integration, safety, safety management 

system, highway safety manual

18. Distribution Statement

No restrictions.

19. Security Classif. (of this report)

Unclassified

20. Security Classif. (of this 

page) Unclassified

21. No. of Pages

 14 

22. Price

Technical Documentation Page
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

Acronyms

Acronym Description

ACG Accident Crash Geocoder 

ALIS Accident Location Information System 

CLEAR Crash Location and Engineering Analysis Repository 

FDE Fundamental Data Elements 

FHWA Federal Highway Administration 

GIS geographic information system 

HSIP Highway Safety Improvement Program 

HSM Highway Safety Manual 

ICL Interactive Crash Locator

IIM Intersection Inventory Management 

LRS linear referencing system

MIRE Model Inventory of Roadway Elements

MPO metropolitan planning organization 

NYSDMV New York State Department of Motor Vehicles 

NYSDOT New York State Department of Transportation 

PIES Post Implementation Evaluation System 

SHSP Strategic Highway Safety Plan 

SIMS Safety Information Management System 

SP&R State Planning and Research 
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

Table of Contents

Introduction............................................................................................................................................... 1

Funding....................................................................................................................................................... 2

Legacy Systems ......................................................................................................................................... 2

Capabilities of CLEAR .............................................................................................................................. 2

Training ...................................................................................................................................................... 5

Challenges.................................................................................................................................................. 5

Next Steps ................................................................................................................................................. 6

Conclusions and Lessons Learned ........................................................................................................... 6

References .................................................................................................................................................. 7

List of Figures

Figure 1. Graphic. Manually locating crashes in CLEAR. ...................................................................... 3

Figure 2. Graphic. Roadway safety management process..................................................................... 4
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

Executive Summary

The New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) has a broad-reaching goal to provide safe and 

efficient roadways throughout the State. This case study presents NYSDOT’s significant advancement in safety 

data integration and analysis. NYSDOT is developing a State-specific safety management system known as the 

Crash Location and Engineering Analysis Repository (CLEAR). Funded through State Planning and Research 

funds, CLEAR will replace three existing legacy systems, meet all safety performance legislation and federal 

standards for reporting, and support the six-step roadway safety management process outlined in the Highway 

Safety Manual. A geographic information systems-enabled crash geocoding engine will automate several steps in 

the geolocation process, as well as support accurate and timely delivery of crash data between the New York 

State Department of Motor Vehicles and NYSDOT. CLEAR will enhance safety analysis workflows, reinforce 

existing safety analysis standards, and increase user access to advanced analytical tools.
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

Introduction 

The New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) has a broad-reaching goal to provide safe and 

efficient roadways throughout the State by applying sound traffic engineering in an effort to prevent crashes, 

eliminate fatalities, and reduce the severity of injuries sustained. NYSDOT has had a robust safety management 

program for many years through data-driven efforts like the Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP) and project 

implementation through the Highway Safety Improvement Program (HSIP). 

NYSDOT was an early adopter of a linear referencing system (LRS) for transportation and safety data 

management. However, as data systems become outdated and technologies advance, the need for a new, 

customized safety tool became apparent. NYSDOT is developing a State-specific safety management system 

known as the Crash Location and Engineering Analysis Repository (CLEAR). The objectives of the system itself 

are guided by improving data integration, increasing user access, and enhancing current safety management 

methods and processes. These objectives help support the roadway safety management process in the Highway 

Safety Manual (HSM) at NYSDOT.

Prior to the development of CLEAR, NYSDOT could only perform network screening on State roads. CLEAR 

will increase NYSDOT’s ability to include locally owned roads into the network screening and safety 

management process.

Purpose and Need 

NYSDOT is developing a roadway safety management tool that integrates crash, roadway inventory, and traffic 

volumes on all public roads. The tool, known as CLEAR, is part of a larger transportation data system 

implementation effort to:

• Revise highway safety program business processes/workflows, with updated documentation.

• Transition to the Statewide Enterprise LRS containing all public roads. 

• Migrate legacy data to a new database.

• Retire three legacy safety management systems.

• Train and educate the user community within NYSDOT and its safety partners.

Target Audience:

• Safety Engineering and Planning Staff

• Information Technology Staff

• Data Managers and Stewards

• Crash, Traffic, and Roadway Inventory Data Managers
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

Funding 

NYSDOT made incremental improvements to their existing safety management systems in previous 

years using funding from federal grants; however, this funding stream has typically not been enough for a 

major programmatic upgrade. To develop CLEAR, NYSDOT used an allocated federal funding source—

State Planning and Research (SP&R) funds. These funds are typically reserved for research activities and 

data upgrades. NYSDOT found that the use of SP&R funds was easily justified as existing technologies 

had become out of date, were no longer going to be supported, or otherwise needed to be updated. 

HSIP funds were not used to develop CLEAR.

Legacy Systems

The CLEAR system will replace three existing legacy systems currently used in the State of New York 

to manage and analyze crash data and serve as the State’s safety management system. These systems 

include: 

Accident Location Information System (ALIS): Web-based geographic information system 

(GIS) application which allows users to access crash data through custom queries and analyze the data 

with several reporting options and formats.

 Safety Information Management System (SIMS): System which stores State and local crash 

data and is used for identifying High Accident Locations (HALs) in the State system each year. 

 Post Implementation Evaluation System (PIES): System that evaluates countermeasures and 

projects and assigns a reduction factor percentage.

Capabilities of CLEAR

CLEAR will meet all safety performance legislation and federal standards for reporting, including the 

Model Inventory of Roadway Elements (MIRE) Fundamental Data Elements (FDE) (Federal Highway 

Administration 2017). CLEAR will feature several individual modules for safety management that 

integrate safety data through a common workflow. The most relevant modules to safety data include

Crash Geocoding, Safety Application, and Data Viewer. The following provides a general overview of 

these modules. 

Geocoding and Editing Crashes

The New York State Department of Motor Vehicles (NYSDMV) owns crash data prior to delivery to 

NYSDOT. Currently, NYSDOT uses its legacy system, ALIS, to geolocate and analyze crash data.

CLEAR will follow a similar process to geolocate crashes that incorporates NYSDMV and NYSDOT in 

the data processing workflow. 

Crash Geocoding Engine

On the NYSDOT-side, this engine will use a multi-tiered algorithm to geocode a single crash location 

based on tiers of information in the crash data fields from crash reports. If a single location cannot be 

determined (i.e., zero viable options or multiple candidate locations), the engine will update the status as 

a geocoding failure.
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

Automated Crash Geocoder (ACG) 

The ACG is a routine that runs a nightly scheduled, automated geocoding for all new NYSDMVuploaded crashes. The ACG retrieves all new crashes from NYSDMV and will iterate through the 

crashes, submitting the locational data for each record to the Crash Geocoding Engine to be geocoded. 

When the geocoding engine returns a successfully geocoded crash, ACG will add the crash (as a point 

feature) to the crash feature class within the CLEAR Geodatabase. It will also populate the crash record 

with the latitude/longitude coordinates, road segment ID, roadway characteristics, and all geocoding 

metadata (status, confidence, source) that is returned by the Crash Geocoding Engine. 

The Interactive Crash Locator (ICL) will flag a case number of a crash record for subsequent processing 

if the crash cannot be successfully geocoded. 

Interactive Crash Locator

The ICL is a browser-based tool that allows NYSDMV coders to load crash records on screen (e.g.,

reports, maps, location form), modify the data (e.g., edit typos), and perform the geocoding interactively

(figure 1).

Interactive Crash Editor 

This NYSDOT module, similar to the NYSDMV-applied ICL module, will provide a map display, query 

form, and data display to allow the user to manually edit crash and location data when errors are 

discovered. The application will provide functionality allowing the end user to correct the location and 

attributes of an existing crash that has already been geocoded.

Figure 1. Graphic. Manually locating crashes in CLEAR.

© NYSDOT
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

CLEAR Safety Application

To reduce the frequency and severity of serious injury and fatal crashes, NYSDOT uses the roadway 

safety management process (figure 2) as defined in the HSM. The CLEAR Safety Application will enhance 

existing workflows at NYSDOT and reinforce existing standards through improved tracking and quality 

assurance.

The CLEAR Safety Application will address each of the six steps in four primary modules to focus the 

user interface and available tools on the operations that are most appropriate during any point within 

the safety management process. The modules are (1) Planning, (2) Analysis and Investigation, (3) 

Implementation, and (4) Evaluation. By organizing into the four modules, it will allow the user to 

progress through the safety management process logically but also allows easy access to a specific 

module when needed. This application will provide robust mapping, geospatial processing, visualization, 

query, analysis, and reporting throughout all modules.

The following are brief descriptions of each module within the CLEAR Safety Application: 

The Planning module will employ both hot spot and systemic screening approaches on the roadway 

network to identify sites with potential for safety improvements. The hot spot screening approach 

allows the user to select performance measures, establish crash thresholds, and conduct the annual 

screening of HALs for further investigation. Employing the systemic approach, users can screen the 

network by selecting focus crash types, focus facility types, and associated risk factors to identify 

candidate locations. This module also includes functionality to develop crash tree diagrams to support 

systemic screening.

The Analysis and Investigation module will help to diagnose contributing factors, select 

countermeasures, and perform an economic appraisal. This module supports thorough diagnosis of 

crash data summaries and trends, generates collision diagrams, compares expected safety effectiveness 

of multiple potential alternative countermeasures, and 

performs benefit-cost analysis to aid in project

prioritization. 

The Implementation module will manage, track, and 

generate reports throughout the project development 

process. The module will integrate with NYSDOT’s 

existing safety management processes and tools for 

project investigation and tracking. 

The Evaluation module will support post-implementation 

safety effectiveness evaluations of constructed projects. 

Some components of this module include user-built 

queries for certain types of improvements, estimations of 

crash reduction factors, and evaluation reports.

Figure 2. Graphic. Roadway safety management process

(FHWA 2013). 

Source: FHWA
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

CLEAR Data Viewer

This application is available to authorized users, such as NYSDOT staff and metropolitan planning 

organizations (MPOs), for general/ad-hoc visualization, query, and analysis of crash and safety data, 

beyond the more focused and robust analysis that will be conducted within the CLEAR Safety 

Application. The dashboard module will show a combination of charts, graphs, and tables that illustrate a 

high-level summary of safety metrics. The map display capabilities will include typical web-based GIS 

functions as well as advanced geospatial functionality like hot spot clustering, heat maps, spatial 

selections, filtering, and street-level views. Users will be able to perform ad-hoc crash and site analysis 

through a query interface that also includes reporting, exporting, and sharing capabilities with other 

users.

Intersection Inventory Management (IIM)

The IIM will be an application that facilitates the management and maintenance of the master 

intersection inventory for NYSDOT. This application will have two modes to facilitate change requests 

and inventory maintenance. 

CLEAR Mobile Applications

Specifically designed for use in the field, mobile applications will provide live access to maps, data, and 

services when an internet connection is available. However, since internet connectivity cannot be 

guaranteed, both mobile applications will be able to “virtually see” geographic features within an area of 

interest (e.g., crashes, investigations, road centerlines) to load onto the devices for disconnected map 

viewing and editing.

Training

NYSDOT understands that the success of CLEAR will be largely dependent on effective training and 

continuous knowledge transfer to both system administrators and end users. The CLEAR vendor will 

develop and deliver instructor-led courses for each CLEAR module and application. All training sessions 

will be recorded and posted for new users, with the developer available for a live Q&A session following 

completion of the training. These trainings will be provided to NYSDOT staff, as well as local-level

analysts and representatives closer to the full implementation of the tool.

Challenges

There are several data systems in New York that are undergoing updates or changes amid the 

development and implementation of CLEAR. These include AgileAssetsTM for asset management, 

completion of an all public roads statewide LRS, and NYSDMV’s crash data system. To overcome the 

uncertainty presented by these parallel transportation data efforts, the CLEAR project team 

communicates and coordinates with these different data/system owners to ensure integration is 

successful. NYSDOT notes that an effective data governance program may be able to help mitigate 

similar potential uncertainties at other State DOTs.

Additionally, New York has an emerging local road inventory. While CLEAR can analyze local roads, the 

types of analyses that are available for these locations are limited by the availability of data. NYSDOT 
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SAFETY DATA CASE STUDY FHWA-SA-20-060

has several data collection initiatives, such as the County Counter Program Initiative for local partners 

to collect traffic volumes, to supplement the available data at these locations and to support more 

robust analysis.

Next Steps

Most CLEAR modules are still under development or are undergoing testing for user acceptance. As the 

tool enters production and testing is complete, NYSDOT will set up training events for NSYDOT staff 

and local representatives.

Conclusions and Lessons Learned

NYSDOT staff roles and responsibilities will not change with the development of CLEAR, but some of 

the processes for safety management, data acquisition, and integration will change. NYSDOT recognizes 

the importance of documenting data governance policies and processes for future users. A benefit of the 

CLEAR solution is the easy, standardized method to access and analyze safety data.

NYSDOT found that an iterative process when developing a new system allowed for constant 

refinement and redesign. The contractor met regularly with stakeholders—including NYSDMV, MPOs, 

regional DOT staff, safety staff, and information technology staff—to demonstrate user interfaces and 

workflows and gather feedback. Because CLEAR will be using data from various sources, it is important 

to keep communication lines open with other business units (e.g., asset management) throughout the 

development process. It is also important to engage other divisions within NYSDOT such as planning, 

design, and traffic engineering to help integrate safety throughout the project development process.

Receiving support from executive-level management was crucial in the Safety Program Development 

Section’s pursuit of an updated safety management system. The Bureau Director understood the 

importance of data and was a champion in updating legacy systems with new technology and tools. The 

Safety Program Development Section also received positive feedback and approval from other data 

owners in developing a new safety management tool.

NYSDOT’s new roadway safety management system, CLEAR, will reinforce existing safety analysis 

standards and increase user access to advanced analytical tools. The enhanced capabilities are made 

possible through the integration of multiple datasets, including crash, roadway, and traffic data on all 

public roads. Through this development effort, CLEAR will support the agency’s broader goals of 

reducing fatalities and serious injuries on the State’s roadways.
7 

Contact

New York State Department of Transportation

Regina Doyle, Safety Program Development Section

Regina.Doyle@dot.ny.gov

Andrew Sattinger, System Development and Operations Unit

Andrew.Sattinger@dot.ny.gov

References

 Federal Highway Administration. (2013). Quantifying Safety in the Roadway Safety Management 

Process, Federal Highway Administration, Report No. FHWA-SA-13-010, Washington, D.C. 

Available online: https://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/tools/crf/resources/cmfs/docs/management.pdf.

 Federal Highway Administration. (2017). Model Inventory of Roadway Elements – MIRE 2.0, 

Federal Highway Administration, Report No. FHWA-SA-17-048, Washington, D.C. Available 

online: https://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/rsdp/downloads/fhwasa17048.pdf. 

 New York State Department of Transportation. (2019). CLEAR Geocoding and Editing Crash 

Data Conceptual Design, Albany, New York. 

 New York State Department of Transportation. (2017). New York State Strategic Highway Safety 

Plan: 2017-2022, Albany, New York. Available online: 

https://www.dot.ny.gov/divisions/operating/osss/highwayrepository/NYS_SHSP_TotalReport.pdf.

 Phone interview on June 16, 2020, with Regina Doyle (NYSDOT), Andrew Sattinger 

(NYSDOT), and Larry Spraker (VHB).