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  • Lighting and marking policies are associated with reduced farm equipment-related crash rates: a policy analysis of nine Midwestern US states

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Lighting and marking policies are associated with reduced farm equipment-related crash rates: a policy analysis of nine Midwestern US states
  1. Marizen Ramirez1,
  2. Ronald Bedford1,
  3. Hongqian Wu2,
  4. Karisa Harland3,
  5. Joseph E Cavanaugh2,
  6. Corinne Peek-Asa1
  1. 1Department of Occupational and Environmental Health, College of Public Health, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, USA
  2. 2Department of Biostatistics, College of Public Health, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, USA
  3. 3Department of Emergency Medicine, Carver College of Medicine, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, USA
  1. Correspondence to Professor Marizen Ramirez, Department of Occupational and Environmental Health, 100 CPHB S318, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA; marizen-ramirez{at}uiowa.edu

Abstract

Objective To evaluate the effectiveness of roadway policies for lighting and marking of farm equipment in reducing crashes in Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

Methods In this ecological study, state policies on lighting and marking of farm equipment were scored for compliance with standards of the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE). Using generalized estimating equations negative binomial models, we estimated the relationships between lighting and marking scores, and farm equipment crash rates, per 100 000 farm operations.

Results A total of 7083 crashes involving farm equipment was reported from 2005 to 2010 in the Upper Midwest and Great Plains. As the state lighting and marking score increased by 5 units, crash rates reduced by 17% (rate ratio=0.83; 95% CI 0.78 to 0.88). Lighting-only (rate ratio=0.48; 95% CI 0.45 to 0.51) and marking-only policies (rate ratio=0.89; 95% CI 0.83 to 0.96) were each associated with reduced crash rates.

Conclusions Aligning lighting and marking policies with ASABE standards may effectively reduce crash rates involving farm equipment.

This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

https://doi.org/10.1136/oemed-2016-103672

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