INTEGRATION OF GIS, GPS, GSM AND REMOTE SENSING, (3GR) FOR ROAD ACCIDENT REPORTING AND MANAGEMENT

Abstract

Abeokuta metropolis is gradually developing into a mega city in Nigeria. At the moment the municipality spans 4 local government areas and the sprawl has just started. Along with the city expansion is the increase of vehicular movements and concomitant vehicular accidents. There is therefore a need for development of an accident, reporting data collection, referencing, management and analysis system, for Abeokuta city. Consequently, the paper looks at a GIS based integration of spatial technologies for near real time reporting and management of road traffic accident in the city. In the study, an accident database management system was developed  to store urban traffic accident data, and analyze these data in terms of their attribute and spatial characteristics in order to exploit the reasons for accidents, the hot spots and rank the urban area with various degrees of danger. Foremost, the study established a road network in ArcGIS for Abeokuta metropolis. Next, locations of fatal and minor road traffic accidents data within the metropolis in the last five years were geo-referenced with the aid of GPS and the attributes were developed into a database. Reasons for road accidents were analysed in order to summarize major factors related to the accidents. Finally a hazard map was created to show the accident hot spots and degree of danger with respect to road accident in the city. The paper particularly explains the method of using Mobile phones to report accidents by eye witnesses while using the GPS to reference the accident locations. The incorporation of GIS map along with some monitoring systems like the Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) was identified as pedestal for the development of  real-time or near-real time accident reporting and management system.