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Introductior <br />The 2025 Kittitas County Road Safety Plan is a comprehensive program of safety improvements aimed at <br />reducing all collisions, but specifically fatalities and serious injury accidents across the entire county road <br />network. This safety improvement program was developed using a strategy similar to the Washington State <br />Strategic Highway Safety Plan: Target Zero 2019, in which crash data is analyzed to identify accident <br />trends and contributing factors, and then sites within the road system are prioritized using a risk -based <br />ranking system. Safety improvement projects are then developed to target specific locations and systematic <br />improvements that provide the greatest benefit to the traveling public by preventing potential fatal and <br />serious injury accidents. <br />Due to the sporadic nature of crashes on rural county roads, it can be difficult to determine trends using <br />past data alone to choose locations for improvements. However, past crash data can be used to predict <br />future crashes by evaluating the contributing factors and targeting improvements for roads with similar <br />characteristics. As a result, Kittitas County has decided to utilize this strategy to allow for a proactive <br />approach that benefits more locations throughout the entire county road system and is more cost effective <br />than only focusing on past crash locations. <br />n-,lta Anaklzicz <br />Data used for this evaluation was provided by Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT). <br />The data includes detailed information about crashes on Kittitas County roads from 2019 to 2023, including <br />a comparison of how Kittitas County's roads relate to other public roads in the state, detailed in Table 1. <br />Although overall, fatal and serious injury collisions occur at a similar rate to other public roads within the <br />state, Kittitas County is committed to reducing these types of collisions and strives to collaboratively <br />achieve the statewide goal of zero deaths and serious injuries on Washington's roadways by 2030. The <br />Kittitas County Road Safety Plan focuses on identifying cost efficient safety improvement projects that offer <br />substantial safety benefits countywide and reduce potential fatal and serious injury collisions along Kittitas <br />County's roadway network. <br />