Agency Information Collection Activities: Request for Comments for New Information Collection

Michael Howell
Federal Highway Administration
February 3, 2015

[Federal Register Volume 80, Number 22 (Tuesday, February 3, 2015)]
[Notices]
[Pages 5882-5883]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2015-02058]


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DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

Federal Highway Administration

[Docket No. FHWA-2015-0002]


Agency Information Collection Activities: Request for Comments 
for New Information Collection

AGENCY: Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), DOT.

ACTION: Notice and request for comments.

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SUMMARY: The FHWA has forwarded the information collection request 
described in this notice to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) 
for approval of a new information collection. We published a Federal 
Register Notice with a 60-day public comment period on this information 
collection on November 12, 2014. We are required to publish this notice 
in the Federal Register by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995.

DATES: Please submit comments by March 5, 2015.

ADDRESSES: You may send comments within 30 days to the Office of 
Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget, 
725 17th Street NW., Washington, DC 20503, Attention DOT Desk Officer. 
You are asked to comment on any aspect of this information collection, 
including: (1) Whether the proposed collection is necessary for the 
FHWA's performance; (2) the accuracy of the estimated burden; (3) ways 
for the FHWA to enhance the quality, usefulness, and clarity of the 
collected information; and (4) ways that the burden could be minimized, 
including the use of electronic technology, without reducing the 
quality of the collected information. All comments should include the 
Docket number FHWA-2015-0002.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Keith Williams, 202-366-9212, Highway 
Safety Specialist, Strategic Integration Team, Office of Safety 
Programs, Federal Highway Administration, Department of Transportation, 
1200 New Jersey Avenue SE., Room E71-119, Washington, DC 20590, Monday 
through Friday, except Federal holidays.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
    Title: Inventory of State Police Accident Reports (PAR) and Serious 
Injury Reporting.
    Background: The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) Office of 
Safety's mission is to exercise leadership throughout the highway 
community to make the Nation's roadways safer by developing, 
evaluating, and deploying life-saving countermeasures; advancing the 
use of scientific methods and data-driven decisions, fostering a safety 
culture, and promoting an integrated, multidisciplinary 4 E's 
(Engineering, Education, Enforcement, Education) approach to safety. 
The mission is carried out through the Highway Safety Improvement 
Program (HSIP), a data driven strategic approach to improving highway 
safety on all public roads that focuses on performance. The goal of the 
program is to achieve a significant reduction in traffic fatalities and 
serious injuries on all public roads, including non-State-owned public 
roads and roads on tribal lands.
    In keeping with that mission, the United States Congress on June 
29, 2012 passed the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act 
(MAP-21), which was signed into law (Pub. L. 112-141) on July 6, 2012 
by President Barrack Obama. MAP-21 is a milestone for the U.S. economy 
and the Nation's surface transportation program as it transformed the 
policy and programmatic framework for investments to guide the system's 
growth and development and created a streamlined performance-based 
surface transportation program. The Federal Highway Administration 
defines Transportation Performance Management as a strategic approach 
that uses system information to make investment and policy decisions to 
achieve national performance goals.
    MAP-21 requires the Secretary of Transportation to establish 
performance measures for States to use to assess serious injuries and 
fatalities per vehicle mile traveled; and the number of serious 
injuries and fatalities, for the purposes of carrying out the HSIP 
under 23 U.S.C. 148. The HSIP is applicable to all public roads and 
therefore requires crash reporting by law enforcement agencies that 
have jurisdiction over them.
    In defining performance measures for serious injuries, FHWA seeks 
to define serious injuries in a manner that would provide for a uniform 
definition for national reporting in this performance area, as required 
by MAP-21. An established standard for defining serious injuries as a 
result of highway crashes has been developed in the 4th edition of the 
Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria (MMUCC). MMUCC represents a 
voluntary and collaborative effort to generate uniform crash data that 
are accurate, reliable and credible for data-driven highway safety 
decisions within a State, between States, and at the national level. 
The MMUCC defines a serious injuries resulting from traffic crashes as 
``Suspected Serious Injury (A)'' whose attributes are: Any injury, 
other than fatal, which results in one or more of the following: Severe 
laceration resulting in exposure of underlying tissues, muscle, organs, 
or resulting in significant loss of blood, broken or distorted 
extremity (arm or leg), crush injuries, suspected skull, chest, or 
abdominal injury other than bruises or minor lacerations, significant 
burns (second and third degree burns over 10 percent or more of the 
body), unconsciousness when taken from the crash scene, or paralysis.
    As part of the effort to understand current reporting levels for 
serious injuries to support the MAP-21 performance measures, the FHWA 
seeks to determine at what level law enforcement agencies have adopted 
the MMUCC definition, attribute and coding convention. FHWA is aware 
that not all States have adopted the MMUCC definition, attribute and 
coding convention for serious injuries while other States have only 
partially adopted the definition. It is also known that some 
jurisdictions do not use the State Police Accident Report (PAR) form to 
report on crashes. It is not known if these PARs are MMUCC compliant.
    The purpose of the information collection is to conduct an 
assessment of each Federal, tribal, State and non-State PAR to 
determine if the definition and coding convention used for reporting on 
serious injuries is or is not compliant with MMUCC, and if not

[[Page 5883]]

compliant, the definition and coding convention that is used.
    Respondents: Federal, State, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, 
tribal and local traffic records management agencies. (75 total).
    Estimated Average Burden per Response: It will take approximately 
15 minutes per participant.
    Estimated Total Annual Burden: Approximately 19 hours for a one 
time collection.
    Electronic Access: For access to the docket to read background 
documents or comments received, go to http://www.regulations.gov. 
Follow the online instructions for accessing the dockets.
    Public Comments Invited: You are asked to comment on any aspect of 
this information collection, including: (1) Whether the proposed 
collection of information is necessary for the U.S. DOT's performance, 
including whether the information will have practical utility; (2) the 
accuracy of the U.S. DOT's estimate of the burden of the proposed 
information collection; (3) ways to enhance the quality, usefulness, 
and clarity of the collected information; and (4) ways that the burden 
could be minimized, including the use of electronic technology, without 
reducing the quality of the collected information. The agency will 
summarize and/or include your comments in the request for OMB's 
clearance of this information collection.

    Authority: The Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995; 44 U.S.C. 
Chapter 35, as amended; and 49 CFR 1.48.

     Issued on: January, 29, 2015.
Michael Howell,
Information Collections Officer.
[FR Doc. 2015-02058 Filed 2-2-15; 8:45 am]
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