Draft SOW (693JJ920RQ000270).pdf

DRAFT STATEMENT OF WORK

Title: IDIQ: Small Business Behavioral Safety Research Support

SECTION C - DESCRIPTION, SPECIFICATION, WORK STATEMENT

C.1 BACKGROUND

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is an agency of the U.S.

Department of Transportation (DOT). NHTSA’s mission is to save lives, prevent injuries and reduce economic costs due to road traffic crashes. The agency achieves this mission through education, research, safety standards, and enforcement activity.

NHTSA’s Office of Behavioral Safety Research directly supports the Agency’s efforts to reduce traffic fatalities and injuries by providing the scientific basis for the development of effective behavioral countermeasures to reduce the occurrence and severity of traffic crashes. Behavioral Safety Research studies unsafe driving behaviors that contribute significantly to death and injury from crashes on our highways. The research results support the development and refinement of countermeasures to deter unsafe behaviors and promote safe alternatives. Behavioral Safety Research also evaluates the relative effectiveness of programs to reduce fatalities and injuries on our highways, which is critical to achieving further progress toward meeting national goals and performance targets. Research, analysis, and evaluation program results address existing and emerging highway safety problems and are disseminated to the States to use to identify effective traffic safety countermeasures for implementation through the highway safety formula grant program (Section 402). Examples of studies can be found in the Behavioral Safety Research collection at the National Transportation Library (https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/).

Research topics include drug-impaired driving, alcohol-impaired driving, seat belt usage and child passenger safety (occupant protection), pedestrian and bicyclist safety, motorcyclist safety, distracted driving, drowsy driving, older drivers, young and novice drivers, safe speeds and speed management, Emergency Medical Services, Automated Driving Systems human factors research, and Advanced Driver Assistance Systems driver adaptation research.

C.2 PURPOSE

The purpose of this contract is to procure, on a Cost Reimbursement or Time and Materials basis, professional and technical services to conduct behavioral safety research projects. Under this contract, the Government will issue Task Orders to obtain professional and technical services.

Many of the research opportunities obtained under this contract will require a quick response or turn-around.

C.3 REQUIREMENTS

Each Task Order will include specific requirements for that Task Order. This section describes the types of services that may be required under this contract. The listing below is provided as an example and does not represent any current or known requirement.

https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/

The Contractor will be required to conduct behavioral traffic safety research. This may include any or all of the following activities: research design, data collection, subject recruitment, conducting focus groups, program development, program implementation, literature reviews, data analyses, performance analyses, technological design, human-environment interface, statistical analysis, interpretation of data and results, and report preparation. Any of these activities may involve data collection at a local, state, or federal level.

Typical examples of data to be collected include the following:

• driver records;

• law enforcement records, such as enforcement activity, police stops, and arrest data;

• court records, such as conviction records and sanction records;

• vehicle data, such as instances and circumstances of braking or speed change;

• crash data, including fatal crash data;

• public attitudes;

• safety equipment use (e.g., observation of seat belt or child restraint use);

• human and environment or technological interface;

• the impairing effects of alcohol or drug use;

• human performance;

• attitudes and opinions of traffic safety officials; and

• program process information (e.g., how well a program runs from an operations viewpoint).

The Contractor will be required to obtain data in various formats. Some data may be available archival data, such as DWI arrest records. In some cases, the contractor will be able to obtain data in an electronic format. In other cases, data will be available in hard copy only, which will require more extensive labor to organize. In some cases, the Contractor may need to collect data during the task order, such as seat belt observations or vehicle speeds. In many instances, data collection procedures may require prior approval from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and an institutional review board (IRB).

Of the different potential research activities listed above, research activities may include:

Field Data Collection Crash and Injury Statistical Analyses Program Evaluation Human Factors/Technology Evaluation

Field Data Collection will require the Contractor to send staff to specific locations to collect the data underlying the research activity. An example would be gathering information on the number of passengers in vehicles leaving a high school student parking lot at the end of a school day. The Contractor may be required to collect data on how many cars left the parking lot, how many drivers had passengers, and the sex of the driver and front seat passengers. Another example would be collecting seat belt use at areas frequented by different groups of drivers, such as at a sports bar frequented by college students and a restaurant near a retirement community. Activities would include collecting, organizing and delivering data to the COR (TO).

Crash and Injury Statistical Analyses require analyzing existing data from a variety of sources that may include States’ crash files, hospital or medical cost files, or NHTSA’s crash files such as the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) or the Crash Report Sampling System (CRSS). Examples of projects include analyzing characteristics of fatal non-intersection crashes involving young adult drivers on rural roadways using FARS data, analyzing injury severity of different age groups of drivers using CRSS data, or analyzing teen licensure rates based on State data. These projects shall require the Contractor to conduct statistical analyses on specific data sets and interpret the findings.

Program Evaluation is an evaluation of a program (countermeasure) developed and implemented by a State or local government. Examples include assessing the impact of a demonstration program to increase seat belt use in rural communities; evaluating the impact of a local primary seat belt ordinance; or evaluating a program designed to encourage parents to actively monitor their teen’s driving. The appropriate evaluation approach may be a process evaluation, an outcome evaluation, a safety impact evaluation, or some combination. The Contractor shall use sound evaluation methodology and techniques to address all evaluation questions.

Human Factors/Technology Evaluation project explores drivers’ and/or passengers’ interactions with the vehicle, including advanced driver assistance systems. Examples include implementing and evaluating an in-vehicle monitoring system for teen drivers;

developing, implementing and evaluating and evaluating technologies designed to encourage seat belt use among at-risk populations; using driving simulators for driver training. Through human factors psychology and/or human factors engineering, the Contractor may be required to implement and evaluate various technologies.

C.4 KICK-OFF MEETING

Within two weeks from Contract award, key members of the Contractor’s staff who will be assigned major responsibilities for carrying out the tasks of the task order shall meet with the NHTSA COR (TO) and/or COR and other NHTSA staff. The purposes of the initial “Kick-Off” meeting shall be to:

1. Review any contractual matters, including terms and conditions of the Contract;

2. Review and discuss Section C.3 of the Contract to ensure a common understanding of the general requirements; and

3. Respond to any questions the parties may have.

At the discretion of the agency, the kick-off meeting may take place in person, or by phone.

LIST OF ATTACHMENTS

Attachment No. Attachment Description Number of Pages

1 Hypothetical Task Order 3

ATTACHMENT 1

Hypothetical Task Order

This project is hypothetical, and there are no plans to fund this task under the scope of this effort.

The focus of the task is on the effect of the device on driver behavior/response to pedestrians and bicyclists, not evaluating the design of the after-market device.

TASK: The Effects of a Novel (non-existent) Pedestrian/Bicyclist Alert on Drivers’ Behaviors, Including Driving Performance

Background NHTSA reports that, in 2017, 19% of those who died in traffic crashes were non-occupants, primarily pedestrians and, to a lesser extent, bicyclists. This is up from 14% in 2008.1 Most pedestrian fatalities occur in urban areas under dark conditions; about a third of pedestrians killed in a crash had BACs of .08 or higher.2 Similarly, 75% of bicyclist fatalities occur in urban areas, about half under dark conditions; 20% of the bicyclists had BACs of .08 or higher.3

Thus, pedestrians and bicyclists, who lack the physical protections of motor vehicle occupants, are particularly vulnerable outside of daylight hours. This risk is exacerbated for pedestrians/bicyclists with high BACs, who may exercise poor judgment and behave unpredictably. Technology that could alert the driver to the presence of a person near the roadway, particularly in low visibility conditions such as at night, dusk, or dawn, could allow a driver time to reduce speed or stop their vehicle, thereby reducing fatalities among pedestrians and bicyclists.

The objective of this project is to explore the effects on driver behavior of a hypothetical, after-market device, the Ped/Bike Flag, which alerts drivers to the presence of people such as pedestrians and bicyclists on or within a foot of the roadway, within 75 feet of the front of vehicle. The device operates only at speeds below 45mph. When the system detects a pedestrian/bicyclist, a small display unit mounted above the rear-view mirror emits a tone and displays an arrow that points left, ahead, or right indicating the direction of the hazard. The system works in all light levels and is not affected by moisture. It has low miss and false alarm rates. Note that the objective is NOT to assess usability of the system but rather to examine its effect (if any) on drivers’ behavior.

The Offeror should discuss how it would conduct a research project with the following requirements: Review the literature on effects of alert systems on driver behaviors. Analyze existing data on characteristics of crashes involving pedestrians and bicyclists. Collect

1 National Center for Statistics and Analysis. (2018, October). 2017 fatal motor vehicle crashes: Overview. (Traffic Safety Facts Research Note. Report No. DOT HS 812 603). Washington, DC: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

2 National Center for Statistics and Analysis. (2019, March). Pedestrians: 2017 data. (Traffic Safety Facts.

Report No. DOT HS 812 681). Washington, DC: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

3 National Center for Statistics and Analysis. (2019, June). Bicyclists and other cyclists: 2017 data. (Traffic Safety Facts. Report No. DOT HS 812 765). Washington, DC: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

naturalistic data to explore the effects of the Ped/Bike Flag on driver behaviors in the presence of pedestrians and bicyclists. Assuming the Ped/Bike Flag is effective in alerting drivers to the presence of pedestrians and bicyclists with minimal unintended consequences, develop a plan to conduct a demonstration project and to evaluate the effects of the device on a larger scale.

The Offeror shall detail its approach to conducting a study that covers the following requirements:

Requirement 1: Review the literature on effects of alert systems on driver behaviors.

The Offeror shall describe a review of the literature on effects of alert systems on driver behaviors, e.g., improved response times to hazards, the extent to which the system poses a distraction or users become over reliant on the system. The Offeror shall provide and justify a list of sources to be searched, search terms, inclusion and exclusion criteria, and the method for identifying relevant abstracts.

Requirement 2: Analyze existing data on characteristics of crashes involving pedestrians and bicyclists.

The Offeror shall identify databases to be used in the analyses and shall justify the inclusion of each database by describing the type and quality of data it contains. At a minimum, the Offeror shall include the sample size of the database, a plan to acquire the data, and planned analyses. The offer shall identify the data elements to be included in the analyses, along with the rationale for their inclusion. Additionally, the Offeror shall discuss likely barriers to acquiring and analyzing the data, including the limitations of the proposed databases.

Provide a report that describes findings from the literature review and data analysis.

Requirement 3: Collect and analyze naturalistic data from drivers using the system to identify benefits Ped/Bike Flag, as well as misuse (e.g., overreliance).

The Offeror shall provide a plan to obtain naturalistic data on the effects of Ped/Bike Flag use on driver behaviors in yielding to pedestrians and bicyclists. The data collection and analysis design shall include adequate detail to demonstrate that the Offeror understands where and when risk to pedestrians and bicyclists is elevated in order to collect adequate data to support analyses, as well as a description of the data acquisition system, independent and dependent variables, and planned analyses. The plan shall also describe plans to acquire necessary approval to collect data, recruit participants, collect and analyze data, and report results.

Assume the naturalistic study findings (requirement 3) provide evidence that Ped/Bike Flag is effective in alerting drivers to the presence of pedestrians and bicyclists with minimal unintended consequences.

Requirement 4: Develop a plan to conduct a demonstration project and evaluate the effects of the device on a larger scale.

The Offeror shall consider measures of the process, outcome, and impact of this program.

The design shall include, at a minimum, the number of sites, site selection criteria, coordination with the site prior to data collection; process, outcome, and impact measures and possible confounding variables; means of obtaining data; data analysis plan; limitations of the study; types of conclusions that could be drawn from the findings. The Offeror is free to consider any data elements; however, the Offeror must describe how each data element could be obtained, compiled, and analyzed, and under what constraints. The Offeror shall describe potential obstacles to site selection, data collection, and/or data analyses and how minimize them. Report the results.