Two-stage multi-criteria analysis and the future of intelligent transport systems-based safety innovation projects

This study outlines a new two-stage multi-criteria analysis (MCA) methodology to facilitate assessing and selecting investments in intelligent transport systems (ITSs). The authors focus on ITS-based safety innovation projects (SIPs) in the realm of road transport infrastructure, namely, those conducive to more `forgiving roads´ and `self-explanatory roads´. Stakeholders interested in improving road safety can use this MCA tool to assess alternative options for improving road safety, based on how each option contributes to each stakeholder group´s objectives. The preferences of each stakeholder are fully taken into account in a first stage through partial MCAs, which determine how each SIP contributes to each separate stakeholder´s specific objectives. In the second stage, the preferences of all stakeholders are bundled, with more emphasis on societal preferences. This second stage analysis paradoxically allows identifying policy areas where government incentives could address strong concerns voiced by particular stakeholder groups. In other words, an implicit feedback loop is generated to the SIPs´ design, with `redesign´ intended to reduce the gap between societal preferences and specific-stakeholder ones, thereby increasing the probability that the support of all stakeholder groups involved could still be ascertained.