Risk assessment of the road transportation concerning dangerous goods

Urbanization is seen as a rapid process spreading on new areas and suburbs. Industrial areas are usually placed not far from cities to provide fast transportation of workers and goods. Urbanization spreads over these areas and in the space among factories, logistic centers, and warehouses. Inhabitants may face very often to the problem of vehicle movement, transporting goods and even dangerous goods through the area of high dense population or protected natural environment. The aim of the paper is to propose a model of risk assessment concerning road transportation of dangerous goods. Vehicle transporting dangerous goods produces "moving" risk due to dangerous loads moving through areas of different exposures what gives at each point of the road ( short segment) changeable value of the risk. Model is based on the concept of road risk profile which takes into account road segments of various population densities, natural environment and engineering installations. Paper provides an example of calculation of proposed risk profile for a given road segment and a tanker. Road transportation of dangerous goods is analyzed to identify all important elements and processes. Advantage of the proposed method consists in systemic dividing of all distinguished objects dealing with goods transportation ( dangerous goods, truck, driver), road infrastructure ( road geometry, construction, roadside, land development), natural environment. Objects are divided in active and passive ones. Active objects may produce risk, while passive are exposed to catastrophic events. The general model proposes an idea of hazard identification and risk matrix for a given road segment and is summarized with an example.