Surrogate Safety Assessment Model Overview
Overview
A simulation and analysis project with Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) to predict the safety of roadways before crashes occur.
The Surrogate Safety Assessment Model (SSAM) is a software application developed to automatically identify, classify, and evaluate traffic conflicts in the vehicle trajectory data output from microscopic traffic simulation models. The SSAM also has built-in statistical analysis features for conflict frequency and severity measures that can aid analysts in the design of safe traffic facilities.
SSAM (version 2.16) was initially developed and released to the public in 2008 with additional enhancements completed in 2017. This latest 2017 release, SSAM (version 3.0), improves software performance and adds capability of differentiating between at grade and grade separated conflicts at interchanges.
Description
The safety of intersections, interchanges, and other traffic facilities is most often assessed by tracking and analyzing police-reported motor vehicle crashes over time. Given the infrequent and random nature of crashes, this process is slow to reveal the need for remediation of either the roadway design or the flow-control strategy. This process is also not applicable to assess the safety of new roadway designs that have yet to be built or new flow-control strategies that have yet to be applied in the field.
This research was funded by the FHWA, and consists of two initial projects:
- Surrogate Safety Measures From Traffic Simulation Models, Publication Number: FHWA-RD-03-050.
- Surrogate Safety Assessment Model (SSAM) and Validation, Final Report: FHWA-HRT-08-051.
Detail
A conflict is, simply put, a scenario where two road users will likely collide without evasive action. An example is illustrated in Figure 1, where a vehicle is angling across two lanes to the left turn bay and has abruptly cut in front of another vehicle that must decelerate to avoid a collision.
Traffic Studies
Traffic conflicts have been studied since the late 1960s as a technique to assess the safety of a location, with the understanding that conflict frequency is correlated with the risk of actual collision.
Conflict scenario from SSAM application
Software Applications for Analysis
Conflict studies traditionally use personnel trained to identify and record conflicts observed at an intersection. In this research, the SSAM software application was developed to automate conflict analysis by directly processing vehicle trajectory data. Researchers specified an open-standard "universal" vehicle trajectory data format designed to provide the location and dimensions of each vehicle approximately every 10th of a second. It is hoped that video processing technology will, in the coming years, be capable of automatically extracting vehicle trajectory data adequate for SSAM processing.
Although, the trajectory file format was previously supported as an export option by four popular traffic microsimulation packages–AIMSUN, Paramics, TEXAS, and VISSIM–the differentiating of grade separated conflicts feature is available for 1) VISSIM 9 (and it's later release), and 2) ETFOMM (Enhanced Transportation Flow Open-Source Microscopic Model) Cloud Service) (ECS) with the implementation of the “z-coordinate” in trajectory files by their software developers. It is also important to recognize that the SSAM software is mainly focused on conventional automobile type of safety conflict analysis while the VISSIM trajectory output files would contain all traffic (vehicles, pedestrians, buses, bicycles, etc.) in its trajectory output files.
Resources
The SSAM software is available freely to the public. Please reference the “SSAM Software Download and License” section below to download the SSAM software installation program and its related documents.
SSAM Software Download and License
Before downloading the SSAM software, please read the Surrogate Safety Assessment Model (SSAM) Software License Agreement.
The SSAM software code (version 3.0) and program information are on GitHub. Please use Google Chrome if you do not have the latest version of Microsoft Edge.
Parties interested in downloading the SSAM software (version 3.0) are encouraged to carefully review the README.txt and documents in the “Documentation” folder prior to the installation of SSAM software. Please also be advised that FHWA is only distributing the SSAM software but does not provide any additional follow-up technical assistance.
This SSAM software tool and its related documents are disseminated under the sponsorship of the U.S. Department of Transportation in the interest of information exchange. The U.S. Government assumes no liability for the use of the information contained in this SSAM tool and its associated documents.
Project Contact
Clayton Chen
clayton.chen@dot.gov
Surrogate Safety Assessment Model (SSAM) Software License Agreement
The terms of the license agreement are as follows:
Disclaimer
The Surrogate Safety Assessment Model (SSAM) software product is disseminated under the sponsorship of the U.S. Department of Transportation in the interest of information exchange. The United States Government assumes no liability for its content or use thereof. This software product does not constitute a standard, specification, or regulation.
The United States Government does not endorse products or manufacturers. Trade and manufacturers' names may appear in this software product only because they are considered essential to the objective of the software product.
Limited Warranty and Limitations of Remedies
This software product is provided "as-is," without warranty of any kind-either expressed or implied (but not limited to the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose). The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and distributor do not warrant that the functions contained in the software will meet the end-user's requirements or that the operation of the software will be uninterrupted and error-free. Under no circumstances will the FHWA or the distributor be liable to the end-user for any damages or claimed lost profits, lost savings, or other incidental or consequential damages rising out of the use or inability to use the software (even if these organizations have been advised of the possibility of such damages), or for any claim by any other party.
Notice
The use and testing of the SSAM software is being done strictly on a voluntary basis. In exchange for the provision of SSAM software, the user agrees that the Federal Highway Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation, any other agency of the Federal Government or distributor shall not be responsible for any errors, damage or other liability that may result from any and all use of the software, including installation and testing of the software. The user further agrees to hold the FHWA, the Federal Government, and distributor harmless from any resulting liability. The user agrees that this harmless provision shall flow to any person to whom or any entity to which the user provides the SSAM software. It is the user's full responsibility to inform any person to whom or any entity to which it provides the SSAM software of this hold harmless provision.
The origin of this SSAM software must not be misrepresented; there shall be no claim that this software is the product of or written by any individual, company or organization other than the Federal Government. An acknowledgement would be appreciated in any product in which this SSAM software is included or referenced. Altered versions of this SSAM software shall be plainly marked as "altered" and must not be misrepresented as being the original SSAM software. This notice may not be removed or altered from any distribution, recording, copy or use of this SSAM Software.
Last updated: Monday, May 18, 2026