Achieving Ambitious Road Safety Targets
Description
The proposed orientation of the research is on aspects of the work that
can assist high level decision making on road safety funding, priorities
and progress. This transport research project can add most value by
focussing on the following key areas, which reflect some refinements of
the original orientations:
- Effective Strategies and Actions
The project will provide the latest research advice on how responsive
levels of fatalities and injuries have been to recent measures,
including in the key areas most resistant to reductions. In doing so,
it will provide insights into the effectiveness - in terms of road
safety outcomes - of the different combinations of measures currently
being pursued by countries at different levels of economic development
and road safety performance. This part will involve detailed
comparative analysis of the latest trends in road safety fatalities
amongst the key groups (children, the young, the elderly, those
in-between, motorcyclists, pedestrians, etc.) and research on the
most effective future approaches. The project will consolidate the
findings of recent reports (e.g. children's road safety) and current
projects (e.g. speed and young drivers) and also compare the latest
relative performance across countries on high risk areas (speed,
alcohol and drugs, rural, etc.).
- Road Safety Funding
The project will undertake research into the overall funding of
road safety measures. It will identify on a comparative basis the
costs typically being incurred by governments on road safety as a
proportion of GDP and government budgets and in relation to the size
of their road safety task. It will also research the allocation of
budget funding across the different portfolios (transport, health,
police/judicial, etc.) in relation to road safety and where possible,
the trends in their shares.
- Resource Allocation
The project will explore the relationship between: the costs of road
crashes, the benefits of improved road safety implicit in the
political targets; the government and private funds currently
being devoted to prevention of road crashes, fatalities and injuries;
and where these occur, their consequences. It will explore in
particular the balance in resource allocation between the funding
of preventative measures on one hand and on the other, funding the
activities required to deal with the consequences of road crashes
(public health/hospitals, legal/courts, repair/replacement of
property damaged, etc.) This part will explore the increasing share
of budget funding that might be needed on "prevention" as opposed
to dealing with the "consequences" of road crashes, as road
fatalities fall towards the -50% targets.
The study will then draw research-based conclusions on suggested
best approaches in future to achieving the further reductions in
fatalities required, as well as on levels of funding required and
resource allocations between prevention and consequences.
Participants
The following countries participate in the study: Australia, Austria,
Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece,
Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Spain, Sweden,
Switzerland, Ukraine, United Kingdom and the United States.
Status Report
The final report will be published in 2008.
For more information, please contact:
Véronique Feypell
Related information:
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