Summary of the Road Safety e-discussion

Summary of the Road Safety e-discussion
Prepared by Ranjith de Silva
(Based on the views and ideas expressed by the participants of the email-discussion)

Key words:
Road, Accidents, Safety, IFRTD, Discussion, Rural, also, safety vehicles, users, needs, action, areas, Africa, Development issues, proposal, transport, issue, plans, national, focus, impact, governance, make, action, accident, authorities,

Statistics:
Worldwide toll of road crashes (Source: IFRC and GRSP) (Susil Perera IFRC)
• An estimated 1.3 million people worldwide are killed each year on the roads – more than 3000 people die every day, including 500 children
• 50 million people worldwide are estimated to be injured in road crashes each year, 15 million seriously
• Globally, road traffic crashes have become the leading cause of death for young people aged 15-29 years
• Nearly half of those dying on the world's roads are pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists. Millions more people often remain disabled for life
• In addition to the grief and suffering they cause, road traffic crashes result in considerable economic losses to victims, their families, and nations as a whole
• The global financial cost of road traffic injuries is US$ 518 billion each year
• The cost to low and middle income countries is US$ 65 billion, more than all incoming development aid
• Low- and middle-income countries account for more than 85% of global deaths from road traffic crashes
• By 2020, unless action is taken, road traffic injuries are predicted to rise overall by about 65%
• In India about 41% of the persons getting killed on road accidents are pedestrians, cyclists and two-wheeled riders. (Prof. Ashoke Sarkar)
• It has also been acknowledged in literature that 65-75% of accidents take place due to human error. (Prof. Ashoke Sarkar)
• Indonesia has been suffered from high number of fatalities lead to national productivity loss about 22-23 billion USD a year or 2.9-3.1% from national GDP. – (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).
• Fatality ratio in Indonesia (number of people died and the number of accidents) is increasing, about 30% (2010), it means for every accident the chance of being killed is about 30%. - (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).
• Look into detail, 67% of the accident in Indonesia, involving productive age (22-50 years old), 30% involving youngster (already able to ride a motorcycle, school ages: 15-21yo), almost 60% involving motorcycle. - (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).

1. Issues:
• Not following the rules and regulation and weak law enforcement and misuse of road rules by politically influential people and the rich in Sri Lanka. (Dr. Palitha Ekanayake).
• More than 25% of Sri Lanka’s population will be 60+ years old by 2041, so much vulnerable community is emerging. (Granie Jayalath)
• Can Road safety be considered as a “man-made” disaster as happens mainly due to human error and include in to the Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) plans? It is also a development concern as a result of heavy investment on transport infrastructure development (e.g. development of highways in Sri Lanka)-(Vishaka Hidellage).
• People concerned are reluctant to change the “traditional definition” of “Disaster” and consider Traffic accidents as a “Disaster”. – (Dr. Jayalath Edirisinghe).
• The roles of governments and community should be well defined. (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).

2. Governance and management:
• who has responsibility, whose interests are served etc. (Priyanthi)
• Road Safety Management: This covers development of institutional frameworks and capacities for implementing road safety activities. (Peter - from Africa Road Safety Action Plan).
• Emphasize the importance of 6E concept for prevention of road traffic accidents ( Engineering, Education, Enforcement, Encouragement, Environment, Emergency) and participation of many Ps for fighting against traffic accidents (Police, Policy makers, Professionals, Politicians, Pedestrians, Parents, Principals, etc. etc.). - (Dr. Jayalath Edirisinghe).
• ADB study at 2004 showed Indonesia’s problem for road safety is bad institutional coordination and management. – (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).
• Governments’ ability to implement road safety programmes. (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).
• In Bangladesh (especially in LGED) a lot of work is going on with the mainstreaming of Road Safety in Rural Transport development. LGED is ready to share their experiences with others. – (Md Abdul Quader).

3. Impacts:
Social
• The impact on families of road accident victims, particularly care givers (Priyanthi)
• The economic impact of the killing of animals e.g. cow, goat in road accidents (which is quite common on Indian roads) is tremendous on a poor household. Almost in all the cases, the offenders do not even stop the vehicle (not reported) and the poor owner does not get any compensation. (Prof. Ashoke Sarkar).
• An insurance system for victims and their family livelihood loss (e.g. Loss of cattle, sheep etc). (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).
Post Accidental Care:
• Post crash responses dealing with on site care, transport and trauma care of the injured (Africa Road Safety Action Plan).

4. Road Designing:
• Safer Roads and Mobility which deals with safety of road development for all road users. (Africa Road Safety Action Plan)
• Concentrate on the 5 Es - Engineering, Enforcement, Education, Emergency help and Evaluation. (Prof. Ashoke Sarkar).

5. Rural Road Safety:
• The need to carry out audits on rural roads to ensure that safety features are incorporated at the design and implementation stages (Africa Road Safety Action Plan)
• Step up road safety awareness in rural areas covering all modes of transport. (Africa Road Safety Action Plan).
• The economic impact of the killing of animals e.g. cow, goat in road accidents (which is quite common on Indian roads) is tremendous on a poor household. Almost in all the cases, the offenders do not even stop the vehicle (not reported) and the poor owner does not get any compensation. (Prof. Ashoke Sarkar).
• Lack of awareness: Very often people are not aware about the rules and regulations, dangers associated with roads or even how to cross the road. Major highways pass through mainly rural areas and villagers get exposed to accidents. In India about 41% of the persons getting killed on road accidents are pedestrians, cyclists and two-wheeler riders.
• One important parameter is the deficiencies in our rural infrastructure, e.g. very narrow foot bridges without any hand rail, unsafe and non-engineered waterway crossings (exceeding 120,000 in Sri Lanka), most of rural pathways are not illuminated in night, mobility of women on such path ways quite easily subjected to crimes, by quoting different perspective associated with mobility. (Granie Jayalath)
• Vulnerable rural road users (pedestrian, cyclist, youngster, elderly, women, long distance drivers, including all un-educated drivers), working on speed management in the rural areas, ensuring safer rural road environment, rural emergency system for rural road accidents. - (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).


6. Safer Transport Modes and Vehicles:
• Safer vehicles which focuses on vehicle standards (Africa Road Safety Action Plan).

7. Approach for reduction of accidents:
• Indonesia adopted the ‘zero accident’ approach for the program, but currently shifted to ‘zero fatalities’ approach, it means with the understanding that accident will always happen as human mistakes but otherwise the fatalities should be less or zero. This approach has been used by many countries like Australia, Sweden and in many others, and is proven to be a good approach. If we look at the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011 – 2020, the goal of the action is also to ‘reduce the level of global road fatalities’. Our national plan works at the 5 pillars (also mentioned by Dr. Njenga), orchestrated many organizations involved in this program. - (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).

8. Driver behavior:
• Safe driving which focuses on driver training, testing, public awareness etc (Africa Road Safety Action Plan).

9. Education:
• In India about 41% of the persons getting killed on road accidents are pedestrians, cyclists and two-wheeler riders. It has also been acknowledged in literature that 65-75% of accidents take place due to human error. Therefore, they need to be targeted and educated.
• “People centred” training and education for the authorities and all road users, (especially in rural areas) to respond to the needs to ensure road safety. (Ana Bravo).
• Development of role models in Education, training and awareness programs are needed by IFRTD and affiliated National networks. (Dr. Palitha Ekanayake).
• Promotion of “Virtual Mobility Concept”, to what extent we could use the technologically advanced concepts, to feel the people to stay at home? (Granie Jayalath)
• Improve community adaptability of road safety conditions. (Juhri Iwan Agriawan).
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10. Black spots:
• According to ADB guideline on road safety, three characteristics of black-spot locations where the accident mostly happened in rural area are 1) at "Y" junctions 2) in the village passed through by inter-regional road 3) at the crossing between interregional road with local road or access road. (Arif Wismadi)

11. Safety Audit:
• The main obstacle for working on road traffic issues is a proper database including GIS as a major component.- (Dr. Jayalath Edirisinghe).

12. IFRTD Role:
Identify:
• Identify a clear niche/gap that is being overlooked. (Peter Njenga)
• Identify and present a clear strategy on how IFRTD is positioned to deliver on that niche. (Peter Njenga)
• IFRTD may also may take-up education. Thus making all road users aware of roads safety, particularly in regard to rural areas.

13. Suggestions:
• Develop the discussion further in to a proposal – (Arif Wismadi).
• We have to be innovative in our proposals, and we cannot take the same approach as everyone else working on the issue. We need to go beyond what issues people are working on already and look into the gaps in our knowledge. (Priyanthi Fernando).
• Need to take this forward and create a platform to advance some of the issues that are on the blindside of current approaches to road safety. We need to identify a clear niche of action, keeping in sight our mandate of advancing the course of a more socially conscious transport system. Whatever set of issues we agree to work on, our approach should be to amplify people’s voices/perspectives into this discussion. – (Peter Njenga).