TRB Special Report 300 - Achieving Traffic Safety Goals in the United States Lessons from Other Nations (2010) / Chapter Skim
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3 National Safety Programs in Benchmark Countriesand the United States
3 National Safety Programs in Benchmark Countriesand the United States
Pages 51-92
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From page 51... ...
COMMON ELEMENTS OF BENCHMARK NATIONS' SAFETY PROGRAMS Chapter 1 cited reports of several U.S. expert groups, sponsored by USDOT and AASHTO, that have surveyed traffic safety practices in other countries with the goal of identifying the essential components of successful programs.
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safety professionals of the experience of more than a dozen FHWA–AASHTO safety scanning tours conducted over the past decade highlighted five lessons that U.S. states can apply to improve highway safety (Baxter et al.
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Successful safety programs rely on systematic data collection, analysis, and research to understand the most important crash causes and risk factors on the country's roads.
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• Extensive public education traffic safety programs have been instrumental in sustaining community concern for road safety and support for effective interventions. • The media historically have been supportive of effective interventions, which has facilitated political willingness to act.
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. This information supported a comparative analysis of common institutional features of successful safety programs, summarized in the report as follows (OECD and International Transport Forum 2008d, 16–17)
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EXAMPLES OF NATIONAL SAFETY PROGRAMS Authorities in several countries have summarized their road safety programs by means of timelines showing policy actions and coincident changes in fatalities (Figure 3-1)
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FIGURE 3-1 Safety policy timelines: New Zealand (top) and France (bottom)
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The Interministerial Committee on Road Safety that directs the program has twiceyearly meetings chaired by the prime minister. It sets government policy on highway safety with the participation of the two national police agencies, the transportation agency, the justice ministry, the health ministry, and the safety statistical agency.
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These increases were largely the result of speed enforcement; the number of alcohol tests administered increased only 5 percent in 2004 (OECD and ECMT 2006a; ONISR 2005; ONISR 2008)
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Change, 1,000 Drivers, 1998–2007 2007 1998 2007 Total moving violations cited 4,884 12,972 +166 322 Speed limit violations 1,084 8,098 +647 201 Failure to wear seat belt 635 407 –36 10 Driver's license suspensions for impaired driving, speeding, or points 110 261 +137 6 Alcohol tests 8,178 11,230 +29 279 Preventive test (i.e., not 6,836 8,941 +31 222 subsequent to crash or violation) Positive tests 167 376 +125 9 Fatalities 8.49 4.62 –49 Licensed drivers 40,322 NOTE: Citations include those issued by the two national police forces, which have jurisdiction on all roads and streets and account for most enforcement activity.
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From page 61... ...
The speed and enforcement data suggest that the speed reduction was the result of the enforcement effort. Reduced drunk driving, increased use of seat belts, a slowing of the rate of traffic growth, and unidentified factors also are reported to have contributed to the fatality decline (Chapelon 2004)
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From page 62... ...
The recent state safety plans harmonize with a national road safety strategy developed jointly by the states and territories and the national government in 2001 through the Australian Transport Council. The council's 2009–2010 Action Plan highlights a safe system framework, which requires that safety programs direct actions at the four objectives of safer speeds, safer roads and roadsides, safer vehicles, and safer road users (Australian Transport Council 2008)
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Although the new measures and public information campaigns emphasize driver behavior controls, the safety program also involves safety-enhancing infrastructure improvements (Johnston 2006, 10–11)
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. The South Australia performance indicators report is noteworthy not only for the high level of enforcement intensity it documents but also as an illustration of the kind of routine performance monitoring that is considered necessary in support of the management of Australian safety programs.
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The analysis credited all road safety programs together with a 29 percent reduction and external factors (changes in alcohol sales and unemployment) with a 19 percent reduction.
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with low population density outside the urban centers, Sweden is in some respects more comparable geographically with Canada and Australia than with the large European countries. Vision Zero has been the philosophy guiding road safety programs since it was established by act of the parliament in 1997.
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. The government in 2007 invited an independent panel of international experts to review its road safety program and recommend improvements (Breen et al.
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. Programs to achieve quantitative safety goals are proposed as part of safety planning in the United Kingdom.
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Since 2007, speed camera funding has been integrated with the general national safety program, and local authorities are responsible for camera deployment and operation (Fiti et al.
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. Safer infrastructure is one of the 10 themes of the government's current national road safety strategy.
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by a comprehensive urban traffic safety management program, guided by a strategic plan and by ongoing monitoring and supported by adequate resources. The project began with analysis of road safety problems in the city: the distributions of types, locations, and causes of crashes; in addition, traffic volumes and speeds were mapped.
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Summary Observations on National Safety Programs The summary of past international reviews of safety programs in the first section of this chapter observed that the successful programs must function effectively at three levels: management and planning, technical implementation of countermeasures, and maintenance of political and public support. The benchmark country safety programs described above appear to share some practices in each of these three areas, although some differences are evident as well.
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From page 73... ...
Because of the sparse documentation available to the committee, the roles that public demands and leadership from elected officials played in the development of the benchmark countries' safety programs are unclear in most cases. In Victoria, Australia, a series of public outcries reportedly led to political pressure for action.
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, a 2002–2005 demonstration of intensive enforcement against alcohol-impaired driving; and the Demonstration Projects on Setting and Enforcing Rational Speed Limits, jointly sponsored by FHWA and NHTSA in seven states in 2001–2006; • State safety plans, as influenced by the federal requirement for each state to prepare a Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP) and by AASHTO guidelines on safety planning; • The Uniform Guidelines for State Highway Safety Programs concerning speed management and impaired driving (these are two of the 18 guidelines that NHTSA has prepared, as required by federal law, to aid the states in conducting programs funded by federal safety grants)
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The outline provides a definition of the scope of state and local government traffic safety activities. AASHTO Strategic Highway Safety Plan Elements and Goals 1.
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Public safety agency, including state police Enforcement of traffic and safety laws on state roads, emergency response Vehicle registration and driver licensing agency Motor vehicle registration, vehicle inspection, driver licensing State highway safety office Management or coordination of programs concerning driver behavior (occupant protection, impaired driving, and speeding) ; administration of NHTSA safety grants Local government agencies Public works department Construction and maintenance of local streets and roads Police department Enforcement on local streets and roads Emergency medical response service Ambulance service at crashes
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They include AASHTO, the Governors Highway Safety Association (state highway safety offices) , the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (truck safety enforcement officials)
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Success also required that each local police agency coordinate enforcement crackdowns with local courts and prosecutors to gain their support and to allow them to prepare for the increased workload. • Officers in some local forces were found to lack basic training in anti–drunk driving enforcement techniques.
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a; FHWA 2005) : Participant Site Mississippi Department of Transportation Major arterial highway in Gulfport Massachusetts Governors Highway Safety Bureau Residential collectors in Natick Connecticut State Police Secondary roads in Hebron Tippecanoe County, Indiana, Highway Department Two-lane county roads City of Taylor, Michigan, Police Department City streets and freeway connector South Central Planning and Development Urban and rural roads in two parishes Commission, Louisiana Virginia Department of Transportation Freeway bypass in Martinsville Organization of the program began in 2001, and the demonstrations were conducted at most sites from 2003 through 2005.
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The design of the rational speed limits demonstration program is more problematic, since it is unclear whether the scale of the activity was sufficient to serve as either a test or a demonstration of speed management methods. The goals of the speed demonstration program probably were overly ambitious for the resources available.
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, calls on each state to develop its own comprehensive safety plan (i.e., a plan addressing all five areas) , and calls for increased federal aid for state safety programs (AASHTO 2005)
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The older federally required annual highway safety plans addressed to NHTSA are narrower in scope; they address only programs funded with federal grants, in particular the NHTSAadministered highway safety grant programs and the hazard elimination program. Before the 2005 federal requirement, some states (e.g., Washington, Oregon, and Wisconsin)
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. Shortcomings in state planning parallel the description in the World Bank Guidelines for the Conduct of Road Safety Management Capacity Reviews of safety programs in countries where safety management capacity is limited and a strong lead safety agency is absent.
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Uniform Guidelines for State Highway Safety Programs The law that establishes the federal highway safety grant program requires that state highway safety programs, to be eligible for federal grants, be "in accordance with uniform guidelines promulgated by the Secretary [of Transportation]
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: Each State should provide leadership, training, and technical assistance to: • Monitor and report travel speed trends across the entire localized road network; • Identify local road segments where excessive and inappropriate vehicle speeds contribute to speeding-related crashes; • Monitor the effects on vehicle speeds and crash risk of setting appropriate speed limits; and • Coordinate, monitor, and evaluate the short- and long-term effect of State legislative and local changes that establish appropriate speed laws and posted speed limits on mobility and safety. However, as the section on speeding countermeasures in Chapter 4 describes, systematic speed monitoring today is rare among state and local transportation agencies and (as noted in the section above on safety plans)
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States can use the aids in safety plans to set quantitative targets for their hazard elimination programs and for the safety performance of planned new construction and to help guide allocation of resources among roadway safety improvements and other safety programs. The planning and analysis resources listed in Box 3-7 apply to highway design and traffic control.
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2003) -- Outlines procedure to optimize highway safety; emphasizes integration of relevant agencies -- Measurable targets linked to federal requirements for state safety plans -- Component of AASHTO safety planning initiative • Interactive Highway Safety Design Model (FHWA n.d.
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Resources include funding as well as legal authority; for example, funding for enforcement and publicity together with legal authority for sobriety checkpoints as components of a state's anti–drunk driving program. REFERENCES Abbreviations AASHTO American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials ATSSA American Traffic Safety Services Association CISR Comité Interministériel de la Sécurité Routière DfT Department for Transport ECMT European Council of Ministers of Transport FHWA Federal Highway Administration GRSP Global Road Safety Partnership NHTSA National Highway Traffic Safety Administration OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development ONISR Observatoire National Interministériel de Sécurité Routière PACTS Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety PennDOT Pennsylvania Department of Transportation AASHTO.
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2009. Implementing the Recommendations of the World Report on Road Traffic Injury Prevention: Country Guidelines for the Conduct of Road Safety Management Capacity Reviews and the Specification of Lead Agency Reforms, Investment Strategies and Safe System Projects.
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Safety Programs Newsletter, May–June.
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2006. Highway Safety Program Guideline No.
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2008. South Australian Road Safety Action Plan 2008–2010.
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