Targeting Accident Remedial Measures

Total number of accident and casualties, especially killed and serious injury show how severe safety problems in our road. Nearly 3000 people still die on the UK road every year (DfT, 2009). More than 34.000 people are killed across the European Countries and almost 40.000 in the US while India become the highest number of road accidents in the world with over 105.000 deaths annually. UN WHO recent released shows 1.2 million death, 50 million injury or disabled and US$ 518 billion every year across the globe because of traffic accident. It means almost 3.300 people lost their live every day. Road accident is second most common cause of death for children and young adults (WHO, 2010)[1].

However these figures only explain the frequency of accident and death. It is important to understand the factors behind these figures and find the pattern and the trend. To analyze this, an exposure will be needed. Comparing the frequency to the exposures will offer the possibility to calculate the risk and future projection. For example, UK accident fatality rate is about 5.00 per 100.000 populations in 2007 which mean only five people are died on the road accident from 100.000 populations. This rate was one among the best in European countries. Another example is comparison of vehicle involvement in accident, which shows Heavy Goods Vehicle (HGV) has 1.6 and Car, has 0.8 rates per 100 million vehicle kilometres traveled. It means HGV would have killed people twice in 100.000 kilometres traveled by these vehicles.

There has been a long argument to both approaches, Number versus Rates. Number is considered to give very detail examination of each accident and the frequency of it on the sites, while Rates provide a better accident related risk assessment. Rates bring in a notion of risk, the risk of something going wrong against the units of exposures.

Figure 1: Use of Data for Road Safety Improvement (UN WHO)

General Practice of using Number of Accident and Casualties

Since 1998, EU Commission on Road Safety has tried to provide the Road Safety trend by using ‘quick indicator’ which consist of three main categories: number of accident resulting in injury, number of persons killed and number of person injured. Data is provided in country-to-country basis which classified in age, gender, month and year, mode of transport and road users. The main idea of this database is the collection of each single accident and it’s detailed as reported from country member (CARE, 2010)[2]. This database has become a powerful tool of analysis by quantifying road accident throughout the European road. Graph below shows the road accident fatalities trends of EU countries over 20 years:

Furthermore, many local authorities in UK have used accident number and casualties in their accident assessment. Leicestershire County Council, for example, counts the number and the severity of accidents from 2001 to 2006 in selected junctions. Accident that has been taken place in the proximity of assessed scene have been identified and highlighted as a black spot[3]. It has been figured out in the assessment that M1 Junction 21 has the highest number of accidents with annual average of 27 accidents while the average all studied scenes is 24 accidents. Therefore, this junction have been upgraded and expected to reduce numbers of accidents and KSI casualties.

Accident Risk Assessment by Accident, Fatalities and Injury Rates

Rates are comparison of accident frequency against chosen exposures. There are many choice of measures have been used for different objectives by different groups. Health sector, for example, mostly apply fatalities per 100.000 populations, while transport sector use fatalities per distance traveled or fatalities per million vehicle‐kilometers as a major measure. Rumar (1999) suggest several indicators to be operated as exposures, such as: number of persons or vehicles, time in the activity, distance traveled with that transport mode etc is some of the more frequently used measures.

Mode		Per 100 million person kilometers	Per 100 million person hours
Road	Total	1.1	33
	Bus	0.08	2
	Car	0.8	30
	Foot	7.5	30
	Cycle	6.3	90
	Motorcycle/moped	16	500
Train		0.04	2
Ferry		0.33	10.5
Air		0.08	36.5

Table 1: Estimates of fatality risks per person kilometers and hours for each transport mode in the EU

Target is easier to monitor against rates and relatively straightforward in comparison, as presented in table 1 where we could instantly figure out that motorcycle is the highest risk of transport mode.

UK Practice of assessing Accident and targeting accident Measures

Department for Transport in 2009, released a document called “Safer Way” which comprehensively explain four main categories of safety improvement across UK Road, they are:

1. Details overview of safety problems and evidence
2. The Importance of comparison and benchmarking
3. Future Projection and setting up the target
4. The Strategy to improve the safety

This document uses both measures, for example, in the evidence and problem acknowledgement, it is stated that 3000 people were killed in UK road in 2007 and about 20% of these casualties are motorcyclist. However, if it is compared 1994 – 1998 data, total fatal casualty has reduced by 36% and possibly to achieve 40% of reduction by 2010.

Based on this evidence, UK DfT has proposed the new target on measuring and ensuring the development of safety across the country, that are by 2020, total number of road death and total annual serious injury should be reduced by 33% compared to 2004-2008 baseline.

Although UK is one among the best on Road Safety, some countries have better safety performance by comparison of fatality rate per 100.000 populations. These countries, such as Nederland and Norway, have achieved rates of improvement better than UK

Figure 3: International Comparison of Fatality Rate per 100.000 Populations

Conclusion

A lot of groups are involved in accident data collection, analysis and setting up targets for better road safety development. Different needs and objectives have lead to various approach of road crash data. Safety improvement might be derived from accident database analysis and careful assessment of accident site followed by appropriate accident remedial measures (ADB, 2005). Comparison and benchmarking are important to have a better understanding on safety strategy and improvement. There is no international standard on assessing road safety performance and setting up the target yet, as UK exercised of mix matrices might provide more comprehensive approach. Then, a better use of data could lead to ambitious but achievable target.

---

[1] Global Health Observatory (GHO), available at http://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/road_safety_status/country_profiles/ accessed 12 May 2011 

[2] CARE European Road Accident Database, available at European Commission on Road Safety, http://ec.europa.eu/transport/road_safety/specialist/statistics/care_reports_graphics/care_what_is_it/index_en.htm, accessed 12 May 2011

[3] Leicestershire County Council, 2010, Accident Assessment Methodology, available at www.leics.gov.uk/downloaddatabasefile

Rumar, Kare (1999) Transport Safety Visions, Targets And Strategies: Beyond 2000, Swedish Road and Transport Research Institute

World Health Organization (2010) Data systems: A road safety manual for decision-makers and practitioners, WHO Press, Switzerland