2015 a milestone for EU Road Safety Action Programme

The workshop to discuss the preparation of the interim evaluation of the Road Safety Action Programme 2011-2020, organised by the European Commission's Road Safety Unit, was attended by the main stakeholders involved in road safety, including the European Road Federation (ERF).
December 22, 2014 Read time: 2 mins

The workshop to discuss the preparation of the interim evaluation of the Road Safety Action Programme 2011-2020, organised by the European Commission's Road Safety Unit, was attended by the main stakeholders involved in road safety, including the European Road Federation (ERF).

The ERF presented its recommendations to achieve the 2020 targets from an infrastructure perspective, focussing on three areas: Establishment of minimum safety performance for road infrastructure elements in the TEN-T (road markings and signs, road safety barriers); Improvement of data collection and data availability; Adaptation of road infrastructure to the needs of vulnerable road users.

Next year will be a milestone for road safety in Europe as the ten-year action plan reaches its midpoint. The action plan's main goal is to reduce the number of fatalities on Europe's roads by 50 per cent by 2020 compared to 2010 levels. To achieve this, seven strategic objectives have been identified: education and training of users, enforcement, infrastructure, safer vehicles, ITS and vulnerable road users.

There is a broad consensus that the European Commission has played a key role by coordinating actions and boosting national initiatives. The importance of exchange of best practices, creation of platform for specialists, working groups, standards or technical harmonisation was stressed during the discussions.

The need to improve the safety of vulnerable road users was also highlighted, including not only motorcyclists, but also cyclists, especially in urban areas. A better coordination between different Commission departments could also facilitate the exploration of horizontal synergies and links between policy areas.

In addition to the assessment of the first five years, participants also looked ahead until 2020. In this sense, discussions focused on the road user perspective (i.e. education and training, first-aid training, enforcement) and technical developments (i.e. infrastructure, ITS, active safety, emergency care issues, etc).

Urban Traffic Control

Related Content

  • Tolling is still stuck on the sidelines says ASECAP speaker
    August 19, 2015
    Geoff Hadwick attended ASECAP’s 2015 Study Days meeting in Lisbon and found a frustrated European tolling sector undertaking some soul searching. The international road tolling industry its failing to make it case and the sector is losing out to a range of other socio-political lobby groups according to International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association (IBTTA) chief executive Pat Jones. Speaking at the recent 2015 ASECAP Study Days conference in Lisbon, Jones issued a stark warning: “Tolling is still o
    Read More
  • Participants in new phase of global road safety initiative selected
    February 13, 2015
    Bloomberg Philanthropies has announced the winning cities and countries selected to participate in a new phase of the foundation's Global Road Safety Initiative, which aims to reduce fatalities and injuries from road traffic crashes. With a new commitment of US $125 million over five years, the program will work at both the national level to strengthen road safety legislation and the city level implementing proven road safety interventions. Twenty invited cities participated in the competition with ten c
    Read More
  • EU releases first transport infrastructure funds
    April 8, 2014
    Following its decision in March to make the first US$16.4 billion tranche of funding available for trans-European transport network projects, the European commission has now adopted the first work programmes within this framework: a multi-annual work programme covering larger projects with a total budget of US$15.1 billion and an annual work programme for 2014 addressing smaller projects with a budget of US1.3 billion. The funding priorities set out in these programmes include: The closing of missing lin
    Read More
  • Progress towards a pan-European cooperative infrastructure
    July 17, 2012
    Kallistratos Dionelis, General Secretary of ASECAP, makes the case for a lightly regulated, staged progression towards a pan-European cooperative infrastructure environment, the achievement of which should look to engender cooperation between the public and private sectors. Such an approach, he says, is the only real path to success.
    Read More

Highlighted Content