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Indicator Specification
The Commission first launched an Action Programme on Road Safety in 1993. The Commission Communication "Promoting Road Safety in the EU: the Programme for 1997-2001" (European Commission, 1997) followed on from there. The current road safety programme, covering 2002-2010, is aimed at halving the number of fatalities on EU roads by 2010 (European Commission, 2001).
The indicator provides an insight into the trends in fatalities of road, rail, air and water transport, and also covers the number of accidents with injuries. It demonstrates the relative safety of different groups of road users and the need for improvement of safety measures as well as infrastructure.
The best way of comparing transport safety in different countries is by providing overall trends and rates (per million inhabitants and per passenger-km) figures over a given period of time. The European Commission has set up an accident database, CARE, for the comparative study of situations in which accidents happen, assisting in information dissemination and comparison of solutions. Projects such as ERSO (2009) provide a more detailed assessment of the safety situation on European roads and in the future should include most, if not all, countries of the EU.
The definition of the indicator is the number of persons killed each year in transport accidents by mode expressed both as absolute totals and per million of population. The modes covered by this indicator are road, rail, air and sea.
The number of persons killed in traffic accidents are provided in absolute numbers.
Relative change in road fatalities (base year 2000).
Road fatalities per million: absolute number of people/1 million people.
During the last decade, a considerable effort has been made to reduce the number and severity of transport accidents, via educational programmes, limitation of permitted blood alcohol level, speed limits, technical measures such as safety belts and air bags, and traffic control measures. Harmonization of the national laws on the technical condition of vehicles was one of the Community's most remarkable achievements. It included:
In 1997, the European Commission launched a programme for promoting road safety in the EU (European Commission, 1997) and set out a programme for the period 1997-2001 (referred to as the second road safety programme). In September 2001, the Commission published a White Paper "European transport policy for 2010: time to decide" (European Commission, 2001), where it proposed:
In June 2003, the Commission introduced a new action programme to increase the safety on European roads (European Commission, 2003). Three pillars can be recognised from this strategy to improve road safety:
To commit all stakeholders to the strategy and to obtain maximum effectiveness, the stakeholders are invited to sign the road safety charter, in which they can promise to improve progress in road safety.
The accident statistics database (CARE) was set up to evaluate the efficiency of road safety measures, determine the relevance of Community actions and facilitate the exchange of experience in this field. The database is available through the European Road Safety Observatory (ERSO) website:http://ec.europa.eu/transport/wcm/road_safety/erso/index-2.html
The target is set in the White Paper on "European transport policy for 2010" to halve the number of road fatalities by 2010 from 2000 year level (European Commission, 2001).
A road injury accident is an accident involving at least one road vehicle in motion on a public road or private road to which the public has right of access, resulting in at least one injured or killed person (European Commission, 2003).
Three types of victims are generally considered in rail accidents: passengers, employees and others.
Both statistics on road traffic accidents and statistics on rail traffic accidents will, according to the definitions, include accidents at level crossings between roads and railways. In order to avoid double counting comparing road and rail accidents, accidents at level crossings should be reported separately.
A railway operating accident is an accident occurring on main lines or service tracks operated by the railway, associated with railway stock movements on open tracks or on station premises and resulting in death of a person or a serious injury, or in extensive damage to stock, track or other installations, or extensive disruptions to traffic. Accidents in workshops, warehouses and depots are excluded as well as suicides (UNECE, 2009).
Rail accidents and casualties (UNECE, 2009):
Aviation accidents and casualties (UNECE, 2009):
N/A
No methodology references available.
In general, data on road fatalities from the policy statistical records are reliable, but concerns have been raised in earlier years that the total number of persons injured in road traffic accidents are underreported and that the records from the health sector (casualty departments) are more realistic. Furthermore, there is no agreed methodology for reporting road and rail injuries and hence datasets are not comparable across Member States. Definitions such as severe casualties may vary among the European countries. This uncertainty is one of the reasons for reporting only on fatalities and injury accidents.
Road data can be considered as reliable, accurate and robust. Data for other modes is sufficiently available.
No uncertainty has been specified
Work specified here requires to be completed within 1 year from now.
Work specified here will require more than 1 year (from now) to be completed.
For references, please go to https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/indicators/transport-accident-fatalities or scan the QR code.
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