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The reduction of the number of road accident fatalities by 50 %, by the year
2010, suggested by the EU, involves the active contribution of all the agents in
charge of the road safety in Europe. Even though the accidents that happened
in urban areas have a relative smaller severity, it is the place where, for the
moment, in absolute terms, the major number of accidents take place in the EU
countries, as well as generating serious consequences on the more vulnerable
users (pedestrians, cyclists, children, the elderly…).
The current SAU action has as main objective to obtain an approximation of
the characteristics of the current accident collection and analysis systems
through the application and the study of a survey made to a sample of
European cities. This survey represents the starting point to raise and be able
to develop and reach a consensus on more appropriate improvement strategies
that will improve the current working procedures and optimize the available
means for the information record on urban accident rate.
In this project, a specific and detailed study of the urban accident collection
and analysis system has been carried out with the aim of knowing its
characteristics and high heterogeneity. As it has already been specified in
studies carried out in other countries, it has been confirmed that there are
significant problems of quality in the accident data that are precisely collected
through questionnaires filled in by the police bodies in charge of the traffic
accident management.
The survey study has been considered as essential to have a more reliable
and accurate knowledge on the issue of the urban accident rate (already fixed
before), and with it, being able to pose appropriate recommendations and
“good practices” in relation to the collection system
implementation/improvement, as well as to the urban traffic accident analysis
and monitoring, which might give answers and solutions and contribute to the
development of local tools.
Prior to the development of the European survey, the DGT (Traffic General
Directorate) showed a particular interest in this survey study, given that it
considered as being fundamental to have a complete vision on the state in
Spain, due to the short term forecast to completely reform the Spanish traffic
accident collection system. The appropriate integration of the urban data is one
of the most critical aspects of this reform.
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