Each year in Australia around 1,200 people die on the roads, and almost 40,000 are seriously injured. These figures provide a stark reminder that the road system needs to be improved to keep all road users safe.
While much progress has been made in past decades to reduce road trauma, including improvements in vehicle design and the performance of road users, as well as significant advancements in traffic planning, management, and infrastructure design, the annual cost of road trauma in Australia is estimated to be in excess of $30 billion.
The National Road Safety Strategy 2021–30 sets a target of 50% reduction in deaths and 30% reduction in serious injuries by 2030 and Australian Government’s Vision Zero statement represents a commitment to eliminate deaths and serious injuries on the road by 2050.
These commitments emphasise that no one should be killed or seriously injured while using road networks, and that fatalities and serious injuries are both unacceptable and preventable – key principles of the Safe System approach.
AusRAP is informed by and founded on the Safe System approach.
Since the 1990s, leading road safety countries have been pursuing a paradigm shift in the way the road safety problem is regarded. Commonly referred to as the “Safe System” approach, this paradigm shift changes the way in which the road safety problem is perceived and therefore managed. A significant cultural shift is required before this approach becomes normalised practice. A Safe System forces everyone to look at road safety from a public health perspective, in which injury is avoidable and responsibility lies with all those involved with the road network, including system planners, designers and operators in addition to the road users.
The approach is based on the principle that no one should be harmed or killed while using the roads. From this standpoint it is unacceptable that the victims of road trauma are blamed for the outcomes of road user errors. Moreover, it must be acknowledged that the way in which the road system has been designed and is operated may also contribute to crashes. A Safe System, therefore, is one in which roads are planned, designed and operated to be forgiving of human error so that severe casualty outcomes are unlikely to occur.
The Safe System approach brings a public health focus to road safety, ensuring all efforts aim for harm minimisation. At the centre of this is human fallibility and the fact that errors at present can lead to unintentional death and injury. Efficient road travel should not be at the expense of human wellbeing.
There are four key principles that form the basis of the Safe System approach (International Transport Forum 2016):
- People make mistakes that can lead to road crashes
- The human body has a limited physical ability to tolerate crash forces before harm occurs
- A shared responsibility exists amongst those who plan, design, build, manage and use roads and vehicles and those who provide post-crash care to prevent crashes from resulting in serious injury or death
- All parts of the system must be strengthened to multiply their effects; so that if one part fails, road users are still protected.
The Safe System approach reflects a holistic view of the combined factors involved in road safety. A Safe System protects road users from death and serious injury by taking human error and frailty into account.
The Safe System is usually considered in terms of key interacting “pillars”.
- Safe roads
- Safe speed
- Safe vehicles
- Safe people.
A fifth pillar, post-crash response, was introduced into the Safe System model by the United Nations in 2010 (World Health Organisation 2011); however, it is yet to be reflected in the portrayals of the Safe System in Australasia.
Each of the Safe System pillars is inter-related and problems in one area may be compensated by solutions in another.
For more information about the Safe System approach, see Guide to Road Safety Part 1: Introduction and The Safe System.
