The driving environment includes physical infrastructure (roads, signs, traffic lights, etc.) and the condition and maintenance of that infrastructure. Increasingly, information technologies play a role in the driving environment – for example, by controlling the timing of traffic lights. All of these factors have an enormous influence on traffic safety.
Safety challenges related to the driving environment vary between countries and between developed and developing economies. Around the world, we work with government agencies and private-sector partners to promote road safety. In late 2004, working in partnership with General Motors, Honda, Michelin, Renault, Shell and Toyota, we helped to found the Global Road Safety Initiative. The purpose of the initiative is to transfer best practices, with the objective of reducing accidents and building capacity in developing countries to manage road safety. Projects include educational outreach to increase safety belt and helmet usage rates, and training aimed at improving roadway design.
The first focus of the initiative is China, where both the number and rate of traffic accidents are high and growing. Ford and other participating companies have pledged $1 million each over five years to fund important road safety projects in China, Brazil and countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). The projects are being implemented through the Global Road Safety Partnership, an existing organization founded by partners including the World Bank and national governmental aid organizations. Ford is taking a leadership role in the Partnership through chairing the Executive Committee as well as being actively involved in project execution. The projects will rely on delivery through local organizations to build local capacity, so that those organizations can continue their work in a sustainable fashion long after the projects are completed.
In 2003, Volvo partnered with the Thailand Department of Highways and the Global Road Safety Partnership to establish the Thailand Accident Research Center (TARC). According to Thailand's health sector, approximately 20,000 people die in traffic accidents each year in Thailand. This gives the country the dubious distinction of having one of the highest traffic fatality rates in the world. TARC builds on the Volvo Traffic Accident Research Team's 30-plus years of experience in Sweden. Volvo has donated substantial in-kind expertise to the project, along with a specially equipped accident investigation vehicle to carry out in-depth, on-the-scene accident research.
TARC has two main objectives: first, to build a database of knowledge gleaned from local accident experience, and second, to provide policy makers with information to help them prioritize traffic safety solutions and ultimately reduce the number of accidents. The project has now trained a team of investigators, and has been conducting research at accident scenes in several provinces in Thailand. The team, which also has two doctoral and four Master's students working with the investigators, has published several reports and presentations internationally. They have also built up an accident database, making it possible for researchers to use material from traffic investigations and reconstructions of accidents in Thailand. (More information can be found at www.tarc.or.th)
In Europe, Ford has also been taking a leadership role in two major accident research activities, in cooperation with public bodies. These activities include the German In-Depth Accident Study and the United Kingdom's Car Crash Injury Study. Ford sees these two different but complementary studies as key components of its policy of data-driven decision making, both internally to ensure that our safety strategy is targeted at the most productive areas, and externally to help governments focus their rulemaking attention on genuine safety issues, where they can make a difference.
