Why is road safety in the U.S. not on par with Sweden, the U.K., and the Netherlands? Lessons to be learned

Luoma, Juha; Sivak, Michael

doi:10.1007/s12544-014-0131-7

Cited by 17 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…If the United States had the same motor vehicle crash death rate as Belgium (the country with the second highest death rate), 12,000 fewer lives would have been lost in 2013 and an estimated $140 million in direct When accounting for factors that differ across countries, including population size, vehicle miles traveled, and number of registered vehicles, the United States consistently ranked poorly among OECD comparison countries. This low ranking is consistent with other cross-national motor vehicle injury research findings (8)(9)(10). Although it is difficult to identify and quantify the reasons for differences between the United States and the comparison countries, differences in policies and their enforcement, use of advanced engineering and technology, and differences in public acceptance and use of effective strategies have all contributed to reducing death rates in the best performing countries.…”

Section: Conclusion and Commentssupporting

confidence: 81%

Vital Signs: Motor Vehicle Injury Prevention — United States and 19 Comparison Countries

Sauber-Schatz¹,

Ederer²,

Dellinger³

et al. 2016

MMWR Morb. Mortal. Wkly. Rep.

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Background: Each year >32,000 deaths and 2 million nonfatal injuries occur on U.S. roads.Methods: CDC analyzed 2000 and 2013 data compiled by the World Health Organization and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) to determine the number and rate of motor vehicle crash deaths in the United States and 19 other high-income OECD countries and analyzed estimated seat belt use and the percentage of deaths that involved alcohol-impaired driving or speeding, by country. Results:In 2013, the United States motor vehicle crash death rate of 10.3 per 100,000 population had decreased 31% from the rate in 2000; among the 19 comparison countries, the rate had declined an average of 56% during this time. Among all 20 countries, the United States had the highest rate of crash deaths per 100,000 population (10.3); the highest rate of crash deaths per 10,000 registered vehicles (1.24), and the fifth highest rate of motor vehicle crash deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled (1.10). Among countries for which information on national seat belt use was available, the United States ranked 18th out of 20 for front seat use, and 13th out of 18 for rear seat use. Among 19 countries, the United States reported the second highest percentage of motor vehicle crash deaths involving alcohol-impaired driving (31%), and among 15, had the eighth highest percentage of crash deaths that involved speeding (29%). Conclusions and Comments:Motor vehicle injuries are predictable and preventable. Lower death rates in other high-income countries, as well as a high prevalence of risk factors in the United States, suggest that the United States can make more progress in reducing crash deaths. With a projected increase in U.S. crash deaths in 2015, the time is right to reassess U.S. progress and set new goals. By implementing effective strategies, including those that increase seat belt use and reduce alcohol-impaired driving and speeding, the United States can prevent thousands of motor vehicle crashrelated injuries and deaths and hundreds of millions of dollars in direct medical costs every year.

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Section: Conclusion and Commentssupporting

confidence: 81%

Vital Signs: Motor Vehicle Injury Prevention — United States and 19 Comparison Countries

Sauber-Schatz¹,

Ederer²,

Dellinger³

et al. 2016

MMWR Morb. Mortal. Wkly. Rep.

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“…Good Swedish urban planning has probably led to a more limited need to use cars, contributing to a lower exposure to road accidents. However, advanced urban planning is a structural factor that is hard to achieve quickly [11]. Nonetheless, long-term development is recommended, and other related means are available as well, such as developing public transport and encouraging people to use it, alongside telecommuting, etc.…”

Section: Agementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Earlier studies comparing the differences in safety between countries have concentrated mainly on factors explaining the differences and are based on aggregated accident data [e.g. 8,9,11,24,4].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comparison of road safety in Finland and Sweden

Peltola

Luoma

2016

Eur. Transp. Res. Rev.

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Purpose The main aim of this study is to identify factors behind Finland having a poorer road traffic accident record compared to Sweden. Another aim is to study whether there are any benefits to using real disaggregate data. Methods We use the term safety potential to describe how much safety would improve in Finland if the rate of a selected measure in Sweden existed in Finland as well. In our analyses we use population risk to compare safety as a main measure. Results Comparison of the number of fatalities per population in 2009-2013 between Finland and Sweden showed that for Finland there is a safety potential of 99 yearly fatalities out of 248. The number of fatalities per vehicle kilometre in Finland is 30% higher than in Sweden and the number of motor vehicle kilometres per person 23% higher. The highest potential for fatality reduction is for cars, related mainly to head-on fatalities. Age groups 15-17 and 18-20 years were identified as having the greatest relative population risk in Finland: the safety potential among 15-17-year-olds is seven moped and motorcycle fatalities and among 18-20-year-olds 12 car fatalities annually. Finland having the Swedish fatality risk per person kilometre would prevent six bicycle and six pedestrian fatalities per year. Conclusions The extensive network of middle-barrier roads introduced in Sweden would probably offer the most extensive safety benefit for Finland also. Advanced use of disaggregated data provides more options than programmes created for analysing aggregate data.

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“…[13,14]. In practice, truly comprehensive analyses are often infeasible, and, therefore, many authors tend to focus on particular effects or relations, such as comparing crash rates between different regions or assessing trends in the rates in relation to selected explanatory macro-level variables, such as the size and composition of the car stock [15,16]. In addition, cross-country comparisons of road safety performance and measures can be attributed to this category [16,17].…”

Section: Approaches In Analysis Of Road Traffic Sensitivity To Weathementioning

confidence: 99%

“…In practice, truly comprehensive analyses are often infeasible, and, therefore, many authors tend to focus on particular effects or relations, such as comparing crash rates between different regions or assessing trends in the rates in relation to selected explanatory macro-level variables, such as the size and composition of the car stock [15,16]. In addition, cross-country comparisons of road safety performance and measures can be attributed to this category [16,17]. Gitelman et al [17] Shows, for the world's best performing countries in terms of road safety, that only a few perform really well across the board, whereas most of these overall good performing countries appear to have some weak spots in their policy portfolio.…”

Section: Approaches In Analysis Of Road Traffic Sensitivity To Weathementioning

confidence: 99%

Weather Conditions, Weather Information and Car Crashes

Perrels

Votsis

Nurmi

et al. 2015

IJGI

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Road traffic safety is the result of a complex interaction of factors, and causes behind road vehicle crashes require different measures to reduce their impacts. This study assesses how strongly the variation in daily winter crash rates associates with weather conditions in Finland. This is done by illustrating trends and spatiotemporal variation in the crash rates, by showing how a GIS application can evidence the association between temporary rises in regional crash rates and the occurrence of bad weather, and with a regression model on crash rate sensitivity to adverse weather conditions. The analysis indicates that a base rate of crashes depending on non-weather factors exists, and some combinations of extreme weather conditions are able to substantially push up crash rates on days with bad weather. Some spatial causation factors, such as variation of geophysical characteristics causing systematic differences in the distributions of weather variables, exist. Yet, even in winter, non-spatial factors are normally more significant. GIS data can support optimal deployment of rescue services and enhance in-depth quantitative analysis by helping to identify the most appropriate spatial and temporal resolutions. However, the supportive role of GIS should not be inferred as existence of highly significant spatial causation.

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Why is road safety in the U.S. not on par with Sweden, the U.K., and the Netherlands? Lessons to be learned

Cited by 17 publications

References 11 publications

Vital Signs: Motor Vehicle Injury Prevention — United States and 19 Comparison Countries

Vital Signs: Motor Vehicle Injury Prevention — United States and 19 Comparison Countries

Comparison of road safety in Finland and Sweden

Weather Conditions, Weather Information and Car Crashes

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