Abstract
The main focus of this article is on the road traffic safety development trends in Latvia. Soon after the regain of independence at the beginning of the 1990s, road traffic safety characteristics in Latvia were the worst in the Latvian history. The increase of car availability and affordability made the car a major road vehicle. The implementation of road safety programmes contributed to essential improvement of road traffic safety in Latvia. The number of road accident fatalities in 2020 compared to 1991 decreased more than sevenfold. Nevertheless, the current Latvian road traffic safety statistics is well below the average level of the EU member states and even the pandemics did not cause similar reduction as in most member states. This indicates that great improvement is still needed. The article shows the Latvian experience in road traffic safety enhancements and discusses the measures to improve road traffic safety.
Highlights
In Latvia as in most of the EU countries, more than 80% of inland transport passenger-kilometres are covered by cars, having much higher passenger transportation share than buses, trains and motor coaches (Eurostat, 2020b)
The aim of this paper is to show the Latvian experience of road traffic safety improvement and to discuss the measures to improve road traffic safety level
To evaluate the traffic safety level in each country individually and to carry out international comparisons, it is possible to use the indicators of traffic safety level mentioned in this article: number of fatalities, fatalities per million vehicle kilometres, fatalities per 100 000 inhabitants, number of injured and seriously injured, related to the total mileage and population data, accident rate and absolute number of reported accidents, economic losses caused by road traffic accidents both in absolute figures and relative to GDP (WHO, 2018)
Summary
In Latvia as in most of the EU countries, more than 80% of inland transport passenger-kilometres are covered by cars, having much higher passenger transportation share than buses, trains and motor coaches (Eurostat, 2020b). Concerning the ton-kilometre volumes of goods transport in Latvia, railway plays a major role contributing to 75% of goods transportation in 2018 (Eurostat, 2020a). Inroad vehicle traffic is continuing to increase and in 2017 it reached 5085 vehicles/hour. Road traffic still makes a huge challenge for the society causing an essential number of human life losses, injuries and losses both to welfare and country economics. Since the early 1990s, the number of road fatalities in Latvia has essentially decreased. Losses to Latvian national economy are still considerable and in 2020 amounted up to 209 million EUR (CSDD, 2021a) or to 110 EUR per capita
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
