Abstract
The Safe System approach to road safety has been adopted in many countries, but it has been adopted pervasively to a substantially constrained extent. This paper argues that effective adoption is hampered by two weaknesses in strategies for the implementation of Safe System: (1) interpretations of the shared responsibility principle and (2) Safe System adoption presented as simply requiring the use of multiple pillars of action. The typical description of shared responsibility includes responsibility by road users to obey the rules. This absolves accountability for road safety by the system owners and operators, facilitating victim blaming and reliance on road users who are acknowledged to be fallible. Thus, the system cannot be fully safe, and the vision of zero road trauma cannot be achieved. The extent to which road users are responsible for road safety via their actions is precisely the extent to which those responsible for the system have failed to deliver a safe road system. The assessment of road safety plans as Safe System because it includes multiple pillars of action fails to distinguish a system approach from a Safe System approach. Through these inclusions and interpretations, road safety advocates inadvertently obviate the responsibility of system owners and operators to provide a safe road system and prevent the achievement of zero road trauma, which nonetheless remains the vision described in Safe System strategies and plans. The Ultimate Safe System approach is proposed with a definition that genuinely drives the delivery of a truly Safe System and thus zero road trauma. Practical implications are considered.
Highlights
Received: 19 December 2021Road trauma is a growing humanitarian crisis, with World Health Organization estimates of annual deaths reaching 1.35 million [1] and annual injuries reaching 50 million [2].Global Burden of Disease estimates are similar, with slightly fewer deaths but 54 million injuries [3]
These show how Safe System is being operationalized, and they identify how this operationalization has in part contributed to the failure of road safety delivery and to the prevention of achieving zero road trauma
Based on this analysis of existing strategies asserted to be Safe System, the paper offers a clarified definition of the Safe System to facilitate strategic planning to adopt more genuine Safe System approaches to road safety and to achieve zero road trauma
Summary
Road trauma is a growing humanitarian crisis, with World Health Organization estimates of annual deaths reaching 1.35 million [1] and annual injuries reaching 50 million [2]. The aim of this paper is to evaluate descriptions of, and strategies for the adoption of, a Safe System through a review and logical analysis of existing Safe System guides and national strategies These show how Safe System is being operationalized, and they identify how this operationalization has in part contributed to the failure of road safety delivery and to the prevention of achieving zero road trauma (often referred to as vision zero). The present critical analysis relates to two key aspects of the description, interpretation, and operationalization of Safe System: (1) the principle of shared responsibility with road users and (2) describing and assessing Safe System in terms of pillars Based on this analysis of existing strategies asserted to be Safe System, the paper offers a clarified definition of the Safe System (the ‘Ultimate Safe System’) to facilitate strategic planning to adopt more genuine Safe System approaches to road safety and to achieve zero road trauma
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