Mots clé accident reduction targets; hot spots of accidents; international comparison of fatality figures; childrens accidents

Work towards setting and achieving safety targets for sustainable road traffic requires a strengthening of the capacity of the various institutions responsible for all aspects of road traffic safety and an increasing in their capability for multi-sectoral action. The setting of targets is a well-established management strategy and, when applied for accident reduction, has proved very effective in a number of countries. National targets need to be disaggregated so that all those with urban traffic safety responsibilities are given their own specific and realistic target with adequate funding directly related to the level of compliance. To manage such a strategy efficiently, it is recommended to prepare, on an annual basis, a road safety plan jointly with all relevant authorities. Such a plan should state the accident reduction target and ways and means to achieve it.

Competent authorities responsible for road traffic safety should thus focus their activities on a diagnosis of the road accident problem, draw up an integrated plan of action, including goals and objectives, coordinate the work of all organizations involved, procure funds and resources, produce design guides, design and implement improvements, monitor implementation and evaluate measures, feed back information from evaluations and amend the action plan as necessary.