European road infrastructure needs to get safer

Publication date: 15 April 2005

The Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) together with five other organisations in charge of road safety programmes, the Federation of European Motorcyclists' Associations (FEMA), the European Union Road Federation (ERF), the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association (ACEA), the Association des Constructeurs Européens de Motocycles (ACEM) and La Prévention Routière Internationale (PRI) have released today a joint statement calling for a European legal framework on safe road management.

road_infrastructure_safety_management.pdf (121 KB)

The organisations say that enforcing traffic policies is not enough to effectively increase long-term road safety as it is not always the driver who is at fault. The European Union should do more to provide guidance on safer road engineering in order to ensure Europe’s road users are offered the driving conditions they deserve.

More specifically they call for establishing which auditing procedures are required at different stages, harmonising accident data collection and mapping, tackling safety hazards, promoting a European culture of safe road design and setting up expert networks and common reporting mechanisms enabling "best in Europe" approaches to self-explaining roads and forgiving roadsides.