Overview
The amount of fatal road accidents dropped from 3300 casualties yearly in the early 1970s to less than 800 nowdays. Still, it remains a major object of concern to the Dutch government. SWOV conducts scientific research in order to contribute to road safety by means of scientific research and dissemination of results. These results may also help and facilitate outlining a traffic safety policy by the government. It is an institute financed by the Ministry of Transport and has a permanent status. Its activities were organised in four-year programmes, but were reduced to one-year programmes in recent years.
SWOV is an interdisciplinary and independent scientific institute that is responsible for research on road safety and by doing so enhancing traffic safety. The results are mainly aimed at professional users of this knowledge. One of the main tasks is therefore, the dissemination of the knowledge to them. The research is conducted on a scientific basis and focuses on long-term, generic (that is for example, not based on one single actor) research.
The main subjects of the 2007-2010 programme were:
- Road and traffic
- Human Behaviour
- Assessments and outlooks
- Road safety analyses
- International activities
- Research on regional issues
- Advisory research
- PhD research
- Factsheets and knowledge base
- Knowledge dissemination
The main subjects of the 2011 programme were:
- Knowledge management and research support
- Communication and knowledge dissemination
- Assessments and outlooks
- Road safety observatory
- Decentralized policy, enforcement and education
- Safer roads
- Safer vehicles
- Road users in their environment
- Research for a 'plan of attack for bicycle safety'
- Responding to current matters
The main subjects of the 2012 programme were:
- Knowledge management and research support
- Communication and knowledge dissemination
- Assessments and outlooks
- Road safety observatory
- Decentralized policy, enforcement and education
- Safer roads
- Safer vehicles
- Road users in their environment
- Sustainable Safety 2012: innovation and specific policy issues
- Research for a 'plan of attack for bicycle safety'
- Responding to current matters
The main subjects of the 2014 programme were:
- Analysis and Developments
‘Finding out why developments occur’ - Decentralized policy
‘A key role for regional and local partners’ - Sustainable Safety
‘Create a system in which it just cannot go wrong’ - Bicycle safety
‘We are a bicycle country, but there is so much we don’t yet know about bicycle crashes’ - Infrastructure
‘Recognizable, predictable ánd safe for everyone!’ - Internat
A Programme Advisory Board advises the SWOV on its complete research theme and knowledge distribution programmes. The members of this group also validate the results of the programme. The Advisory Board consists of representatives of the national, provincial and local governments as well as interest and pressure groups. The Ministry of Transport is then responsible for approving the research programme. The scientific integrity and quality is guaranteed by the Scientific Advisory Board in which several representatives of the scientific world are present.
Funding
The programme is mostly financed by the Dutch Ministry of Transport. Moreover, a smaller part of the subsidy is contributed by the European Union and ICES-KIS3.