Overview
In the 'Safe, what is safe?' report, SWOV characterised speed control as one of the main lines of a policy aimed at drastically reducing the number of road crash casualties. In the light of this, SWOV proposes to strive that, within a period of 10 years, nearly everybody obeys the then existing speed limits in the Netherlands. In order to achieve this, it is important to identify (cost)-effective measures that combat unsafe speed behaviour. In order to realise safe and (to the circumstances) adjusted speeds, it must generally be viewed at from three directions: enforcement and surveillance, new technologies in the vehicle or along the road, and features of the road/infrastructure. This project aims to use the first two viewing directions and to find the answer to, among others, the following questions:
- what do the optimal surveillance and enforcement activities look like?
- what are the possibilities and effects of intelligent, flexible speed limits?
- what are the possibilities of in-vehicle technologies (e.g. ISA, ACC)?
The project 'Recognisable design and predictable behaviour' will study the effects of road and surroundings features on driving speed together with other traffic behaviour.
The project contributes to a deeper understanding of the (cost)-effectiveness of various measures and combinations of measures to achieve desired, safe traffic behaviour.
The results of this project lead to policy recommendations with regard to (cost)-effective and feasible speed control measures in the short, middle, and long-term.
Three activities have been carried out in 2003.
- The first one is a linking and analysis of data on speed behaviour, surveillance activities, and crashes; this within the framework of the evaluation of the regional enforcement projects. This gives an indication of the most (cost)-effective way (or mixture of ways) of speed surveillance.
- Then, a meta-analysis of the results of national and international studies of the effectiveness of speed surveillance will be carried out.
- Finally, the political support for ISA will be described by means of an interview and questionnaire study.
During the course of 2004, the plans for a follow-up study will be made concrete by using the results of the first two activities and the first results of the 'Analysis of speed, speed distribution, and safety' study. We are considering empirical studies of the use of intelligent, flexible speed limits that take the weather and traffic conditions into account, and the effects of more-or-less obligatory in-vehicle technologies. Examples of empirical studies are: driving simulators, observations, and quasi-experimental studies.
In 2005 and 2006, these plans will then be carried out.