Road safety audit
A road safety audit (including road safety audit , Eng. Road Safety Audit (RSA)) can reveal shortcomings in planning for the road to the traffic safety to give a higher profile. When planning roads, compromises have to be made between the interests of different stakeholders. The environment with buildings, fauna and flora and economic framework conditions can require adjustments to the planning and approximation of the limit values of the technical regulations . On the other hand, complex planning situations often place high demands on the planners, clients and the engineers entrusted with quality assurance. Experience shows that these situations are not always optimally mastered. Serious results of accident research show that there is a not to be underestimated degree of improvement possibilities with regard to road safety on existing and also on relatively newly built roads. This can be due to the fact that the aspects of traffic safety were not sufficiently considered in the planning. Avoidable accidents can lead to human suffering and economic damage even on new or upgraded roads. In the audit, road planning is evaluated exclusively under the aspect of road safety; based on this evaluation, there is feedback to the planner on recognizable deficits in the planning.
development
In the UK, the road safety audit was introduced with the Road Act of 1988. The basis was decades of experience with comparable processes in the field of railways. Since then, numerous other countries have introduced the road safety audit. To be mentioned are z. B. Austria, Denmark, France and Romania. In Germany, with the "Recommendations for the Road Safety Audit" (ESAS) in 2002 and the certification of road safety auditors based on it, a decisive step towards the application of road safety audits was taken.
On November 19, 2008, the European Union published the “Directive 2008/96 / EC on safety management for road infrastructure”. The Member States must apply this Directive, which applies to roads in planning, construction or operation, which are part of the trans-European road network, from 9 December 2010.
Costs and benefits
The costs depend on the type and scope of the planning project to be audited. It is also important whether the audit is carried out in a team or by individual auditors. As a guide, an audit would require around 2 to 6 auditor's daily work. In terms of German standards, the costs are around 1,600 to 4,800 euros per planning and planning phase.
The road safety audit has the following benefits:
- Security risks for the different user groups are shown,
- Subsequent improvements to security deficiencies are not required,
- Avoidance of economic losses due to traffic accidents,
- Increase in the quality of road designs through intensive technical discussion between planners, administrations and auditors.
It is often not very easy to carry out a cost-benefit analysis of the road safety audit. In general, it can be said that the benefits outweigh the costs. Research on cost-benefit has been carried out in some countries. The Austrian Board of Trustees for Road Safety has calculated an economic benefit for audits of more than 50 times the cost. In Denmark in 1995 a cost-benefit factor of 16.8 was determined. In Germany, the Transport Technology Institute of the General Association of Insurers carried out a detailed study in 2004 that determined benefit-cost factors in a range between 4 and 99.
The road safety audit in the Federal Republic of Germany
Procedure
As mentioned above, the road safety audit was recommended for use with the publication of ESAS in 2002. The application is the responsibility of the respective authorities of the federal states and municipalities. In some federal states (e.g. Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania ), the application is restricted by state decree to the road sections that are part of the EU's TEN-T network. The formal implementation of the minimum requirements of the above EU directive and therefore at least the application of the safety audit for almost all motorways in Germany is mandatory. In other federal states (e.g. North Rhine-Westphalia ) it is widely used in almost all projects, including projects in cities and municipalities.
In 2019, the Research Association for Roads and Transportation published a "Guideline for Road Safety Auditing" (RSAS) as a further development of ESAS. As a guideline, this set of rules is appropriately much more binding than the previous recommendations and also contains procedures for a safety audit of the existing roads (existing audits).
The recommendations for the safety analysis of road networks (ESN) issued in 2003 are to be applied with a view to checking existing road networks. Both sets of rules apply to motorways, country roads, main roads and access roads . Investigations according to the ESN are only to be provided in the case of an accumulation of accidents with serious personal injury. Since 2006, the recommendations for protection against accidents with impacts on trees (ESAB) have also been available.
The training and certification for security auditors is currently being carried out at the universities of Weimar and Wuppertal. To this end, the university professors' audit partnership (ADH-SAS) was founded. The Federal Highway Research Institute (BASt) maintains a list of the safety auditors certified in Germany. The technical and scientific exchange between auditors and other road safety experts is promoted through various activities. Relevant thematic symposia take place annually, which are organized by the Research Association for Roads and Transport (FGSV). In 2005, a non-profit association of road safety auditors and experts was founded, which also serves to exchange experiences in this field (German Road Safety Audit eV - GRSA).
criticism
The FUSS eV, Fachverband Fußverkehr Deutschland, criticizes the fact that the formalized traffic safety audit at the time (before 2019) only related to new construction and renovation plans. The much larger number of roads is largely disregarded or only refers to the accumulation of accidents. Safety potential, especially for pedestrians and cyclists, could be implemented here to a considerable extent. The author points out that in Great Britain and Scandinavia there has been a pedestrian audit for a long time , in Switzerland as a foot traffic inspection , which includes essential aspects of a safety audit under this aspect which is important for traffic safety, whereby comfort and safety for pedestrians when crossing roads is an essential part.
Web links
- Research Society for Roads and Transportation eV
- List of auditors certified in Germany and their departments, from the Federal Highway Research Institute, PDF 99 KB
- German Road Safety Audit eV
- Audit partnership of university teachers (AdH) - certification in Weimar and Wuppertal
- Training concept for infrastructure security instruments (ISSI) and list of auditors certified in Switzerland, Federal Roads Office FEDRO