ERTICO is organising the 16th ITS European Congress which will be held in Seville, on 2-4 June 2025. This event will focus on clean, resilient, and connected mobility, which is a major component for road safety. Furthermore, during this conference, Seville’s green transport achievements will be promoted and its role in broader European objectives, such as the European Green Deal and the Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy, will be highlighted.
The European Council has published a special Report titled ‘Reaching EU road safety objectives – Time to move up a gear’, which provides an in-depth examination of the current state of play and trends in road safety in the EU. The text highlights the importance of investing on high-quality, resilient, and sustainable road infrastructure, and the related road safety planning obligations, as well as of interconnectivity and interoperability of data related to traffic to improve road safety management.
Eurostat has recently released a progress Report titled ‘Sustainable development in the European Union – monitoring report on progress towards the SDGs in an EU context – 2024 edition’. This publication provides readers with a statistical overview of the EU’s progress towards its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Based on the assessment of the past five years of available data, the EU made progress towards most of the SDGs, while it fell slightly behind in a few goals. Specifically for road safety, the EU road safety policy framework 2021–2030 and Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy aim to reduce deaths and serious injuries on the road by 50% by 2030.
The Transport Community organised with great success a hybrid event about the Capacity Building on Maximum Abbreviated Injury Scale 3+ in Belgrade, on 21 June 2024. During this conference, the conclusions of the SafetyCube project regarding the collection of serious injury data were presented. Furthermore, the MAIS3+ database and several best practices from EU Member States were discussed. NTUA Professor George Yannis actively contributed with the following presentation:
The Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI) in cooperation with the University of Leeds are organising the Road Safety on Five Continents (RS5C) Conference, which will be held in Leeds, United Kingdom, on 3-5 September 2025. The Conference aims to be a leading source of research results and interaction in the transport area with focus on safety and health associated with road transport.
The European Association of Operators of Toll Road Infrastructures (ASECAP) organised with great success for the second year a European day awareness campaing to draw public attention on safety of staff working on motorways. This campaign titled “All lives matter” aims to take a European dimension supported throughout the network operated by ASECAP members. Drivers were able to take part in a wide range of workshops and simulations to illustrate in practical terms the risks they face daily to ensure the safety of everyone on the roads.
The European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) organised with great success the ETSC PIN Conference 2024, which was held in Brussels, on 19 June 2024. During this Conference, ETSC presented the findings of the 18th PIN Annual Road Safety Performance (PIN) Report looking at progress in reducing road deaths and serious injuries across Europe. Two key road safety issues were analysed in more detail: the safety of powered two wheelers and safety on rural roads. NTUA Professor George Yannis actively contributed with the following presentation:
The World Bank established a new dedicated Road Safety Unit that elevates the road safety agenda to an even higher priority level, housing also the multidonor Fund of the Global Road Safety Facility (GRSF). On that occasion, GRSF has launched a new Business Plan for the years 2024-2027, as well as a new website showcasing the new strategy, approach, and programs. To further promote road safety, the World Bank recently established the annual Hart Schafer Road Safety Award in order to recognize excellence in advancing road safety financing and innovation in low and middle-income countries.
The European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) published the 18th edition of PIN Annual Report, with the active contribution of NTUA, presented at the 2024 ETSC Road Safety Performance Index event which took place with great success on 19 June 2024 in Brussels. According to this PIN Report, 20,418 deaths were killed on EU roads in 2023 representing a decrease of only 1% compared to 2022, falling far short of the 6.1% annual reduction needed to achieve the EU target of a 50 % reduction by 2030. The European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) has also awarded its 2024 Road Safety Performance Index (PIN) Award to Finland, recognising its long-term performance in improving road safety.
Road fatalities in Greece in 2023 presented a slight decrease (5%) compared to 2022 figures, according to the provisional ELSTAT data. During the period 2013-2023, Greece presented an impressive road safety improvement in the European Union, with a decrease of 29% in road fatalities since 2013 and a decrease of serious injuries of 46%. The rate fatalities per million vehicles has decreased by 37% since 2013.
The Civil Engineering School of the National Technical University of Athens was ranked this year 19th in Europe and 51-100 worldwide among all Civil Engineering Schools. This ranking is produced by the QS Organisation (QS World University Rankings by Subject 2024) based on the following criteria: Research, Teaching, Employability, Facilities, Internationalization, Innovation, Engagement and Access. NTUA road safety activities have contributed to this ranking.
The Hellenic Association for the deployment of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS Hellas) together with the Research University Institute of Communication and Computer Systems of NTUA, co-organised with great success the 9th ITS Hellas Conference, which took place in Athens, on 5-6 June 2024. This Conference was held under the theme “Smart Transport & Logistics 2024: Explore. Innovate. Transform”, focusing on the developments in the field of Intelligent Transport Systems in Greece. NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation:
A paper titled “Review of City-Wide 30km/h Speed Limit Benefits in Europe” authored by George Yannis and Eva Michelaraki has been published in Sustainability. This study allows the quantification of the benefits in safety, environment, energy, traffic, livability, and health before and after the phased implementation of city-wide 30 km/h speed limits. Results from 40 different cities across Europe (including Paris, London, Brussels, and Helsinki) demonstrated that 30 km/h speed limits have led to significant reductions: 37% of road crash fatalities, 18% in emissions, 2.5dB in noise pollution and 7% in fuel consumption (on average), with very small variations of average traffic speed.
EFTHITA Rhodes completes 20 years of actions on road safety, for “a world without traffic injuries”. EFTHITA promotes traffic education and focuses on informing and raising public awareness for safer road traffic and harmonisation of legislation. Furthermore, the work and actions of this organization are in line with the strategies and actions of the European Commission and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, in order to achieve the goal of reducing road fatalities by 50% by 2030.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has recently published the Road Safety Country Profiles within the framework of the fifth Edition of the Global Status Report on Road safety 2023 (GSRRS) published in December 2023, with the active contribution of NTUA. These 170 Country Profiles are available through the WHO web and the WHO Road Safety Data app and contain a unique wealth of data and information on all road safety pillars, including safe road infrastructure, safe vehicles, post-crash response and road user behaviour.
The 2024 International Research Council on the Biomechanics of Injury (IRCOBI) Europe Conference will be held in Stockholm, Sweden, on 11-13 September 2024. Through scientific conferences, training courses and other activities, the IRCOBI Council provides an academically rigorous forum for dissemination of the latest research into injury causation and protective systems.
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) has recently published a Synthesis Report titled “Speed Limits” which focuses on the interventions regarding effective speed management. More precisely, new principles about setting speed limits are emerging, based on an assessment of the combined risk relating to the infrastructure, travel speeds, volume and mix of traffic by type (including vulnerable road users). Furthermore, signs are the primary way of communicating the speed limit of a road to drivers, with principles of effective speed limits signing been uniformity, consistency, simplicity, relevance and legibility.
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) has recently published a Synthesis Report titled “Speed” which focuses on the relationship between speed and risk. Precisely, as average traffic speed reduces, so does the likelihood of a crash resulting in injury that is recorded by the police. Furthermore, effective speed management policies are likely to include an integrated package of measures, including credible speed limits, enforcement, education and engineering. RoSPA is a leading voice in health and safety that has campaigns to reduce avoidable crashes on the road.
Using the International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP) methodology, road safety infrastructure changes and safer speeds within more than 1,000 infrastructure projects have prevented almost 700,000 deaths and serious injuries in 74 countries since 2016, according to a new paper with Johns Hopkins University published in PLOS One. This study is the first to measure the impact of road projects financed by governments, development banks and private-sector road operators around the world using the iRAP methodology and tools.
BBC World News published an article about a revolutionary idea that changed the way Europe regarded road collisions. Claes Tingvall, as the head of Road Safety for the Swedish Road Adminstration in 1995, tried to balance road safety with other factors, including cost, driver preferences and the impact on the economy of changing traffic flows. Tingvall found that crash victims were not, as many in the road transport sector, assumed – drunk and irresponsible drivers but for the most part, they were people who made small mistakes. He introduced the Vision Zero fatalities as ultimum target and the Safe System approach as the way to share the responsibility also to the Authorities and all those involved in the design and the operation of the road and traffic system to be preventive and forgiving to human errors, eliminating the crash and injury risk.