The Vehicle and Traffic Safety Centre at Chalmers (SAFER) has recently launched its new website, aiming to further communicate worldwide SAFER research findings and presenting all projects, publications, news, seminars and other activities. SAFER is the open innovation arena with the contribution of Volvo, VTI, Chalmers University and other partners, where researchers and expertise work together to create safe mobility. Its traffic safety approach covers people, vehicles and the infrastructure – and together they contribute to safer road transports and smarter, more sustainable cities. 

The Newsletter of the African-European Dialogue Platform on Road Safety (SaferAfrica) has been recently issued with the active contribution of NTUA. This Newsletter is the official, semi-annual newsletter of the SaferAfrica Project funded within Horizon 2020 programme of the European Commission, aiming to create favourable conditions and opportunities for the effective implementation of actions for road safety and traffic management in African countries by setting up a Dialogue Platform between Africa and Europe. The first issue includes a) New Network of Regional Road Safety Observatories by World Bank, OECD and FIA, b) Towards the Pan-African Road Safety Knowledge and Data Centre, c) Data-driven road safety under construction in Cameroon. 

http://www.saferafrica.eu/media/1699/01_newsletter-saferafrica_july-2017.pdf

The renown international scientific journal Advances in Transportation Studies (ATS) has launched its new website. The new ATS website has been redesigned for a user friendly and appealing web navigation offering to the Scientific Community a quick access to all scientific results published. 

The Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering of the Civil Engineering School of the National Technical University of Athens was ranked 9th in Europe and 39th worldwide among all Transportation Science & Technology Schools  and the Civil Engineering School of the National Technical University of Athens was ranked 7th worldwide (3rd European) among all Civil Engineering Schools  according to ShanghaiRanking’s Global Ranking of Academic Subjects (GRAS) 2017 . The methodology of the ShanghaiRanking’s Global Ranking include specific thresholds, indicators and weights. 

A coalition of Industry, NGOs, Consumer Groups and Cities are calling on the European Commission to urgently bring forward new minimum safety standards for new cars, vans and trucks, waited since long. The European Association of Automotive Suppliers (CLEPA), the European Cyclists Federation (ECF), POLIS, the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) and Transport & Environment (T&E) released a letter suggesting that new minimum vehicle safety standards are ‘absolutely critical’ to reducing deaths and serious injuries on European roads. 

The Road Safety Institute ‘Panos Mylonas’ with the support of the Federation Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) produced and implemented a video campaign titled “a while ago…” within the Fourth UN Global Road Safety Week, focusing on speed, identified worldwide as a major risk factor of death and disability. 

SafetyCube is a research project funded by the European Commission under Horizon 2020, the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation, in the domain of Road Safety. The project started on May 1st, 2015 and runs for a period of three years with primary objective to develop an innovative road safety Decision Support System (DSS) that will enable policy-makers and stakeholders to select and implement the most appropriate strategies, measures and cost-effective approaches to reduce casualties of all road user types and all severities in Europe and worldwide. NTUA is actively contributing to all phases of the SafetyCube project. 

The latest SafetyCube newsletter is now available, including very useful Practical Guidelines for determining the number of serious road injuries.  

On March 23rd, during its 74th session, UN World Road Safety Forum discussed an Informal Document on automated driving. This document, submitted by the Chair of WP.1 Informal Working Group of Experts on Automated Driving (IWG-AD), provides a draft common understanding of the Vienna and Geneva conventions with regard to the use of automated driving functions. 

NTUA is inviting experienced researchers from EU countries established outside Greece, who would like to pursue a PostDoc research programme at the NTUA Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering, to apply for European or Global Fellowships of the Marie Curie Individual Fellowships Programme of the European Commission (deadline: September 14^th, 2017).

The NTUA Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering is a world class centre on transport research excellence, offering high level research opportunities in state-of-the-art transport science disciplines, within a highly skilled and warm research team. Detailed requirements for application are available at the Marie Curie Programme website   and for further information you can contact us.

The International Road Transport Union (IRU) has recently launched the Guidelines on Safer Goods Reception, with aim to promote and ensure a safe and efficient working environment and use of the loading/unloading site for all stakeholders at the reception of goods. These IRU Guidelines provide information, rules and recommendations for different goods reception areas, taking into consideration safety, environment and cost effectiveness measures, enabling users to select the best solution based on its specific requirements. The Guidelines include general information on goods reception areas intended to facilitate the safe loading and unloading of goods and aim to contribute to an efficient and safe working environment for all new and existing reception areas.  

The UN Road Safety Collaboration is organising the global campaign for the Fourth UN Global Road Safety Week, 8-14 May 2017. The Week will focus on speed and what can be done to address this key risk factor for road traffic deaths and injuries. Speed contributes to around one-third of all fatal road traffic crashes in high-income countries, and up to half in low- and middle-income countries. The Global Road Safety Week seeks to increase understanding of the dangers of speed and generate action on measures to address speed, thereby saving lives on the roads.   Several events are also organised in Greece:

• NTUA – The Future of Road Safety Research Workshop, Athens
• IOAS – Road Safety Educational & Awareness Activities, Athens
• EFTHITA – Several Road Safety Events, Rhodes
• SOSTE – Slow Down, Several Greek Cities
• Making streets liveable, Road Safety Information Activities, Megara

The European Traffic Police Network (TISPOL) together with the European Commission DG Move Road Safety Unit have launched the project EDWARD – the European Day Without A Road Death 2017. After just one year, Project Edward has earned its place on Europe’s road safety calendar. The 2017 European Day without a Road Death will take place on Thursday 21 September. Several events, initiatives and promotional activity right across Europe will take place. Moreover, there will be a brand new dedicated Project EDWARD website with lots of new resources, artwork you can download – including images and infographics, a social media schedule so you will know what we’re going to be doing and can align yourself with various messages in the build-up to the day and on the day itself, a countdown timer to the day itself (starting 11 June, 100 days before 21 September), an interactive map and a brand new pledge to sign.  

Several EU countries have uploaded their videos about project EDWARD 2017: 

The Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP) has launched a new series of Positioning Papers, designed to create an understanding of the scale of road traffic deaths and injuries and their linkages to other humanitarian and development issues. The Positioning Papers seek to highlight that road safety is a multidimensional issue that requires an urgent and sustained contribution across many sectors, and that evidence based road safety interventions can address broader development issues such as children’s rights, public health, consumer rights and more. The Positioning Papers further enhance the GRSP’s suite of tools to support road safety advocacy campaign planning, including a general advocacy campaign toolkit and media advocacy toolkit, all of which are available on its Advocacy Tools web page. 

The Civil Engineering School of the National Technical University of Athens was ranked this year 12th in Europe and 42rd worldwide among all Civil Engineering Schools. This ranking is produced by the QS Organisation (QS World University Rankings by Subject 2017) based on the following criteria: Research, Teaching, Employability, Facilities, Internationalization, Innovation, Engagement and Access. NTUA road safety activities have contributed to this ranking.

Professor Demetris Koutsoyiannis, Dean of the Civil Engineering School highlighted that the Civil Engineering School improved its ratings, compared to 2016, in all individual criteria of the ranking, except for one: the reputation of its graduates, in which there was a slight decline (from 80 to 74.9). The Civil Engineering School scored its best individual ranking in the “citations per paper” criterion (91.1), in which it was ranked 19th worldwide. In this specific criterion it overpasses a lot of competitive schools which have a better overall ranking. 

The Independent Council for Road Safety International (ICoRSI) is a recently launched new not-for profit organization, which provides independent authoritative advice on global road safety policies by road safety scientists that have no financial conflicts of interest. ICoRSI aims to provide rapid, independent and evidence-based information on road safety policy and practice to policy makers and the public, strengthen the capacity of safety professionals and policy makers to understand existing evidence and undertake new research and facilitate in capacity building for safety professionals and policy makers in the field of transportation safety. 

ICoRSI has recently launched comments on WHO’s draft global targets for road safety risk factors. 

The infographic of the 2016 NTUA Road Safety Observatory (www.nrso.ntua.gr) highlights one more very intensive year, striving with highly scientific expertise to improve road safety in Greece, in Europe and worldwide.

The nrso people with excellent dedication, efficiency and expertise were active in 13 innovative research projects, succeeded to publish more than 55 scientific papers (21 in peer reviewed journals), achieved more than 38.500 visits of the nrso website, handled more than 75.000 emails and run more than 4.500 km! 

At the end of another year full of surprises and non-stopping efforts, we heartily wish you very joyful Christmas holidays and a very happy and fruitful new year 2017, plenty of personal and professional achievements. Let’s face the new challenges ahead with creative hope and scientific persistence for even safer roads in Europe and worldwide.

The recently established Road Infrastructure Safety Directorate (P.D.109/2014)  of the Hellenic Ministry of Infrastructure, Transport and Networks has further adapted Greek legislation to the provisions of Directive 2008/96/EC  on Road Infrastructure Safety Management by introducing the certification procedures for Road Safety Auditors in Greece (OG 1694/13.6.2016) .

This new legislation concerns the establishment and implementation of procedures for road safety audits and inspections, the assessment of road safety impacts and the management and improvement of the Greek national road network safety level, at the design, construction and operational stages. According to these new procedures, Road Safety Audits will be performed by Certified Auditors who should have completed a Certified Road Safety Training Program and obtained the certificate of competence.  NTUA has actively contributed to the development of these procedures and the related scientific supporting material.

Dr. Panagiotis Papantoniou obtained the NTUA Thomaidion Αward 2016 for the publication of the journal paper titled “Assessment of driving simulator studies on driver distraction”, co-authored by Prof. George Yannis and Dr. Eleonora Papadimitriou in the Advances in Transportation Studies. 

Dr. Dimosthenis Pavlou obtained the NTUA Thomaidion Αward 2016 for the publication of the conference paper titled “Driving behaviour of drivers with Mild Cognitive Impairment and Alzheimer’s Disease: a driving simulator study”, co-authored by Dr. Eleonora Papadimitriou, Dr. Costas Antoniou, Dr. Panagiotis Papantoniou, Prof. George Yannis, Prof. John Golias, and Dr. Sokratis Papageorgiou, in the Proceedings of the 94th Annual meeting of the Transportation Research Board, Washington, January 2015. 

According to a recent University Ranking, based on the number of references in scientific journals over the last decade (2007-2016) in the field of transportation, NTUA ranks 3rd in Europe and 19th worldwide (h-index: 26). The Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering of the School of Civil Engineering of the National Technical University of Athens has contributed largely to this excellent performance and road safety was one of the main components. 

The World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims is observed on the third Sunday of November each year (this year on 20 November 2016) by an increasing number of countries on every continent around the world. From 1995, the European Federation of Road Traffic Victims (FEVR) observed this day, as European Day of Remembrance, that was adopted by the United Nations in 2005, and is dedicated to remembering the many millions killed or injured in road crashes and their families and communities, as well as to pay tribute to the dedicated emergency crews, police and medical professionals who daily deal with the traumatic aftermath of road death and injury.  

Several activities took place worldwide, including those of:

• the European Commission support  and special statements by Commissioners Bulc and Andriukaitis 
• the World Health Organization (WHO) supported this World Day of remembrance  and produced a booklet on Post-crash response: supporting those affected by road crashes 
• the  European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) on the occasion of this World Day of Remembrance launched the new REVIVE initiative focusing on post-collision care 

Several activities took also place in Greece:

• EFTHITA Rhodes organised a seminar on parents driver behaviour and was also received by the President of the Republic who expressed all his support 
• SOS Traffic Crimes organised traffic safety promotion events in central places in Athens, Kalamata, Katerini and Alexandroupolis 
• Road Safety Institute “Panos Mylonas” organised prevention and educational road safety actions in cooperation with Technological Educational Institution (TEI) of Athens and other Greek Institutions 

The New Urban Agenda is a twenty year global policy framework for cities. It has been adopted at the United Nations Habitat III conference, held in Quito, Ecuador. The #SaveKidsLives campaign, contributed towards ensuring road safety goals were included in the Global Goals. Now, with over 1 million supporters, the #SaveKidsLives campaign marks a significant achievement; the New Urban Agenda includes the core objective of a ‘safe and healthy journey to school for every child’ as a priority. 

Safer City Streets, the new global traffic safety network for liveable cities, was launched on 18 October during the UN Habitat III conference in Quito, Ecuador. Safer City Streets is managed by the International Transport Forum and it is built for cities to share their experience and learn from each other. Cities address many challenges by working together and learning from each other – but so far not in road safety. Safer City Streets fills this gap by linking cities that are working to make their citizens safer in traffic. It provides city officials high-value information for better decision making, global networking and learning opportunities for city officials and the possibility to carry out research on topics of common interest. Member cities have access to policy-relevant data, a network of experts and targeted analysis.  

NTUA has actively contributed to the Methodology for Developing the Database and Network.  

EuroNCAP announced it’s latest safety ratings, sorted by the date of publication, by star rating and by make in alphabetical order. In 2016, the star rating is based on a vehicle fitted only with safety equipment which is standard across the entire model range, throughout EU28. All cars assessed now have a rating with standard safety equipment only. A second rating might also be available for the same vehicle model which represents the additional safety available from a ‘safety pack’, containing all of the safety technologies needed to achieve the additional star rating and must be available on all variants in all countries where the additional equipment is not standard. The EuroNCAP’s latest safety ratings are now available: 

The European Traffic Police Network (TISPOL) together with the European Commission DG Move Road Safety Unit have launched the project EDWARD – the European Day Without A Road Death 2016, which took place with great success on 21 September 2016. This day there were 43 road deaths across 31 countries, compared to 70 fatalities on the same day in 2015 (reduction of almost 39%) with 19 countries recording zero fatalities on 21 September, compared with 11 countries in 2015. A full country-by-country result report is now available: 

Project EDWARD also featured a road safety pledge asking road users to promise to: drive at speeds that are both legal and safe, pay particular attention when driving near schools, never drive after drinking alcohol or taking drugs/medicines, always wear seat belt and not using mobile phone while driving. 

An invited lecture titled: “Decision, Knowledge and Science in road safety” was given by Dr. Sylvain Lassarre, Emeritus Research Director of the French Institute of Science and Technology for Transport, Development and Networks (IFSTTAR) on June 24th 2016 at theDepartment of Transportation Planning and Engineering of NTUA.  

A new Road Safety overlay feature to the Travel Risk Map has been recently launched by the International SOS Foundation, working in collaboration with GRSP and utilizing data from the WHO Global Status Report on Road Safety 2015. The interactive Travel Risk Map has been a widely used resource for business travellers in understanding the risks posed when visiting or relocating to foreign countries in terms of travel security and medical risk. The addition of the Road Safety Risk overlay will serve to educate the mobile workforce to be more aware of the vast differences in road traffic environments from country to country. 

The new website of the Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering of the School of Civil Engineering of the National Technical University of Athens is now up and running at: www.transport.ntua.gr

The education and research activities of the Department since its establishment in 1982 are highlighted, together with all the latest news. Road safety was and still constitutes a major scientific discipline within the activities of the Department. 

The PhD Dissertation of Dr. Panagiotis Papantoniou at the Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering of the National Technical University of Athens, titled: ‘Risk factors, driver behaviour and accident probability. The case of distracted driving‘ has been awarded winning dissertation of the European Friedrich-List-Award 2016 and the European Platform of Transport Sciences (EPTS).  

A special issue of Transportation Research Part F: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour, on Fitness to Drive is now calling for papers. The Special Issue of Fitness to Drive considers all aspects associated with determining if a person is fit to drive and subsequent implications of this decision.

Its basis includes: 1) naturalistic and/or observational studies of drivers post personal decision or medical requirement to cease driving, 2) evaluation of methodologies for objectively determining fitness to drive 3) issues of enforcement, legal and societal implications, and 4) consideration of how decisions of fitness to drive fit within the licensing system in terms of private and commercial license holders. The submissions should be empirical papers based on rigorous quantitative and qualitative methods/techniques and should be submited before October 1st, 2016. 

The United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution which represents the strongest ever commitment on road safety made by UN Member States. It invites Member States that have not already done so to consider adopting policies and measures to implement United Nations vehicle safety regulations or equivalent national standards to ensure that all new motor vehicles, meet applicable minimum regulations for occupant and other road users protection, with seat belts, air bags and active safety systems fitted as standard.

The resolution builds upon the ‘Brasilia Declaration’ passed by the 2nd Global High Level Conference on Road Safety held on 18th -19th November 2015 in Brasilia and endorses the standard fitment of active safety systems which are the primary focus of the Stop the Crash Partnership.  

SafetyCube is a research project funded by the European Commissionunder the Horizon 2020, the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation, in the domain of Road Safety. The project started on May 1st, 2015 and will run for a period of three years with primary objective todevelop an innovative road safety Decision Support System (DSS) that will enable policy-makers and stakeholders to select and implement the most appropriate strategies, measures and cost-effective approaches to reduce casualties of all road user types and all severities in Europe and worldwide. NTUA is actively contributing to all phases of the SafetyCube project. 

The latest SafetyCube newsletter with the latest project developments is now available.  

The MSc programme ‘Traffic Psychology and Sustained Mobility‘will start running on 1 September 2016, by the University of Groningen. The programme is based on differenct disciplines covering the broad theme of mobility and offer courses that examine social perspectives that consider how a decline in the ability to process information affects mobility and that focus on the clinical effects of ageing (e.g. dementia). Road Safety in the modern mobility framework is a key issue addressed by this MSc Programme.  

The United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution seeking to establish a road safety trust fund, Aimed at Halving Global Number of Traffic Deaths and Injuries. Acting without a vote, the Assembly adopted a draft resolution titled “Improving global road safety” (document A/70/L.44), expressing concern that road traffic crashes killed more than 1.25 million people and injured as many as 50 million people a year.  It invited Member States and the international community to step up collaboration to meet target 3.6, and encouraged the upcoming United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Development to consider road safety and safe, affordable public transport.

Jean Todt, Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Road Safety, stated that the Road Safety Trust Fund is a priority, taking into account that the cost of road accidents and their consequences is estimated to around $500 billion a year.  

The European Commission has adopted a series of rules applicable to road hauliers and road passenger transport operators. They include a common classification of serious road safety infringements undertransport legislation, as well as new specifications for smart tachographs (the device that records driving times of lorry, bus and coach drivers), making the best use of new digital technologies such as Galileo. The objective is to enhance road safety, contribute to a fairer competition between road transport operators and to facilitate a consistent enforcement of EU rules across borders. 

The Civil Engineering School of the National Technical University of Athens was ranked this year 8th in Europe and 33rd worldwide among all Civil Engineering Schools. This ranking is produced by the QS Organisation based on the following criteria: Research, Teaching, Employability, Facilities, Internationalization, Innovation, Engagement and Access. NTUA road safety activities have contributed to this ranking.

Professor Demetris Koutsoyiannis, Dean of the Civil Engineering School said that this great improvement is the result of the systematic and collective efforts of all Faculty members, researchers and students for academic and research excellence.   

Personal Injury Claim has launched its Ultimate Guide to Road Safety Apps, an online guide that looks at the main areas of road safety where smartphone apps are available to promote safer driving through the use of apps. While smartphones often act as distractions and can actually cause collisions, they can also reduce the level of risk through specific applications. 

The NTUA Road Safety Observatory is now posting and sharing on Twitter (@nrso_ntua_gr) all new Greek, European and international road safety knowledge, information and data published at the nrso website (www.nrso.ntua.gr).

Simply follow us on Twitter: @nrso_ntua_gr  

The Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP) has recently launched a key new web resource centre to support advocacy efforts specifically for road safety policies and implementation. The new Advocacy Resource Centre is a one-stop resource for organizations campaigning for road safety policies or policy implementation. It features over 800 pieces of content, which have been specifically collated and created to be useful for both road safety organizations and other organizations that may be interested in addressing road safety.

The Advocacy Resource Centre also holds a comprehensive Advocacy Toolkit, which is a a nine-part comprehensive guide detailing all aspects of constructing a successful advocacy campaign, focusing specifically on road safety.

SafetyCube is a research project funded by the European Commissionunder the Horizon 2020, the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation, in the domain of Road Safety. The project started on May 1st, 2015 and will run for a period of three years with primary objective todevelop an innovative road safety Decision Support System (DSS) that will enable policy-makers and stakeholders to select and implement the most appropriate strategies, measures and cost-effective approaches to reduce casualties of all road user types and all severities in Europe and worldwide. NTUA is actively contributing to all phases of the SafetyCube project. 

The first SafetyCube newsletter with the latest project developments is now available. 

A Special Issue of the Journal of Transportation Safety & Security focusing on Driving Simulation Experiments and Behavior Analysis is now calling for papers.  Topics of interest include, but are not limited to the following:

– simulator sickness (e.g. simulation fidelity)  

A Special Issue of Accident Analysis & Prevention focusing on Road Safety Data Considerations is now calling for papers that address issues related to road safety data and methods that can be applied at all stages of data handling (collection, processing and analysis). Moreover, the presentation of applications utilizing innovative road safety data analysis is encouraged, particularly in emerging regions (that typically lack detailed and updated crash and casualty information), focusing on methodological adaptations for tackling information scarcity, or other limitations of technology transfer. 

2015 was a very intensive year for the NTUA Road Safety Observatory as presented at the respective 2015-in-figures infographic highlighting nrso activities on research and web presence but also on work and sports.

The intensive 2015 nrso activity is demonstrated by the active contributions to 12 research projects, together with the 54 papers in scientific journals and conferences and the more than 38.500 visits of the nrso website, whereas the 65.368 emails handled and the 3.088km run are proving the high nrso efficiency and fitness to perform!  

The Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP) has launched a newinteractive mapping tool on its website. This interactive map draws on a database of over 11,000 cells and allows the user to quickly and easily find information and data of interest. The interactive map features three primary tabs, enabling searching by GRSP Activity, IFRC Engagement or by Global Crash Data from the WHO Global Status Report on Road Safety 2015.

This tool comes as a result of multiple surveys into stakeholder needs and will be constantly updated with the latest data so that it becomes a ‘go to’ entry point for a wealth of road safety information, data, tools and resources that are being built into the GRSP website.  

We heartily wish you very joyful Christmas holidays and a very happy and fruitful new year 2016, plenty of personal and professional achievements. Let’s face the new challenges ahead with creative hope and scientific persistence for even safer roads in Europe and worldwide.

At a recent interview at CNN Greece, NTUA Professor George Yannis attempts to decode the effect of economic crisis on the impressive reduction of road fatalities in Greece and in Europe. He presented NTUA related work but also the main findings from the recent OECD/ITF Report on the relation between growth and road safety.

According to recent research, the economic crisis has played a major role to the recent impressive road fatalities reduction in Greece and in Europe (claimed to be responsible for the 2/3 of this reduction).  Professor George Yannis estimates that after the crisis, traffic increase will result to some road accidents increase (already happening in the EU), however this increase will be limited as the improved driver behaviour (less agressive and less speedy) will also remain after the crisis.  The full article  and the related video are now available.

The World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims is observed on the third Sunday of November each year (this year on 15 November 2015) by an increasing number of countries on every continent around the world. This day adopted by the UN in 2005, was dedicated to remembering the many millions killed or injured in road crashesand their families and communities, as well as to pay tribute to the dedicated emergency crews, police and medical professionals who daily deal with the traumatic aftermath of road death and injury.

In Greece this year, Efthita Rhodes, member of FEVR (European Federation of Road Traffic Victims) and the Global Alliance of NGOs for Road Safety organised a series of events to commemorate this day, including the promotion of the special video translated in several languages.  Furthermore, on the occasion of this day, the Road Safety Institute Panos Mylonas (IOAS) has released the results of the UN Millennium Development Campaign MY World.  

A film to raise awareness of the road safety crisis, directed by Luc Besson is now a part of the #SAVEKIDSLIVES campaign on road safety of the FIA and FIA Foundation, the international motoring federation. According to World Health Organisation figures, 500 children are killed each day in road crashes globally. In a bid to raise awareness of this road safety crisis, Jean Todt, President of the FIA, and Special Envoy of the UN Secretary General for Road Safety, turned to world renowned film director Luc Besson to deliver a potent visual message highlighting the road dangers facing children around the world.

The film is a shocking wake-up call and was shot on location in South Africa and Paris demonstrating the dangers faced every day by children on their journey to school, whether caused by the lack of safe infrastructure in the townships of South Africa or by the heavy traffic of a major European city.  

The Dutch Institute for Road Safety Research SWOV, offers openly to the road safety scientific community, a very powerful online documentation tool: the SWOV Library Portal. It provides users the opporunity to search through a large number of journals, full text publications and several other road safety theme files.   

Professor John Golias was appointed Minister for Reconstruction of Production Environment and Energy  at the new transitional Government of Greece. It is the first time that a Transportation Engineer is appointed Minister at the Greek Governement.

Professor John Golias is the Director of Traffic Engineering Laboratory of NTUA and Rector of NTUA. He has been involved in all areas of transportation planning and engineering sector for more than 35 years through numerous research projects, engineering studies and committees in Greece and abroad and he is the author of a great number of published scientific papers, cited widely worldwide. He served also as Secretary General of the Ministry of Transport during the Athens 2004 Olympic Games and Chairman of the Hellenic Institute of Transportation Engineers. Road accident analysis and road safety policy are among his key scientific areas. [/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]

The newly founded organisation HELLASTRON (Hellenic Association of Toll Road Network) carried out an information campaign promoting the appropriate use of emergency lanes in all Greek Motorways: Atiiki Odos, Rion-Antirion Bridge, Egnatia Odos, Nea Odos, Moreas, Aegean Motorway, Olympia Odos and Kentriki Odos. A well-documented leaflet titled “Emergency lane – Life lane” containing the necessary instructions for the use of the emergency lane is widely distributed this summer to the drivers using the Greek motorways.  

The 6th European Transport Research Conference Transport Research Arena 2016 to take place in Warsaw between 18-21 April 2016 is organising the EU Champions of Transport Research Competition. The competition recognises and celebrates leading researchers who are, or have recently been, contributing to surface transport EU‐funded projects. Successful candidates will have to demonstrate excellence and proven impacts in their field of research. This competition will provide a platform to further disseminate knowledge and results from research projects in Surface Transport, promoting future synergies and further development of innovative ideas, in line with the strategic objectives of the TRA stakeholders. The Champions of Research Competition will act as a showcase for the very best EU‐funded research and encourage the identification of current and future leaders in the field. The deadline for submission of entries is 30 September 2015. 

Panagiotis Papantoniou, NTUA PhD Candidate and Researcher at the Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering in the School of Civil Engineering of the National Technical University of Athens has been awarded with the outstanding conference poster award of the 1stInternational Conference on Transport & Health Changing Perspectives, which took place in London, 6-8 July 2015. The outstanding conference poster award concerned the poster presentation on “How cell phone use affects reaction time of older drivers” co-authored by Costas Antoniou, George Yannis, Eleonora Papadimitriou, Dimosthenis Pavlou and John Golias.   

The Interim Evaluation of the road safety policy framework has been recently released by the European Commission, taking stock of action taken to date and assessing progress made towards the target of halving of the number of road deaths over the period 2011-2020. The main conclusions of this Interim Evaluation are:

– the policy framework remains relevant,
– the fatality reduction target is an important tool,
– the target is still within reach, but will be a challenge,
– more attention needs to be paid to vulnerable road‑users and serious injuries,
– future challenges: an ageing population, distracting technical devices.  

The complete documentation of the European Commission Road Safety Policy Interim Evaluation is now available: The Interim Evaluation Report and the Staff Working Document  , The Support study  and its Annexes  by Jeanne Breen, Policy orientations on road safety 2011-2020   and Transport White Paper 2011.

A video explaining the traffic arrangements in Olympia Odos has recently been released by Olympia Odos Operation Company. Olympia Odos is one of the hardest road infrastructure projects built today in Greece, because it has a major specificity; it is the only highway made while being in use by significant traffic volumes, as the under construction new motorway follows the route of the old road.  In the video, the reasons for all the traffic arrangements and how they contribute in the safety of those who use the motorway and those working for the construction of the new motorway are illustrated. 

The UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has appointed FIA President Jean Todt as his Special Envoy for Road Safety at a meeting held today in Paris. In this capacity, he will assist the UN Secretary General in mobilizing sustained political commitment towards road safety. Mr. Todt will also advocate and raise awareness about the United Nations road safety legal instruments, and share established road safety good practices, through his participation in global and regional activities on road safety. 

The Civil Engineering School of the National Technical University of Athens was ranked this year 29th among all Civil Engineering Schools worldwide and 8th in Europe. This ranking is produced by the QS Organisation based on the following criteria: Research, Teaching, Employability, Facilities, Internationalization, Innovation, Engagement and Access. NTUA road safety activities have contributed to this ranking. 

Professor Demetris Koutsoyiannis, Dean of the Civil Engineering School said that this great improvement is the result of the systematic and collective efforts of all Faculty members for academic and research excellence. 

A Round Table discussion dedicated to the young drivers’ safety organised by the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering (Laboratory of Transportation Engineering) of the University of Cyprus, will take place inNicosia, on 29 April 2015. The event is taking place right before the summer period begins, to promote road safety behavior of the public (especially young drivers) and Cyprus’s visitors for vacation and recreation.  

The European Commission has launched a new online search tool that displays most valid driving licence models issued in the European Economic Area (Liechtenstein, Norway and Iceland) countries. The tool showspictures of the licence and other information such as explanation of national categories, national codes and administrative validity of the document and will be particular useful for national authorities working on road side checks or dealing with the administrative exchange of driving licences. 

A workshop on ‘Safe School Transport: New technologies pave the way for optimizing the organization and upgrading the safety of school transport system’, organised by the Hellenic Institute of Transport of the Centre for Research and Technology Hellas (CERTH) took place in Thessaloniki, on March 27th, 2015. The event was organised under the framework of the project ‘Integrated System for the Safe Transport of Students‘ – i-student trip. 

Benefit results of road improvement programmes are now available fromEuroRAP. In terms of crash costs alone, more than 2% of European GDP is lost annually. The expected Benefit-Cost ratio is 5 for applying EuroRAP recommendations across the TEN-T, as highlighted in a recent EuroRAP infographic. 

Road Safety advice is now available on Olympia Odos webpage. Useful advice is given for different driving scenarios, for example driving inside tunnels, what to do in the case of fire etc.  

The International Journal of Transportation, published online by the Science and Engineering Researh Support Society (SERSC) has just announced a call for papers for the Special Issue on Road Safety in Europe, with Guest Editors NTUA Professors George Yannis and Constantinos Antoniou. This Journal provides a chance for academic and industry professionals to discuss recent progress in the area of Transportation. The merit of this journal is to expedite the review process in order to deliver emerging issues timely. The deadline for paper subbmission is end of April 2015. 

On Wednesday, February 11th, 2015 the European Parliament plenary overwhelmingly adopted Spanish MEP’s Ayala Sender’s report on cross-border exchange of information on road safety related traffic offences, based on the European Commissions’ updated rules to tackle traffic offences committed abroad. These rules will allow Member States to exchange information in order to identify EU drivers who commit traffic offences abroad, including the four “big killers” that cause 75% of road fatalities: speeding, running traffic lights, failure to use seatbelts and drunk driving. These rules will apply to all EU Member States. 

Attikes Diadromes, the Operator of “Attiki Odos” Athens Ring Road Motorway, was among the five organisations to receive the 2015 Excellence in Road Safety Award from Violeta Bulc, the EU’s Commissioner for Transport, at a ceremony in Brussels. This Award, also known as the Charter Award recognises the most innovative practices carried out in the framework of the European Road Safety Charter. The objective of such an award is to recognise the hard work of organisations that engage in road safety, and to inspire others to do so as well. The winners were selected from some 2.200 signatories of the Road Safety Charter following an evaluation made by the European Commission. 

The UN Road Safety Collaboration is organising the global campaign for the Third UN Global Road Safety Week, 4-10 May 2015, on the theme children and road safety: #SaveKidsLives. The campaign seeks to highlight the plight of children on the world’s roads, generate action to better ensure their safety and promote the inclusion of safe and sustainable transport in the post-2015 development agenda. The centrepiece of the #SaveKidsLives campaign, which was launched in November 2014, is a child declaration, developed with input from children around the world. The campaign invites all road safety policy-makers and advocates to “sign it”, “show it”, and “deliver it” to those in charge of road safety in countries and communities during the Week. 

We heartily wish you very joyful Christmas holidays and a very happy and fruitful new year 2015, plenty of personal and professional achievements. Let’s dream, let’s hope and let’s work systematically for a more bright 2015, getting closer to the road casualties zero vision in Europe.

A joint campaign is organised by the Greek Moorways ‘Attiki Odos‘, ‘Aegean Motorways‘, ‘Gefyra‘, ‘Egnatia Odos‘, ‘Kentriki Odos‘, ‘Moreas‘, ‘Nea Odos‘ and ‘Olympia Odos‘ to raise road safety awareness at work zones. As part of the campaign a brochure is distributed by all the country’s traffic tolls, that invites drivers in mutual commitment to respect human life and thus the safety of all those working on the road. 

Ten leading global companies have come together to create Together for Safer Roads (TSR)  – an innovative private sector coalition focusing on improving road safety and reducing deaths and injuries by road traffic collisions. The vision of Together for Safer Roads is a world where roads are safe for all people. Members will use their combined knowledge, data, technology and networks to promote safer roads, vehicles and systems; safer road users; and advocacy and thought leadership.

TSR members will also focus on scaling industry best practices that draw on cross-industry expertise. An Expert Panel, drawn from Academia, NGOs, Governments and International Organizations, with the active participation of NTUA Professor George Yannis, advises the Coalition on its focus areas and activities. 

A comprehensive European road safety research roadmap has been prepared within the framework of the EC co-funded support action PROS – Priorities for Road Safety Research in Europe. About 120 experts from more than 40 stakeholder organisations – with the active participation of NTUA – have contributed to the development of this roadmap within the two years of running time of the PROS support action. This Report contains a complete research topics list with their priorities together with a long-term road safety research roadmap. This roadmap is expected to be exploited by the European Commission, National Administrations, the Industry and the European Research Community in order to guide road safety research activities within the coming years. 

The International Transport Forum celebrated the 25th anniversary of IRTAD. For 25 years, IRTAD has worked to improve traffic safety data and support evidence based decision making to enable more effective road safety strategies and save lives. Founded with 12 member countries as a database, IRTAD also soon brought together road safety experts and statisticians from research institutes, national administrations, international organisations, universities, automobile associations and car manufacturers. Today, IRTAD has 70 members from 35 countries. 

Reducing road fatalities and serious injuries by helping governments to implement a “safe system” approach in road safety is the objective of a new ITF Working Group launched on October 1st, 2014 in Paris. The “Working Group on the Implementation of a Safe System Approach” will develop actionable policy guidance for countries who aim to improve their road safety performance and in the long run eliminate road traffic as a cause of death or serious injuries. The group’s work programme will build on a previous ITF report, “Towards Zero: Ambitious Road Safety Targets and the Safe Systems Approach“, published in 2008. The working group comprises 28 road safety experts from 23 countries (including Prof. George Yannis from Greece), the World Health Organisation, the World Bank, the International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP), the Global New Car Assessment Programme (Global NCAP) and the FIA Foundation. 

A Workshop titled “Road Safety – Road Accidents” organized by the Police Department of Kalamata took place on September 17th, at the Cultural Center of Kalamata, within the framework of the European Mobility Week (16-22 September 2014). This event aimed to increase road safety awareness of the local communities given that road accident causes are known and can be prevented. More than 150 people attended the Workshop including local and regional representatives, police officials and other road safety stakeholders.

Panagiotis Papantoniou, NTUA research engineer and PhD Candidate presented key policies and specific measures to reduce road accidents at the Messinia Region.  

NTUA Emeritus Professor George Kanellaidis has been recently awarded by the President of the Hellenic Republic, the Golden Cross of the Order of Merit for his contribution to the Strategic Plan for Road Safety in Greece. 

Emeritus Professor George Kanellaidis has been involved in all areas of highways engineering and road safety for more than 40 years through numerous research projects, engineering studies in Greece and abroad and he is the author of a great number of published scientific papers, cited widely worldwide. Road safety strategic planning in Greece has been one of his key scientific areas over the last decades.

Professor John Golias was recently elected as the new Rector of the National Technical University of Athens, heading nine Engineering Schools, more than 500 faculty members, 12.000 students and 4.000 researchers. It is the first time that a Transportation Engineer is elected as NTUA Rector.

Professor John Golias is the Director of Traffic Engineering Laboratory of NTUA and Dean of the School of Civil Engineering. He has been involved in all areas of transportation planning and engineering sector for more than 35 years through numerous research projects, engineering studies and committees in Greece and abroad and he is the author of a great number of published scientific papers, cited widely worldwide. He served also as Secretary General of the Ministry of Transport during the Athens 2004 Olympic Games and Chairman of the Hellenic Institute of Transportation Engineers. Road accident analysis and road safety policy are among his key scientific areas. 

The new smartphone application ‘Going Abroad’ is now available after an initiative of the European Commission. This app provides information on EU road traffic rules and is available for iPhone and iPad, Google Android and Microsoft Windows phones in 22 languages. Apart from all important road safety information for all EU countries, the app also contains a road safety quiz and a memory game to entertain passengers during long car journeys. Of course the app should never be checked while driving; drivers should let the passengers do the job or take breaks from driving to stay both rested and well-informed. 

NTUA Professor Matthew Karlaftis passed away on 4 June 2014. NTUA and the global scientific community lost an eminent scientist and a bright personality, with significant contribution to transportation planning and engineering in Greece and worldwide. Prof. M.Karlaftis contributed and guided several research projects and engineering studies and published numerous papers in scientific journals and conference proceedings, cited intensively worldwide. Editor-in-Chief of Transportation Research Part C and Board Member of several other Journals, he received several scientific awards. He served also as Chairman of the Hellenic Institute of Transportation Engineers. Transportation statistical modeling was his passion, with great contributions on road accident analysis.

Prof. M.Karlaftis will always be the bright example for the Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering of the National Technical University of Athens.

According to the Prime Minister Decision nr. 1245/15-5-2014, the Greek Road Safety Inter-Ministry Committee is re-established.  Under the new structure, the Inter-Ministry Committee is chaired by the Prime Minister, assisted by a Support Committee chaired by the Deputy Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Networks and the respective Secretariat.  

In parallel, the new National Road Safety Council has also been re-established, comprising representatives from all decision makers and stakeholders involved, as well as key road safety experts. 

The Road Safety Festival ‘Safe driving, it’s a matter of life‘, organised by the Hellenic Association of Insurance Companies and the ‘Road Safety Institute – Panos Mylonas‘ took place on May 28th, at Syntagma Square, Athens, under the auspices of the Greek Presidency of the EU and the City of Athens.