Instituting a Safety Culture in our Transportation System: Parallel Visions

1. Instituting a Safety Culture in our Transportation System: Parallel Visions Khalil J. Spencer Chair, Los Alamos County Transportation Board Information taken from ongoing projects by the National Center for Bicycling and Walking and The American Automobile Assn. Foundation

2. AAA Foundation Statement • …to elevate …traffic safety on the national agenda • break through the collective acceptance of and/or complacency over the toll of crashes on our society (including roughly 43,000 annual fatalities), • motivate U.S. decision makers and motorists to acknowledge traffic safety as a legitimate priority. • …(sponsor) highly visible, long-term work that aims to ignite and sustain a serious dialogue about and demand for traffic safety at all levels of our society.

3. NCBW Vision Statement • … adopting a vision that these (traffic) deaths and injuries can be predicted, have causes, and are preventable. • …traffic crashes are not accidents. • … what measures are necessary to eliminate virtually all such incidents, • (apply) the same standard we impose on our airline and nuclear industries.

4. Parallel Visions: AAA and NCBW • AAA: • promote a “safety culture.” (develop) a Safety Culture Index (SCI), with which to quantify the present state of affairs ... • (focus) upon developing safety cultures in highway safety agencies at the state and local levels • NCBW… • a campaign to redefine our societal perspective on motor vehicle crashes, substantially reducing their occurrence, and thereby significantly decreasing the attendant number of injuries and fatalities.

5. Measurable Outcomes (NCBW) • 1.U.S. road-crash deaths plummet from the current 40,000-45,000 a year to 30,000 by 2016 and 20,000 by 2026; serious-injury accidents decline similarly. • 2. U.S. population-based traffic fatality rate (currently ~15 / 100,000) falls to the same level as Canada and Australia (~9 / 100,000) by 2016, and to the same level as the U.K., Scandinavia, and The Netherlands (~6 / 100,000) by 2026. • 3. Share of U.S. children who get to school each day under their own power doubles from its current 10% level to 20% by 2016, and doubles again by 2026. • 4. Percentage of U.S. road-traffic fatalities that are adjudicated with someone held accountable doubles by 2016, and doubles again by 2026.

6. Other benefits • Encourages walking and biking, thus improving fitness and conserving energy • Will not need a massive vehicle to feel safe, thus encouraging fuel conservation and lowering people’s driving costs • Will let LSV’s, small cars better compete in the safety realm

7. ALARA: A specific tool for this task • “As Low As Reasonably Achievable” as an outcome • What do we need to do to achieve this goal? • ALARA looks at specific kinds of safety thinking • Engineering, Education, Enforcement, Encouragement (4-E’s)

8. Substitution of a less dangerous device • Replace private vehicle transit, when possible, with transit systems operated by highly trained professionals. • Use a small vehicle rather than a large one, thus mitigating the amount of vehicle energy that has to be dissipated in a panic stop or a crash. • Walk or ride a bicycle (i.e., a small, low mass vehicle) over short distances, further reducing mass. • Mandate energy absorbing panels on the outside of all vehicle front ends to mitigate crashes with pedestrians, cyclists, and other vehicles.

9. Engineering Controls • antilock brake systems, • dual and redundant brake lines, • run-flat tires, • shatterproof glass, • stability management systems, • divided highways, • pedestrian overpasses, • Front/back “radar” that reacts to impending collisions, • bulbouts or speed bumps that force vehicles to reduce speed. • Vehicle Data Recorders that save crash data and govern performance • BUT, these controls inconsistent with “bigger, faster, more powerful” and “closed course, don’t try this at home” goals and attitudes

10. Administrative Controls • Rules and regulations. Ideally, they should augment and compliment engineering controls. • These can clearly articulate goals, hazard analyses, and direction. • Unless a strong safety culture is present, can be, ignored or “pencil-whipped”, impart a false sense of security • Are weak, if recipient is receiving mixed signals, i.e., “closed course, don’t try this at home”.

11. Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) • Last layer of defense from likely accident scenerios. • Properly designed and worn PPE are a sign that a safety culture is in place and valued. • Seat belts, air bags, helmets, leather jackets, etc. • Large vehicles can defeat PPE in small vehicles • Weakness is that if taken alone, are passive rather than active defenses, i.e., you assume they will protect you even if you do nothing.

12. Training and Awareness • Ensures individual and group competence during routine operation, • Provides emergency preparedness via drills and “what if” exercises, • Ensures participants are knowledgeable and can “think on their feet” in an emergency. • Present low level of training for motorists, and virtual lack of training for pedestrians and bicyclists, does not inspire confidence that roadway users are fully competent, or prepared for real-world crises • Example: take a road test in a Civic, drive a Hummer the next day. Should we have more graduated licensing?

13. Accountability • Repeat violators, weak sentences, “no fault” mentality implies a casual attitude; deaths or injury are “no one’s” fault. • Contrast to airline or nuclear industry, where zero accidents are the goal and people held accountable for ignoring safety • Crashes or moving violations investigated, operators held accountable for misbehavior, especially when injury or intimidation results. Use Data recorders to establish cause. • Change the prevailing “no fault” paradigm. • Change what is considered acceptable advertising, i.e., “closed course, don’t try this at home”. • Paradigm-shift in DWI is a good model, i.e., what sorts of thinking will be needed?

14. Conclusions • We need to institute a safety culture in transportation practice • ALARA requires a careful evaluation of risk factors and a clear understanding of how traffic works BEFORE operational decisions are made. • Once the ALARA process begins, feedback is used to modify, replace, or improve safety measures taking into account unforeseen events. • Cooperation needed among all of the participants (traffic engineers, vehicle manufacturers, law enforcement, end-users, lawmakers, health professionals, safety modelers, etc.)

15. More conclusions… • Proposed model: Sweden: • The concern for human life and health is an absolutely mandatory element in the design and functioning of the road transport system. This means that a road traffic safety mode of thinking must be clearly integrated into all the processes that affect safety within the road transport system. The level of violence that the human body can tolerate without being killed or seriously injured shall be the basic parameter in the design of the road transport