TME Welcomes Hosts Roads to Respect Participants and Awards

   

During the visit on 30 September, the engineers – from six different European countries, took part in awards ceremony which recognised the three most successful students from 2008. Inés Ayala Sénder, a member of the European Parliament, presented awards to:

1. Marios Philippou, Cyprus. Philippou proposed a scheme to improve lighting and road marking on a provincial road that is intensively used by tourists. He successfully involved local stakeholders in the project.
2. Petros Sekeris, Greece. Sekeris proposed the remediation of one inner-city intersection and one high-risk intersection on a country road. The infrastructure on the inner-city crossroads has been adapted by city authorities following Petros’ proposal.
3. Petar Krasic, Serbia. Krasic identified lighting and traffic-calming measures to make a country road safer for motorists. This road has accounted for a large number of injuries in the past.

One of the key activities of the R2R programme is the five-day Safety Camp in Brussels where the students learn more about identifying and managing high-risk sites and road-safety campaigning. During the visit to TME, the students also learnt about Toyota’s 360° approach to safety.

R2R is just one of the many projects supported by Toyota Fund for Europe (TFfE). The project assists students to optimise their proposals to address safety concerns, and lobbies for the implementation of the solution. Improving road safety does not have to be expensive: low-cost measures can have a big impact in terms of reducing the number of accidents. R2R is a joint project between TME’s Corporate Social Responsibility team and the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC).

The R2R partnership between Toyota and ETSC has been running since 2007. The partnership involves close cooperation between TME and ETSC. For example, local Toyota subsidiaries in the participating countries give lectures on road safety to the students at the start of each project cycle. Since the launch of R2R, four high-risk sites have been addressed by local authorities and two more are in the process of being approved.