EuroRAP: Transfer of road safety engineering knowledge to Eastern Europe

The European Road Assessment Programme (EuroRAP) assesses road safety as part of the EU’s target to halve the number of deaths on European roads by 2010. This specific project, funded by TFfE and implemented within the EuroRAP network, draws on the expertise of countries with the best road safety performance (such as Ireland, Sweden and the UK). The aim is to provide the Eastern European Group with support to establish their own national programmes and to facilitate their ability to undertake safety upgrade projects on their road networks.

Three two-day workshops were organised in cooperation with local Toyota companies in the Czech Republic and Poland. The workshops were attended by various road safety stakeholders such as road safety experts, engineers, NGOs, research institutes, local road authorities and automobile clubs.

The structure of the meetings allowed participants to discuss the technical details of EuroRAP protocols in an open forum and to learn from others in the group. The exhibition and seminar gave participants an introduction to the ways in which the key messages from the programme could be communicated and the promotional materials that are most effective in getting the messages across to the target audiences. Exposing the group to a wide cross-section of specialists enabled them to get a better impression of the way in which such programmes are viewed outside the professional road-safety audience and introduced them to the questions that they should be prepared to answer.

During the course of the project, the Eastern European Group established itself as unique within EuroRAP. The majority of the countries represented in the Group have a low- to middle income level and therefore benefit from the advanced methodology being developed under the International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP) which covers specific issues relevant to developing countries. The Eastern European Group has become an important contributor to knowledge building and the practical assessment of these emerging methodologies.

About EuroRAP
The European Road Assessment Programme (EuroRAP) is a pan-European body that aims to:

• Reduce death and serious injury on European roads rapidly through a programme of systematic testing of risk that identifies major safety shortcomings which can be addressed by practical road improvement measures.
• Ensure assessment of risk lies at the heart of strategic decisions on route improvements, crash protection and standards of route management.
• Forge partnerships between those responsible for a safe roads system - motoring organisations, vehicle manufacturers and road authorities.