ROAD SAFETY ENGINEERING

The Road Traffic Act 1988 places a duty on roads authorities to:

(i) carry out studies on road accidents in their area and take appropriate action to prevent these accidents; and
(ii) take measures to reduce the possibility of accidents occurring as a result of new road works

These duties are catered for in ‘Accident Investigation and Prevention’ (AIP) respectively, with the prevention aspect usually being known as ‘safety audit’.

Whilst it would seem that much of these activities could be performed by people with mere common sense, to achieve the best results, appropriate experience and training are in fact required. A road accident is defined by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) as: ‘a rare, random, multi-factor event always preceded by a situation in which one or more road users have failed to cope with the road environment’. Road safety engineers will look for solid evidence of a problem rather than relying on the details of a particular incident. Studies of accident data will initially inform the investigation, but site observations and measurements are necessary to form true conclusions and thus the basis for appropriate remedial measures.

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