论文部分内容阅读
92% of worlds road fatalities are in developing world, where 83% of worlds population live with only 13% of global vehicle population.The road safety is a serious public health issue with more than million deaths and huge number of injuries.The hard fact is that it is still growing without any abatement, and heterogeneous traffic defies any easy solution.Segregation of non-compatible modes is one feasible option, but safety culture of road users only actually brings lasting safety in a road system.Behavioural change is a long drawn process through education and campaign supported by effective enforcement.But, developing world has not been able to afford it, as the volume of road users is huge, and imbibing safety culture may take decades.In addition, it will require significant change in regulatory and legal framework with institutional reforms.Contribution of the road infrastructure itself is a significant one in the occurrence of a crash and its severity.Thus, making the roads safer with required provisions can be the responsibility of a single Road Authority, subject to adequate funding.Also, safety engineering aspects can be accommodated within existing implementation framework without any major institutional reform.The design related deficiencies in the road infrastructure of the developing world is the root cause of the safety concernsbelieved to beunsolvable problem.It should be admitted that there is an acute shortage of safety engineering expertise, and therefore, training and capacity building will be required.Further, certain basic legal provisions in the road network development making engineers responsible for those will surely ameliorate the safety in a significant way.While road users will continue to make mistakes, engineers must ensure minimization of hazards by design provisions.The aim is to provide road network free of hazards to realise the idea of forgiving road.