Road crashes are preventable

The issue of road fatalities is everybody's business with a record of more than 470 deaths in 2022. In implementing the New Road Traffic, the Government needs to take a look at the causes such as the road conditions, lighting and construction of the roads as well as the conditions of vehicles.

Tackling road safety

4 Jan 2023

THOUGH MODEST, last year’s 2.1 per cent reduction in deaths from traffic crashes is welcome. Perhaps the new traffic law, when it comes into force next month, “will go a far way”, as Prime Minister Andrew Holness predicts, “in bringing order to our roadways” and help to push road deaths further down.

However, that legislation, even with drastic new penalties for infractions by motorists and other road users, will not by itself deliver results at the level policymakers hope for. The aim, in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), is to halve road deaths by 2030 – in seven years.

The upward trajectory of road deaths for the nine years to 2021 suggests that this will not be easy. However, data from the previous decade, during which traffic fatalities declined by a third, give cause for optimism.

Policymakers, therefore, ought to conduct a comprehensive analysis of what they did in those years to determine what worked and what may still be applicable for the future.

They must also do two other things: use the data they gather to help in designing road safety policies; and remember the value of good, old-fashioned road safety education, going beyond teaching to look right and left before crossing roads. Road users must, from early, learn other things that impact road safety, including the value of operating motor vehicles with due care and within the bounds of the law.

Put another way, the road code should be embedded in the curricula of the island’s primary and secondary schools. For in modern societies, being able to operate a motor vehicle is almost sine qua non for people’s existence therein.

STATISTICS NOT PRETTY

Globally, over 1.3 million people die in road crashes annually, of which nine in 10 are in low- and middleincome countries like Jamaica. Most of these fatalities – seven in 10 – are young men up to 25. In other words, people mostly die in traffic crashes when heading into the most productive periods of their lives.

Similarly, large numbers of people are seriously injured, removing them permanently, or for long periods, from the workforce. The cost of their care and rehabilitation is expensive. The United Nations estimates that traffic crashes cost countries around three per cent of their gross domestic product (GDP).

By and large, the global profile of traffic crashes and their effects accords with Jamaica’s.

Up to December 30, there were 477 traffic fatalities in the island, 10, or 2.1 per cent, fewer than in 2021. Those fatalities were from 216 crashes – a five per cent decline in the number of crashes in which people died.

Similar to the global situation, so-called vulnerable road users (pedestrian, pedalcyclist, motorcyclist and pillion) accounted for the majority of the victims – 58 per cent.

As a single category, motorcyclists, 141, or 30 per cent, were the majority of the fatalities. They were followed by pedestrians, 22 per cent (104), and the drivers of private motor cars, 18 per cent (85). Passengers in private cars accounted for 13 per cent of the victims.

These statistics are not pretty. We would prefer zero deaths, or that figures for traffic collisions and fatalities mirrored developed-country levels of under 10 per 100,000, compared to around 16 in Jamaica.

The good news is that road crashes and fatalities are preventable. Negative trends can be reversed – as Jamaica showed in the past.

Each year between 2004 and 2012, the island’s road fatalities fell, declining from 390 in 2003, to 260 in 2012. After that, until last year’s modest fall, it returned to an upward spiral.

Much is known about the factors that contribute to traffic crashes and deaths: speeding; drunk driving; defective vehicles; failure to use seatbelts; motorcyclists and pillions riding without helmets; and so on.

SOLUTIONS

Some of these issues can be impacted by normal traffic legislation, if they are enforced – which Prime Minister Holness said the new Road Traffic Act will be.

But there are other actions, too, that can impact traffic crashes and deaths, such as the condition of roads (most of Jamaica’s are in ill-repair), road design, lighting, transportation policy, and simple regulatory planning.

The last mentioned should be a low-hanging fruit for Jamaica. The island collects a plethora of data on traffic collisions, including where they happen, what day they take place, the time of day, and the age and gender of the people involved. This data can and should be aggressively put to work in developing and adjusting regulatory policy to enhance road safety.

The volume of road traffic, which generally translates to the number of vehicles on the roads, also affects/influences crashes. The more there are, the greater the likelihood of collisions.

More than half a million vehicles are registered in Jamaica. There is pressure for more, largely because of a poor and inefficient public transportation system.

Commuters mostly depend on poorly regulated, unreliable route taxis, whose drivers have a reputation as undisciplined, risk-taking, traffic daredevils. There is no certainty about safety or standards when they are used by members of the public.

Fixing that system, and educating all Jamaicans about road use and vehicle operation, thereby lessening the demand for private vehicles, is clearly part of the solution to vehicle crashes and deaths.

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