Feature
Economic assessment of road safety: usefulness and challenges
Authors
Wim Wijnen Road safety economist, W2Economics (1) (The Netherlands)
Jesús Leal Transport Research Centre, Cedex (Spain) Spanish-speaking Secretary of World Road Association Technical Committee 3.1 National Road Safety Policies and Programmes
Michael Griffith Federal Highway Administration (United States) Chair of World Road Association Task Force TF1 on Road Safety Manual
Improving road safety requires investment of money, time, and other resources. There are many investment options, and politicians, policy makers, and road authorities need to make choices about how much money they should spend on road safety, which locations to spend it, and the types of road safety measures to use. Economic assessment tools can help decision makers allocate the available resources on those measures that will reduce the number of casualties and level of suffering as much as possible.