PHOTO: ATHAR KHAN/EXPRESS
He suggested steps, according to the five strategic pillars of Road Safety of WHO, to prevent accidents
He expressed these views while speaking at a consultative workshop on “National Guidelines on Road Safety Engineering and National Road Safety Action Plan 2018-2022” which was organised by NTU International on Tuesday.
He said millions of lives could be saved by implementing the UN General Assembly Resolution 2011. He said the years from 2011 to 2020 were marked as the decade of action for road safety.
“One of the World Health Organisation’s five strategic pillars of road safety is the development of an effective system of post-crash response, which has been established in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Gilgit-Baltistan in the form of Rescue 1122,” he said. He pointed out that the trauma registry programme in 2013 revealed that over 900 road traffic crashes (RTCs) were being managed by Rescue 1122 alone on a daily basis in Punjab. Thus far, the emergency service has responded to over 1.9 million RTC emergencies.
Furthermore, he said that 72% of the injuries were a result of RTCs, followed by 11% due to falling from a height and 5% due to violence. He added 83% of RTCs involved motorcycles.
Speaking on the occasion, road safety expert Rosemary Rouse said the main theme of the workshop was to start a consultation with road engineering entities of Punjab and help them draft safety engineering guidelines. She said another objective was to allow the Punjab-based engineering community to gain experience in road safety engineering practices.
Safety Engineering Specialist Eldorado Mazzia briefed the audience about national guidelines on road safety engineering, including sustainable safety principles, speed management, road engineering, risk of fatality and capacity building of staff.
“In a sustainable and safe road traffic system, infrastructure design inherently and drastically reduces crash risk. Should a crash occur, the process that determines crash severity is conditioned in such a way that severe injuries are almost excluded,” he quoted a research study. It was unanimously recommended by experts that the speed limit on all vehicles be reduced to 50km/h in urban areas excluding Lahore Canal Expressway and Ring Road. It was also recommended that when designing U-turns and underpasses, road engineering should be carried out according to the guidelines, whereas the road safety audit of all newly constructed roads should also be mandatory.
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