Cost‐Effective Measures for Reducing Road Fatalities in the Short Term

Abstract

When traffic safety statistics in less developed countries (even those where enormous progress has been made in the last years) are compared with those of more advanced countries, it is evident that there is still a great deal to be done. Using Chile as a case study, we propose a set of measures to significantly reduce fatalities in the short term. A simple methodology is proposed to guide the process of selecting the most promising measures, taking into account their cost‐effectiveness. Eight such measures are identified and their potential benefits and costs of implementation are estimated for our case study. Special care is taken in choosing measures aimed at protecting vulnerable road users who represent around 50% of road fatalities in Chile. The plan we propose has the potential to reduce 460 fatalities per year (i.e. 21%), as a conservative estimate. A discussion on the transferability of these results to other developing nations is offered.

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Alvaro Velasco and Gonzalo Prieto of CONASET for their support throughout this research. They are also grateful for the valuable comments of Milton Bertín and Juan de Dios Ortúzar on preliminary versions of this document, and also wish to thank the comments of two anonymous referees that significantly contributed to improve the paper. This research had the financial support of the Vice‐Rectory of Communications and Public Affairs of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Luis Ignacio Rizzi is grateful for the financial support of FONDECYT (Project 1085287) and of the Millennium Institute on Complex Engineering Systems (ICM: P‐05‐004‐F; CONICYT: FBO16).

Notes

1. Figures estimated by the authors using data from the Chilean Central Bank (www.bcentral.cl).

2. Twenty‐four‐hour road‐crash fatalities were adjusted by 1.3 to convert them to 30‐day fatalities. See section ‘Road accidents in Chile’.

3. In addition to the national police, Carabineros de Chile, the following ministries make up CONASET: Ministry of the Interior, General Secretariat of the President, General Secretariat of the Government, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Public Works, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Housing and Urbanism and the Ministry of Transport and Telecommunications, with the last Minister being the President of CONASET. The agency has a permanent Executive Secretary.

4. The scarce local evidence available suggests that speed cameras made a contribution to road safety (Paredes et al., 2006; Rizzi, 2003).

5. Italics are ours.

6. ICD‐10 stands for International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems—10th Revision. The codes considered by the Ministry of Health to count a traffic fatality are V02‐V04, V09, V12‐V14, V19, V20‐V79 and V86‐V89. Some of these codes account for fatalities that are not reported by the police as a road fatality.

7. By methodological limitations, we refer to a lack of vision and knowledge on the part of those involved in road design, building and road management with respect to the safety of vulnerable users. This argument was very emphatically made to us by Milton Bertin, former Executive Director of CONASET in the 1990s.

8. Kopits and Cropper (2005) report a value of US$8600. This value was updated to 2005 US$ with an inflation calculator provided by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis (www.minneapolisfed.org/Research/data/us/calc/).

9. The speed limits are 60 km/h in urban zones, 100 km/h in non‐urban zones and 120 km/h in highways.

10. In Chile, driving with BAC levels above 0.01 g/l is considered an offense. The severity of the offence depends on the BAC level.

11. This value was estimated in 2003 Chilean$, was updated to 2009 using the consumer price index and then converted to 2009 US$.

12. A spreadsheet with the calculations can be provided on request.

13. These include reflectors for pedestrians and cyclists, helmets for cyclists, speed cameras and retrofitting inter‐urban buses with seat belts.

14. Chile and Colombia are two exceptions.

15. It is difficult to ascertain whether it is true variation or variation owing to data collection deficiencies. As an example, in Chile, around 40% of road fatalities are pedestrians, whereas in Argentina this figure is currently below 15% according to the Agencia Nacional de Seguridad Vial (http://www.mininterior.gov.ar/ansv/observatorio/estadistica/2008/2008.pdf).

16. In fact, WHO (2004, p. 86) also recommends using daytime running lights by motorized two‐wheelers.