The agreement, which was endorsed by iRAP CEO, Rob McInerney, and ADB Director General of Regional and Sustainable Development, Xianbin Yao, will form an important part of the bank’s Sustainable Transport Initiative and will help in its mission to fight poverty in the region.

Together, iRAP and the ADB will assess high volume, high risk roads and develop and invest in infrastructure improvements that prevent deaths and injuries.  They will also explore opportunities to integrate iRAP benchmarking, performance tracking and economic evaluation tools into the ADB’s project cycle and planning activities, to ensure that road safety remains a high priority within the bank’s operations.

For more information, contact Rob McInerney, CEO iRAP on +61 405 49 3030 or rob.mcinerney@irap.org.

The iRAP Centre of Excellence will support the ongoing development and implementation of iRAP to prevent road crash deaths and serious injuries and generate wider community benefits.

The agreement was signified by the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding by iRAP’s Chief Executive Officer, Mr Rob McInerney, and ARRB’s Managing Director, Mr Gerard Waldron, at ARRB headquarters in Melbourne.

Rob and Gerard said the agreement will be important in improving the safety of roads during the United Nations Decade of Action for Road Safety, which begins in 2011. The goal of the Decade is to dramatically reduce the burden of road crashes, which currently claim 3,500 lives every day worldwide.

The iRAP-ARRB agreement paves the way for cooperative action on improving the safety of road infrastructure both in Australia and around the world.

iRAP has identified infrastructure improvements that can prevent one in four deaths on rural and urban roads in developing countries. The plans target roads where pedestrians, motorcyclists, vehicle occupants and bicyclists are killed and injured with brutal regularity, and identify proven road safety measures that can prevent millions of deaths and save billions of dollars.

Mr Rob McInerney said “We are excited at the prospect of building on our already strong relationship with ARRB, which is one of the world’s leading authorities on road safety research and technology. With this agreement in place, we are another step close toward our vision of a world free of high risk roads.

Mr Waldron said “ARRB is pleased to have a formal agreement with iRAP because it will guarantee the continuance of the established working partnership between iRAP and ARRB. The agreement will see the benefits of the Austroads strategic research program applied to the technical development and application of iRAP, for the benefit of Australian and New Zealand road authorities, as well as iRAP’s international partners. It will ensure that iRAP has access to ARRB’s considerable technical resources.

The International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP) is a not-for-profit organisation dedicated to saving lives through safer roads. Road Assessment Programmes (RAP) are now active in more than 50 countries throughout Europe, Asia Pacific, North, Central and South America and Africa. iRAP is financially supported by the FIA Foundation for the Automobile and Society. Projects receive support from the World Bank Global Road Safety Facility, the Inter American Development Bank, the Asian Development Bank, automobile associations and donors.

ARRB Group is Australia and New Zealand's only national road transport research organisation, whose members are Australian state and territory road authorities, the Australian Local Government Association, the Australian Government and the New Zealand Transport Authority. ARRB is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.

Media enquiries

iRAP: Rob McInerney, CEO, +61 405 49 3030, www.irap.org

ARRB Group Limited: Briarlea Green, Marketing Coordinator, +61 3 9881 1555, www.arrb.com.au

The latest EuroRAP Risk Map results for Great Britain shows 10% of Britain's motorways and A roads have unacceptably high risk, and half of all fatal collisions occur on one-tenth of the road network.

Topping the list of the UK's 10 most improved roads is the A40 Llandovery-Carmarthen, where junctions have been upgraded, new road markings introduced and extensive resurfacing carried out, including anti-skid treatments, saving 20 fatal and serious collisions between 2006-2008: a 74% reduction.

Consultation with road authorities on improvements show that simple, relatively inexpensive engineering measures are paying dividends, contributing to more than 70% fewer fatal and serious collision in the last three years on the top ten roads listed. Improvements to signing and markings, resurfacing, particularly the use of high-friction anti-skid treatments, and the layout and signing of junctions are common.

June 2010

 The Star Ratings were produced by New Zealand's Road Assessment Programme (KiwiRAP). In total 10,002 kilometres of New Zealand’s rural state highways were assessed. 

The assessments involved an inspection of a number of road and roadside design elements such as lane and shoulder width, power poles and ditches, intersection frequency, and the presence of safety barriers which are known to have an impact on the likelihood of a crash and its severity.

KiwiRAP is a partnership between the AA and New Zealand's main transport agencies: Transit, Ministry of Transport, ACC, Land Transport New Zealand, and New Zealand Police.

The results are available at http://www.kiwirap.org.nz/results_star.html.

June 2010

The inspection of the Pacific Corridor, which carries 95% of products traded within the region, was financed by the Inter American Development Bank (IDB) and is part of efforts to reduce road deaths and injuries, through the implementation of the iRAP methodology. The inspections were undertaken by the SEMIC using their specially equipped survey vehicle, accredited by iRAP.

IDB officials and engineers from each of the 7 countries accompanied the inspection, which collected detailed digital images of the roads and roadsides, geometry data and georeference data for the highway. This data will now be used by a team of analysts to assess more than 30 road design attributes that influence the likelihood of a crash and its severity.

June 2010

The report is the first comprehensive safety analysis of the network and highlights wide regional variations in standards and investment.

Of the 15 countries analysed in depth, Sweden, Netherlands, Great Britain and Switzerland top the league when it comes to achieving 'best possible' safety levels. The most remarkable country is Slovenia with its new network now outperforming most others.

The European Vice President responsible for Transport, Commissioner Siim Kallas said: "As EuroRAP builds its European Road Safety Atlas, the safety performance of Europe's roads is becoming more transparent. The idea of mapping the safety of our roads to one common standard is proving highly effective.”

The TEN-T follows the release of How Safe are Europeans on French Roads this summer, which finds that while motorists in France can expect the highest safety engineering standards in Europe on the autoroutes, the safety of other popular French touring roads is far lower.

June 2010

The plan is the culmination of work by iRAP, the Ministry of Transport, Vietnam Road Directorate, the Transport Development and Strategy Institute and the Institute of Transport Science and Technology, and was enabled by the World Bank Global Road Safety Facility.

The Government of Vietnam is now considering the plan and partners and development banks are working to ensure that the recommendations can be linked with existing programmes such as the Vietnam Road Safety Project (VRSP) and Vietnam Traffic Safety Master Plan, and can be implemented.

June 2010

The accolade was given in recognition of the continued efforts and success of the club and technical partner the Traffic Technical Institute of the University of Ljubljana in raising awareness of the need for safer roads alongside safer vehicles and safer drivers.

The EuroRAP programme in Slovenia works in close partnership with a number of governmental and expert organisations including the Ministry of the Interior, Police, Ministry of Transport, Slovenian Roads Agency and DARS (the national motorway company).

The first Risk Mapping results published in November 2009 received widespread support and led to the inclusion of EuroRAP in the Road Safety Operational Plan for 2010-11, part of Slovenia’s current Road Safety Programme. The programme partners in Slovenia are currently embarking on a road inspection programme across the network.

June 2010

The official start of the inspections was attended by the country’s key road safety stakeholders from the Touring and Automovil Club Paraguay, Ministry of Public Works and Communications (Vice Minister Andrés Rivarola pictured), Inter American Development Bank, the Paraguay Road Safety Agency, Petrobras and Road Police.

The inspections were undertaken by the RACC Foundation using their specially equipped survey vehicle. The inspection data is now being analysed by a team from the Catholic University of Asunción.

June 2010

iRAP Tanzania is a partnership between the FIB (Icelandic motoring club), AA Tanzania and TanRoads. The data collected during the inspections is now being assessed and will form the basis of Star Ratings for vehicle occupants, motorcyclists, pedestrians and bicyclists.

The iRAP assessments in Tanzania complement assessments completed in South Africa (2,100km), Kenya (2,400km), Uganda (3,100km) and Nigeria (127km). The World Health Organisation estimates that Tanzania, which has a population of almost 42 million, may experience almost 14,000 road deaths each year.

June 2010