There were nearly 20,000 road fatalities in the European Union in 2024, according to the European Commission, although the number seems to be plateauing. But complacency mustn’t take hold as EU member states strive for Vision Zero and zero deaths. With this in mind, road safety programmes remain a serious weapon in the battle against road deaths.
But better infrastructure design and safety features are also weapons that are much needed, as delegates heard during the second day of the Asecap Days conference in the Spanish capital Madrid.
Indeed, Spain can be pleased with its progress in the battle against road deaths. Claire Depre, deputy director for mobility and transport within the European Commission, noted that the EU had overall 44 fatalities per million inhabitants in 2024, the last year for collated data. By country, Spain had fewer - 35 road deaths. However, Romania topped the league table with 77.
But what of the safety of future mobility, given the apparent coming of autonomous driving? The commission want to ensure that the systems are made safe for all road users. In response to this new mobility technology, the European Commission has launched the EU Automotive Action Plan to establish a ‘single market’ for autonomous driving.
By the end of next year, the commission wants to establish largescale testbeds for autonomous vehicles. It will also work towards boosting the regulatory framework for the development of autonomous driving systems as well as harmonising the rules for testing and deployment of such systems.
Simulating change
Greece, which often acknowledges that it lags behind other major economies in road fatalities, has had success with its programmes to tackle road user behaviour. As Dimitrios Gatsonis, chief executive of concessionaire Aegean Motorway, told delegates: “Vision Zero is not a number, it’s about a culture”.
In particular, the Greek public has taken to heart the message that the culture must change, thanks to Greece’s Road Safety Institute’s experiential learning with simulators programme.
The simulator goes on road shows to schools, military bases and universities, to name only a few locations, as well as corporate social events and public festivals. It simulates vehicular rollovers, fatigue experience and even distracted driving. Gatsonis figures that around 40,000 people have used it at the 500 activities which the simulator has been. Evaluation scores show that 98% of users say they are more aware of poor driving behaviour and 95% would recommend their friends try the simulator. As Gatsonis said, Vision Zero is also a duty - and it is achievable.
C-ITS in Italy
In Italy, concessionaire Autostrada del Brennero has been using C-ITS to great effect for cutting down road incidents, said Ilaria de Biasi. She told Asecap Days delegates that drivers can receive messages about the presence of construction sites ahead in order to prepare to slow down or change lanes.
Cooperative awareness messages come from Vehicle to Vehicle technology and can be sent to a central C-ITS server to aid analysis of traffic situation for all drivers.
Public awareness campaigns are also part of the Italian concessionaire’s tactics, said de Biasi. In some events, people who have suffered from road accidents are called up to tell their story - a very sobering moment in any of the gatherings.
Marek Dockalik, from Slovakia’s national highways agency Národná diaľničná spoločnosť, explained how it is using advanced variable message signs to alert drivers that there is a “white out” ahead – where mists descend upon a road and obscure everything at times within only several metres ahead of a vehicle.
Meanwhile, Christoph Schabasser, from barrier maker Rebloc, described how its newest design, the Slim Barrier Concept, allows concessionaires to use barriers alongside roads where before there has been little space for more bulky systems.
Environmentally sound
Beware - for when it rains, it pours, as the saying goes in English. It seems that Greece has had almost everything that Mother Nature could throw at it.
The past decade or more has been a litany of natural disasters, explained Konstantinos Papandreou, chief executive of concessionaire Olympia Odos Operation, the company that has undertaken operation and maintenance services for the Elefsina-Korinthos-Patra motorway, which is currently under construction. These range from floods, rock falls, wildfires, winter storms, mud slides and more.
But dealing with them can only make a concessionaire more ready for the next event, he told the audience. First and foremost, recovery is about safety of drivers and road workers, from the first indication of a disaster to the reopening of a damaged stretch of motorway.
It teaches you to be in what he said is “proactive readiness” in the case of a weather warning. Repair machinery should be in place and lines of communication with highways authorities and emergency services should be open.
In fact, he noted, good communications and relationships are paramount for a concessionaire because a lot of natural disasters will need much more resources than has the concessionaire readily at hand.
Greeen spaces
Concessionaires can also use nature to fight nature. Firms should landscape and plant, said Pietro Torchi Lucifora, general manager of Spanish consultancy Ecogest, a provider of maintenance services including landscaping and management of green areas and roadside vegetation along roads, urban and intercity. Green spaces help protect highway infrastructure.
Water absorption and drainage, temperature reduction, protection of infrastructure from wind and soil erosion as well as a general improvement in local air quality are only some of the advantages of properly-landscaped highways and intersections. One of the tricks to get the best environment is to choose native plant species that survive without a lot of attention because it is their natural environment.
Protecting the actual road surface itself is one of the challenges being tackled by Acciona Construction. The Spanish company is experimenting with “smart” and sustainable precast concrete road surface slabs to create modular rigid pavements. They are called “smart” because they have embedded Weigh in Motion sensors. Also, the slabs are made from eco-friendly geopolymer concrete.
They are craned into position, explained Laura Piarulli, an innovation technician with Acciona Construction, and interlocked with similar slabs either side, thanks to a system of large externally extending rebars.
If the slab is damaged, the rebar connections are simply cut and the slab is craned away. A new slab without extending rebars is lowered into place. A system for easily and quickly replacing the interlocking rebars has been designed to ensure the slabs are once again safe and secure in position.
Forward to Bratislava
Wrapping up day two and the conference, Julian Nunez, president of host association, Spain’s Seopan, noted that the best way to provide the 450 million European Union citizens with the safest and most modern roads is through tolling.
Europe needs tolling and the concessionaire companies that ensure road customers get the best technology available for the 181,000km of tolled roads through the 27 member European Union countries. Asecap will defend the interests of its 124 member associations and companies.
Asecap president Konstantinos Koutsoukis said the sector lives in challenging times. In particular, concessionaires need to adjust - and do it fast: “We need to communicate what the challenges are that we face and what the world would look like without us”.
And so forward to next year’s Asecap Days conference in the very heart of Europe, the Slovakian capital Bratislava.
