European Commission - Page 4
Valletta – The European Commission has published new data showing that deaths on EU roads fell by just 2% last year, following a 1% increase in 2015. According to ETSC analysis, road deaths will now need to fall by 11.5% a year in order to meet the EU target of cutting deaths by half in the decade to 2020. Commenting on the publication of the latest figures, Antonio Avenoso, Executive Director of the European Transport Safety Council said: “With around 500 deaths on EU […]
The European Commission has published new proposals to revise qualification and training rules for lorry and bus drivers. ETSC welcomed the initiative but says the rules should be extended to van drivers and include elements on avoiding distraction. Data from 2014 show that 3,863 people were killed in collisions involving HGVs of more than 3.5 tons and 751 in those involving buses and coaches. But ETSC points out that more die in collisions involving vans, than with lorries (nearly 4,000 in 2012). Van use […]
By Antonio Avenoso, ETSC Executive Director After the political turmoil of recent months, 2009, the year of Barack Obama’s inauguration, seems like another age. Back then only a handful of people had heard of Uber, Tesla’s plan for an ‘Autopilot’ feature or Google’s self-driving car project. Technological change, particularly in the car industry, has continued at a dizzying pace since then. But somehow, the European Commission didn’t get the memo. 2009 was also, believe it or not, the year of the last major revision […]
The European Commission’s latest road safety scorecard reveals, for the first time, estimated figures for rates of serious injury per million inhabitants broken down by country for 16 EU member states. The data act as a further reminder of the scale of the problem, with rates of serious injury dwarfing the numbers killed. The data is based on MAIS3+, a common definition of a serious injury now being used for comparison across the EU. EU transport commissioner Violeta Bulc told the European Parliament in […]
Eight EU transport ministers have called on the European Commission to ‘speed up’ plans to upgrade vehicle safety standards saying road safety should be ‘top priority’. In a letter to the European Commissioner for industry Elżbieta Bieńkowska, the transport ministers of Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg and The Netherlands said ‘ambitious’ new vehicle safety standards are needed ‘to help Member States halve the number of road deaths by 2020’. 26,000 people die on European Union roads annually, with at least 135,000 suffering life-changing […]
New EU rules have had a positive impact on tackling road traffic offences committed abroad according to a European Commission report. The number of investigated offences committed by non-residents increased by four times to approximately 2 million between 2013 and 2015 in the Member States which have implemented the rules. The “Cross-Border Enforcement Directive” allows Member States, with the help of an electronic information system, to identify EU drivers who commit traffic offences abroad including four “main killers” that cause 75% of road deaths: […]
Violetta Bulc, the European Commissioner for Transport, has renewed a promise to introduce a target to reduce serious road injuries across the EU. Speaking to MEPs on the European Parliament’s Transport Committee on 5 December, Bulc described the figure of 135,000 serious injuries per year as “serious numbers”, and described the current situation as “frustrating…we are not moving forward”. Bulc said a target will be announced in 2017, based on the Commission’s recent report on serious injuries. She also noted that 16 member states […]
The European Commission has published a list of 19 lifesaving safety technologies that could be made mandatory on new vehicles in the next update of EU vehicle safety rules expected next year. The European Transport Safety Council welcomes the announcement but says several critical areas for action are missing, and the proposed timescale is far too long considering that most of the technologies are already available today. 26,000 people die on European Union roads annually, with at least 135,000 suffering life-changing injuries. Progress on […]
Newly-published research carried out for the European Commission recommends that the EU should set a target to reduce the number of people seriously injured in road collisions. 135,000 people were seriously injured on European roads in 2014, according to figures published by the European Commission for the first time in April. While the number of deaths on European roads has fallen dramatically over the last decade, serious injuries have declined at a much slower rate. Official targets to reduce road deaths have been in […]
The Catalan Traffic Service and the European Transport Safety Council organised the first YEARS National event in Barcelona to debate on the dangers and policy recommendations for young road users in the European Union. Good practice and effective measures adopted by EU Member States were promoted and disseminated during the national conference in order to raise awareness among stakeholders and spur on national administrations to take action and reduce the number of young people killed on the roads. Download the agenda (in English) Download the agenda (in Spanish) Presentations […]
The European Commission has opened a public consultation on maritime safety as part of its ‘refit’ deregulation exercise. The consultation exercise will cover areas of legislation including investigation of accidents, vessel traffic monitoring and minimum training for ship crew. The Commission says the ‘Fitness Check’ of EU maritime legislation will ‘identify any excessive burdens, inconsistencies and obsolete or (cost) ineffective measures in the policy area being considered’. The deadline for submissions is 8 January. https://ec.europa.eu/transport/modes/maritime/consultations/2016-refit_en
ETSC is calling on the European Commission to come forward with a long-awaited target to reduce serious road injuries. The European Commission, for the first time, published a figure in April for the number of people seriously injured on Europe’s roads : 135,000 in 2014. According to ETSC data, the numbers have declined much more slowly than the number of deaths in recent years. ETSC has long argued for the need for a separate pan-European target to reduce serious road injuries, to complement the […]
Common statement signed by 177 European and national Civil Society Organisations and Trade Unions, ahead of the EU27 Summit in Bratislava on 16 September 2016. A new Europe for people, planet and prosperity for all Europe is at a crossroads, and the future of European cooperation and the benefits it brings are at stake. This is about the future of our society and how we want to be viewed by the wider world. The future of our planet and the k ind of Europe our children will […]
An independent report on the EU’s law on the cross border enforcement of traffic rules recommends further action to ensure non-resident drivers are sanctioned for offences committed outside their home country. The evaluation, carried out for the European Commission, found that overall the law is justified in terms of EU added value, is cost-effective, relevant and improves enforcement and awareness of traffic rules for cross-border drivers. But the report also says that implementation has been hampered by delays to the law’s adoption and implementation. […]
This paper builds on recent calls for the European Commission to come forward with a cycling strategy for the European Union. ETSC also supports the need for co-ordinated European action on cycling and would welcome a pan-European strategy. This paper is designed to serve as inspiration for the safety component of such a strategy. Cyclists represent 8% of all road deaths in the European Union but big disparities exist between countries. Cyclists (like pedestrians) are generally unprotected and are vulnerable in traffic. As active travel […]
Renaissance Hotel, Brussels ETSC and the Flemish Foundation for Traffic Knowledge organised a lunch debate on cycling safety in light of the EU’s forthcoming cycling strategy. Cyclists represent 8% of all road deaths and big disparities exist between countries. Moreover, since 2010 the reduction in the number of cyclist deaths has slowed down markedly. The safety of unprotected road users should therefore receive special attention from policymakers at the national and European levels. As active travel is being encouraged for reasons of health and environment, […]
Since 2010 the number of people seriously injured in the EU has been reduced by just 1.6%, compared to an 18% decrease in the number of road deaths in the same group of countries. The majority of countries have reduced road deaths at a faster pace than seriously injured since 2001. In 2014, more than 203,500 people were recorded by the police as seriously injured on the roads in the EU, representing an increase of almost 3% compared to 2013. There is strong political […]
Around 100 MEPs from across the political spectrum have now backed the call by ETSC and more than 70 road safety organisations for a serious road injury reduction target for Europe. The MEPs, representing some 20 Member States, have signed a European Parliamentary written declaration in support of the target, others have until 18 April to join the call. Earlier this month, ETSC and FEVR – the European Federation of Road Traffic Victims met with Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission to ask […]
In response to the dieselgate scandal, the European Commission last month proposed major changes to the oversight of the technical environmental and safety compliance checks new car models must undergo before being approved for sale on the European market. The proposal designed, in the Commission’s words, ‘to correct the flaws in the system’ has three stated aims: Reinforce the independence and quality of testing that allows a car to be placed on the market; Introduce an effective market surveillance system to control the conformity […]
Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission met earlier today with road safety and road victims groups to discuss the future of European road safety targets. Representatives of the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) and the European Federation of Road Traffic Victims (FEVR) presented the President with a banner representing the ‘Let’s Go’ campaign, which calls for a new European target to reduce serious road injuries, alongside an existing target to reduce deaths by half by 2020. More than 200,000 people suffer life changing […]