Development of the European Road Safety Knowledge System

The objective of this paper is the presentation of the European Road Safety Knowledge System, which was developed within the DaCoTA research project of the 7th Framework Programme of the European Commission. This knowledge system includes a number of components, concerning data and tools, road safety issues and countries. A wealth of data was gathered, on road fatalities, exposure, safety performance indicators, socioeconomic indicators, health and causation indicators, road user attitudes & behaviours, traffic laws and regulations, road safety management etc., for 30 European countries. This data was used in road safety analyses leading to the Basic Fact Sheets, and the Annual Statistical report. Comprehensive syntheses of the literature on important road safety issues and methodologies were carried out, in the form of web-texts. Country analyses were also carried out, including road safety management “profiles”, “country overviews” and country forecasts. These were integrated through a web-based Road Safety Knowledge System. This System can be a very useful support for road safety research in Europe, and ideal to link research and policy making..