Bonn, 17.9.2024
Why do dangerous areas on German roads have to become accident hotspots before traffic is proactively monitored there? Traffic expert Prof. Dr. Dieter Müller, Head of the Traffic Sciences Department at the Saxon Police University, poses this question in an interview with the schulwege.de portal.
It is often difficult for local authorities who want to make a difference in terms of road safety to take action, because: According to the German Road Traffic Regulations (StVO) and national regulations for traffic monitoring, monitoring moving traffic is the sole responsibility of the police. Nevertheless, this is no reason for local authorities to keep their feet still, according to Müller. “Municipalities may very well carry out traffic monitoring, i.e. document behavioral violations, but without being able to punish them in the direct temporal context. However, these observations could very well be communicated to the police so that they can generate new monitoring priorities,” explains the traffic expert in an interview with www.schulwege.de. This is where local authorities need to take action and insist that behavioral violations are also monitored.
Crossing aids for safe routes to school
Müller also advocates interpreting the regulations for the creation of crossing aids near schools more generously in consultation with the licensing authority if internal administrative requirements regarding the frequency with which these locations are used by pedestrians are not met. Traffic regulations can be used, for example, to create 30 km/h zones, central islands or crosswalks.
However, this alone would not help: “Violations by motorists and cyclists against pedestrians crossing the road would also have to be much better monitored and punished than before,” warns the traffic scientist.
Optimize traffic monitoring
There are now modern tools that use AI to evaluate accident data and traffic flow data, particularly with regard to excessive speed. In combination with other data, such as the location of schools, retirement homes or other sensitive danger areas in traffic, this allows much more accurate predictions to be made about where traffic controls should be carried out. The Initiative for Safe Roads, initiator of the schulwege.de portal, has this data in the form of a nationwide map of danger spots, which it makes available to interested authorities and local authorities.
About the initiative for safe roads
The Safe Roads Initiative has been campaigning for Vision Zero (no traffic accidents resulting in death or serious injury) since 2014. The aim is to
significantly increase road safety in order to sustainably protect vulnerable road users in particular, raise awareness of road safety and promote the traffic turnaround. To this end, it is developing innovative digital tools for use on the web and in apps. Using specially developed platforms, data can be collected, analyzed and made usable in a meaningful way.
The schulwege.de platform was also launched in this context. The initiative for safe roads would like to recommend it to parents, teachers and local authorities as a further contribution to improving road safety for children.
Press contact:
Jörn Wolter
Initiative für sichere Straßen GmbH
Matthias-Grünewald-Str.
1-3
53175 Bonn
Phone: 0228-76 38 69 00
E-mail: presse@sichere-strassen.org