Assessment of Road Safety Performance for Southeast Asian Countries

Abstract

The aim of this research is to assess the road safety performance in Southeast Asian countries to measure to what extent the new vision "safe system" is considered in the national road safety strategies. For this, a road safety index RSAI(ESA) is developed to use as a tool of assessment. The theoretical framework is based on the main pillars of safe system principles: safer roads and mobility, safer vehicles, and safer road users. A set of indicators are selected based on specific criteria. Each indicator is weighted, normalised, then aggregated using a simple linear additive aggregation method to construct the RSAI(ESA). This index is used to assess the performance of road safety in Southeast Asian countries, and then to rank the countries accordingly. The results show that the countries which have high rate of road crashes have started to take action to solve road safety problems, while some countries need to take further steps to apply the recommendations of the DARS 2011-2020. The setting of the minimum vehicle safety standards regulated by the United Nations (UN) is the most critical element that all the countries in this region should consider in their road safety strategies.