Method to monitor the share of safe travel on high-speed roads

The Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts’ Office of Road Safety is leading the development of the National Road Safety Strategy 2021–30 (NRSS). One of the safety performance indicators (SPIs) used to measure the success of the NRSS (the ‘indicator’) is the share (proportion) of high-speed travel on roads with a minimum safety rating of 3 stars.

The objective of this project is to develop a sound methodology (including defining a baseline, against which improvements can be tracked) for monitoring performance against the Indicator.

The core deliverable is a methodology report informing the Department of approaches to monitoring performance against the Indicator which are effective and implementable. The report will identify what data already exists to apply the approaches, and if not, how such data could be collected.

Participants

• Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts
• ARRB
  

Project background

The progress of the National Road Safety Strategy 2021–30 (NRSS) will be monitored through a set of safety performance indicators. One of the lead indicators will be the “share of travel on all national highways and on the high-speed network (≥ 80 km/h) covering 80% of travel recognised as 3-stars (AusRAP or equivalent risk rating) or better” (‘the Indicator’).

The Bureau of Infrastructure and Transport Research Economics (BITRE) and the Office of Road Safety within the Department will be required to report against this indicator, however, there is currently no “off the shelf” data source available to use for reporting.

State and Territory road agencies hold varying levels of data that could measure performance against the Indicator.

This data includes:

• Estimates of vehicle kilometres travelled (VKT) – to be defined within the documented method – on the national land transport network and state roads.
• Star ratings on national highways and state roads (AusRAP or equivalent). Star ratings provide a measure of the level of safety provided by a road’s design. Star ratings involve an inspection of road infrastructure attributes known to have an impact on the likelihood of a crash and its severity. Between 1 and 5-stars are awarded depending on the level of safety which is ‘built-in’ to the road.

Nationally not all roads on the high-speed network have been rated. There is a strong case to target road safety treatments for high-risk high-volume roads to at least a minimum three-star rating.

Project objectives

The objective of this project will be the development of a sound methodology (including defining a baseline, against which improvements can be tracked) for monitoring performance against the Indicator. The methodology should be able to measure performance against the Indicator overall (at the national level) and at the state and territory level.

The expected outcome of the project will be a methodological report that informs the Department of what approach or approaches to monitoring performance against the Indicator would be effective and implementable. The report will also identify what data already exists to apply the approach or approaches, and if not, how such data could be collected.

The report will advise the Department of the relative costs and benefits of different approaches, thereby informing the Department’s options for monitoring performance against the Indicator.

Please note …

This page will be a living record of this project. As it matures, hits milestones, etc., we’ll continue to add information, links, images, interviews and more. Watch this space!