Project team:
• Volvo Group Trucks Technology, Advanced Technology and Research (GTT, ATR)
• Tongji University:
• Research Institute of Highway, ministry of transport (RIOH):
• Chalmers University of Technology:
• Volvo Cars Corporation:
Research Question 1 (RQ1): Which are the main traffic safety related problems in China?
Research Question 2 (RQ2): Which types of safety solutions have the greatest potential to address the problems identified in RQ1?
This report presents results in a pilot project within the China Sweden Research Centre for Traffic Safety. The centre is a collaboration initiative between the Swedish partners AB Volvo and Chalmers and the Chinese partners Tongji University and RIOH. The current report gives a first overview of the traffic issues in China and Europe and presents some areas where possible countermeasures could be found. The focus has been on commercial vehicles regarding both accidents as well as possible countermeasures. Still, some of the results should be possible to transfer to the general traffic situation in China.
In the report, an overview is given of accident data in Europe and China. An inventory of available data sources in China, Europe and the US was performed. However, national and local data from China and the European Union had to be analysed separately. Due to issues concerning data access and variable inconsistency, it was not possible to directly compare the two datasets.
Many incidents and accidents occur however in a way where they do not end up in national or in-depth accident statistics. In the third chapter of the report, an alternative approach is used in order to retrieve safety critical events. Four bus and goods transportation operators in Shanghai and Beijing were contacted in order to investigate if they keep track of incidents and accidents within their company and if so if they follow up the consequences these events might create (e.g. injuries on drivers and others, property damage, delays). Finally they were asked if they know what cost items these situations create for their business. Despite the fact that most operators do not have exact cost figures on the items related to safety the answers from the interviews indicate that around 20% of the profit of the companies is spent on safety-related items. Safety related costs include maintenance of the vehicles, safety equipment purchasing, insurance, driver training and more direct accident related costs such as repair costs for the vehicles and replacing injured drivers. Alternative approaches in order to find incidents and accidents and their related costs not captured in on-road accident investigations could be to look into insurance reports or detailed records on repair types made and spare parts ordered.
In the current project, possible safety solutions were investigated and compared to what is being done in Europe and in US. Four different areas of possible safety solutions were examined closely:
1. Overview of vehicle regulations in Europe and China for commercial vehicles
2. Comparison of deployment of vehicle based safety systems in Europe and China
3. Analysis of Driver training activities in Europe and China
4. Road infrastructure and operator improvements in China