The "safe system" approach to road safety is explained for teachers and families in New Zealand schools. This approach underpins the Safer Journeys strategy. www.saferjourneys.govt.nz

1. 1
NZ Transport Agency
Waka Kotahi
The Safe System approach to road safety

2. Explaining why Safe System is embedded in
all NZTA curriculum resources for schools
20
A new approach to saving
lives and serious injuries
A more forgiving road
system which
acknowledges human
fallibility
recognises our physical
vulnerability
reduces the price paid for
human error
A change in our road safety
culture affects what we do,
how we do it and what our
students learn at school

3. Explaining why Safe System is embedded in
all NZTA curriculum resources for schools
20
Responsibility for road
safety is spread more widely
than in the past
•Communities work
together to strengthen the
entire system

4. 6
Why the Safe System approach is better
Safe System approach -
Strengthen entire system
The whole community including
schools aim to prevent serious
injury by taking human fallibility
and vulnerability into account
A forgiving system will reduce
serious injury when a crash occurs
World best-practice approach

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It is not only about the driver -
Traditional approach:
Target driver non-compliance
Does not address crashes caused by
simple errors
Targeting the driver doesn’t protect
people when crashes occur
Even when the driver is at fault,
death is too high a price to pay

6. 7
Four Safe System principles
:

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Principle 1 - Human fallibility
1.People make mistakes and
crashes are inevitable
No one performs perfectly
100% of the time
No one should pay for a
mistake with their life or limb

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2.The human body has a limited ability to withstand crash forces
Principle 2 - Human vulnerability
Error may cause crashes, but injury or
death is not an inevitable result.
What happens depends on speed at the
time of crash and what protection is
provided
Even if speed doesn’t cause the crash, it affects crash severity
It’s all a matter of physics: ke = ½mv2

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Principle 3 - Shared responsibility
3. Responsibility for a safe
roading network is shared by
all members of the community

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Principle 4 - Whole of system
4.It will take a whole-of-
system approach to
implement the Safe System in
New Zealand

11. 1
NZ Transport Agency
Waka Kotahi
The Safe System approach to road safety