Tag: road safety

Person over 65 years of age, dressed in dark clothing that walks near his house alongside roadsides, without a reflective vest and crosses outside the pedestrian crossings. It is the most common profile of fatalities due to abuse in Galicia, one of the accidents in which the General Directorate of Traffic (DGT) focuses its awareness campaigns. So far this year, five pedestrians have died in the community, wounded by a vehicle, which in only two months accounts for 35% of the 14 fatalities in all of 2015.

None of them wore a vest, so from Traffic they have decided to reinforce the awareness of the pedestrians about the importance of making themselves visible to the drivers with a joint campaign with the Junta that includes the distribution of 2,000 vests during this year -400 before Week Santa- and talks in the town councils, especially in those that concentrate more black points of outrages. It will be an information campaign in which it will not be fined, although in the cases of recidivists “other measures will have to be taken”, according to warned yesterday the Government delegate in Galicia, Santiago Villanueva.

Traffic last year designed a risk map of abuses involving half a hundred Galician town councils. As explained yesterday by the Lieutenant Colonel of the Civil Guard Association of Traffic in Galicia, Javier Molino, the actions in the most conflictive nuclei with the reinforcement of the surveillance or the improvement of the infrastructures explain that in the current map only repeat five municipalities, despite the fact that the total number round again half a hundred when analyzing the 170 serious and slight violations of 2015.

The dispersion in Galicia, the aging of the population and the complex road network – with 17,000 kilometers of main network and 55,000 of interurban and local – are, according to Villanueva explains, the causes that explain the high numbers of abuses in the community although it qualified That the 14 pedestrians killed in 2015 are three less than the previous year and 72% below the 50 recorded in 2005.

Molino points out that these “singularities” place Galicia five points above the national average each year in terms of deaths due to abuses. For this reason, it is important to insist that users use these elements also when it is daytime – not only from dusk, when it is obligatory due to the loss of visibility – in order to avoid any failure of the driver.

In the educative talks, the agents will remind the elderly people of the importance of always wearing a safety vest and also walking on the left and in case there is always a circular walk through it. This group is the most vulnerable to abuse by having less mobility to react and less vision to calculate the distance of the vehicle. In addition to the talks focused on this group, for Lieutenant Colonel Molino it is “fundamental” that the environment of the elderly remind them how to walk and cross the road. In the same vein, the head of Traffic in A Corunna and head of the DGT in Galicia, Victoria Gomez Debarred, said that “family support” helps to overcome the “rejection” of the elderly to the vest for being “a Flashy garment “but that can be your” lifesaver “.

The Ministry of Environment will put the 2,000 vests of the campaign available to the agents, an action included in the road safety plan 2016-2020 of the Junta that also plans to build 170 kilometers of pedestrian paths. The Ethel insisted that nothing can substitute “the caution” of pedestrians and drivers. In the case of the latter, lowering the speed to 50 km / h where there are houses and people transit reduces by half the number of pedestrians killed.

The Government of Navarra has published a brochure, with the motto “Live safely by bike”, with safety vest and recommendations for cyclists, a group that between 2010 and 2015 has recorded 169 accidents in Navarra, with 12 people dead, 38 severe injuries and 124 minor injuries.

The triptych, which has been edited 32,000 copies, has versions in Spanish (24,000 units) and Esker (8,000 units), emphasizes the use of helmet, visibility (lighting, clothing and reflective), avoiding distractions (Use of mobile phones and headphones) and not to drive under the effects of alcohol and / or drugs.

It will be distributed in educational centers, health centers, cycling clubs (through the Cycling Federation of Navarre), bicycle sales and repair shops, Polo Park, and other entities and groups related to cycling. The publication of this publication is one of the initiatives taken within the working group on cycling safety created a year ago in the framework of the Navarre Road Safety Strategy.

Helmet use reduces mortality by 85%

As regards the helmet, the publication recalls that its use is always mandatory for children less than 16 years of age and, in the case of older people, when traveling by road. The hull must be well secured and must be approved by the EC. As he recalls, helmet use reduces mortality by 85% and risk of head injuries by 70%. Distractions are the first cause of accident and the elements that are most frequently involved in it are the mobile phone and the headset. In addition, the use of both objects is prohibited when cycling.

Ensuring visibility is another of the recommendations, since some of the accidents occur because drivers do not see cyclists. To do this, remember the need to install lighting on the bike. Specifically, the regulations in force require a white position light on the front, a red position light on the rear, and also on the rear a red reflector that is not triangular.

Also recommend wearing light clothing, especially yellow or orange of high visibility and, if possible, use reflective vest. Finally, reference is made to the consumption of alcohol and drugs, indicating that the driving of bicycles under the effect of these substances constitutes a serious fault. The maximum permitted alcohol rate is 0.25 mg in expired air.

The work begins to bear fruit, and more will give. The Villanova Local Police officer José Luis has been teaching classes in schools and institutes in the municipality for six years and has managed to ensure that children act as advocates of road safety for their parents. They have learned the lesson and do not hesitate to require adults to put on their belts, not to talk on the phone at the wheel and to do the exercise of counting 1,001, 1,002 and 1,003 before starting a STOP. And if you play the role of pedestrians already know that it is mandatory to put on the reflective vest, which better to wear light clothing if it is night and always walk on the left.

“Someone who does not wear a belt begins to say pi-pi-pi, so tell him that he or she will. These small machines are going to be xenia aeration, “says the agent.

But his work has not yet ended, far from it. Maui, as the boys call him, has proposed to implant in Villanova the “Generation 00: zero accidents, zero victims”. This is the title that has given to a project that will develop throughout this course. In addition to continuing with the informative lectures and practical classes with the mobile park that gives in these cases the Provincial Traffic Headquarters, his idea includes calling a drawing competition on road safety and instituting a book of signatures in which public entities and Private companies to write their commitment in this matter, among other initiatives.

Six years learning

The objective abounds the official, is to continue deepening training and awareness that prevention can save many lives; and those children who were released in Children and who pass to the institute already have a long way traveled thanks to the classes with Maui.

The police take safety vest returned last week to the school of San Roué de Croon and before it was in San Miguel and Julio Cambia. In the next few weeks he will go to Termed and Bain, and he plans to take these didactic sessions to the center of attention to people with autism and does not rule out doing it with adults as well, because it never hurts to remind them that Safety are to be met.

José Luis knows how to deal with the boys very well and gets them to listen and get the message: “I lost friends in accidents and tell them that there must be zero accidents.”

The Police in safety vest have clarified some of the first data of the investigation that the body clogs team is solving throughout this morning of Friday, when it has been reported the death of a man by abuses on the roads of Navarre.

This is O.G.F, a 43-year-old man from Cantabria, who was driving a truck on the N121A, at the height of the town and has been hit by a vehicle that was driving in the direction of Pamplona. The event took place near midnight, about 23.55 hours on Thursday. The driver of the car that has rolled this man was a young man of 19 years, neighbor of the municipality.

As confirmed by the police force, the darkness of the night has been able to have part of ‘responsibility’ in the facts. Early indications indicate that the man, who was driving a truck, has parked the vehicle on the right-hand side of the road. Apparently, he wanted to cross the national road where the events took place on the other side of the road, where there is a gas station, but he doesn’t wear any reflective vest.

The driver of the car may not have seen the trucker crossing the road on foot, a fact that has caused the vehicle’s impact, at speed, against him. This has been the state in which the car has been:

The same police sources confirmed that the deceased did not wear reflective clothing. For his part, the boy who drove has been negative in all tests that have been practiced, both alcohol and drug. It has been unharmed after the deadly accident on Friday.

Until the place of the events have been patrols of the Provincial Police and Road Safety of Pamplona. This is the second road accident in less than 24 hours in Navarre, as this same Thursday reported the death of a 19-year-old, who was leaving the road descending from San Cristobel.

They land in our streets!

“Overboard”, electric scooter, mini-bike… These motorized wheeled vehicles, usually electrical democratize and it’s a safe bet that they will multiply on public roads. But what are the rules governing their use? How to keep the road safety?

These vehicles require no registration.

For an electric bike reaches a maximum speed of 25km / h, it does not take either. By cons when it exceeds the power of 250w and we exceed 25km / h, and is akin to a moped, the registration is mandatory as the safety vest.

Absolute respect for pedestrians

Often semi-pedestrian area, road landscape merges with sidewalks and pedestrians remain in these circumstances there priority! You are punished if you make the Fungi over 6km / h on sidewalks and pedestrian areas! In addition to walking pace, electric scooter, “PT” and electric skateboard should use bike paths when they exist and if they do not exist, it will be on the road with cars.

The equipment

It is not mandatory but recommended. Knee pads, elbow pads, helmets, protective wrist are needed. A reflective vest is not a luxury.

Good trip and be safe!

Pedestrians are asked to be vigilant at the transition to winter time on Sunday, October 27. Need to wear reflective vest when you on outside. “Every year, during the transition to winter time, is recorded a peak accident rate and mortality which pedestrians are the first victims”, recalls the Finisher prefecture in a statement.

This peak of road accidents is found in the morning between 8 am and 10 am and dusk, between 17 am and 19 pm. In 2012, France, 36% of pedestrian deaths occurs between November and January. “The road safety therefore draws the attention of all road users, particularly the most vulnerable, the need to be extra careful on the occasion of the time change on Sunday 27 October.”

Road safety advises pedestrians to wear bright clothing, “or better yet, matching retro-reflective tape.” For cyclists, it is mandatory to wear Reflective safety vest if they run at night outside a metropolitan area. The day when visibility is low, it is recommended to wear it.