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Road safety campaigns

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In 1989 the growing road toll and cost of accidents were causing widespread community concern. To address the problem of lives being lost and serious injuries on Victoria's roads, Victoria Police, VicRoads and the TAC adopted a concerted, integrated approach to accident prevention.

The approach included:

  • a significant boost to enforcement resources targeting speeding and drink-driving
  • high profile, hard hitting mass media campaigns to sign-post change and help set the public agenda
  • a sustained focus on key issues such as drink-driving, speeding, fatigue and young drivers
  • close co-ordination of enforcement and publicity efforts
  • public education programs directly supporting police enforcement efforts
  • co-ordination of various state and community-based road safety bodies, and
  • an emphasis on research in developing initiatives and evaluating their effectiveness

This integrated approach has been accompanied by a 57% reduction in Victoria's road toll since 1989, with a corresponding drop in serious injuries of 19%.

For its part, the TAC adopted a more aggressive approach to public education by addressing the key causes of road accidents - the attitudes and behaviours of road users.

Since 1989, the TAC's accident prevention strategy has evolved into a multi-faceted program covering a number of road safety issues. This strategy has allowed key road safety problem issues such as the inexperience of young drivers, drink-driving, speeding and fatigue to be targeted in an effective and integrated manner.

The key approaches adopted by the TAC were:

  • to place key safety issues in the public agenda
  • to promote awareness that "this could happen to me" through the use of an emotive, realistic portrayal of road crashes and their consequences
  • to signpost the introduction of new enforcement technologies
  • to highlight the level and unpredictability of police enforcement efforts, and
  • to reinforce the perception of the increased risk of detection.