New road safety target announced by the EU

17 May 2018

RoadSafe, together with many road safety organisations welcomes the announcement by the European Union (EU) of the publication of the ‘Third Mobility Package’ , a package of transport proposals to improve road safety in the EU, including an action plan on road safety that includes a new long-term target to halve road deaths by 2030 as well as, for the first time, a target to reduce serious injuries by the same amount.

In a long-awaited and very significant announcement today the European Commission set a new EU target to halve road deaths, and for the first time, serious injuries in the decade to 2030. Importantly the Commission has also proposed a package of new vehicle safety standards that could, by themselves, prevent more than 2000 deaths every year by 2032, ten years after the measures come into force.

Further comment form ETSC, The Towards Zero Foundation and Global NCAP .

According to analysis carried out for the European Commission by TRL, the UK transport research laboratory, the proposed vehicle safety measures could prevent 24,794 deaths across all vehicle categories between 2022 and 2037 .  

25,300 people died in the year 2017 on EU roads, a figure that has hardly changed in four years.