Road Safety Audit

 Road Safety Audit

Road Safety Audit (RSA) is a review of a project to assess and identify the safety concerns of road users. In this process, emphasis is laid on improving safety for vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists. 

RSA can be carried out in the following cases:

• To evaluate the safety of an existing road or an infrastructure.
• To identify the safety concerns of a proposed infrastructure during the planning, design and implementation stages.

Road safety audits are applicable to diverse types of road projects and to all categories of roads in both urban and semi-urban areas. Road safety audits should be conducted on all road projects, such as:

• Intersection design projects (signalized and non-signalized),
• Pedestrian and bicycle routes,
• Local area traffic management schemes in urban areas,
• Traffic calming measures in neighborhoods,
• Approaches to bridges, rail over/under bridges,
• Grade separators and interchanges,
• Implementation of Mass Rapid Transit System, etc.

The purpose of a road safety audit is to manage safety by identifying and addressing risks associated with road safety deficiencies. Auditing at different stages of a project, starting from the planning stage can lead to the timely elimination of problems and minimize time and costs of retrofitting roads/ transport infrastructure to improve safety at a later stage.
 

The benefits of conducting a road safety audit are:

• Identification of potentially unsafe locations along a road,
• Reducing the severity and likelihood of road accidents
• Reducing the need for costly remedial work by rationalizing the design,
• Minimizing the total cost of a project to the community by preventing accidents, disruption and trauma. 

The RSA process starts with the decision to build a new road, invest in reconstruction, widening or major maintenance of an existing road or simply to evaluate the safety aspects of an existing infrastructure. Road Safety Audits should be performed periodically since the planning stage of a roadway project, so as to ensure the safety aspects for all users are taken care at all the stages. It is recommended that RSA should be conducted in the following critical stages of a project life cycle.
Feasibility stage (if any new proposal is made on existing infrastructure)

• Design stage
• Construction stage
• Maintenance stage 

In the feasibility stage audit, the existing roadway where the project is proposed will be audited considering the safety aspects of the existing road. The results of any crash investigation, especially any previous road safety inspection reports must be considered in the feasibility stage for brownfield projects (i.e. retrofitting or maintenance of existing infrastructure). Feasibility stage audit need not be carried out for a greenfield project (a project where no transport infrastructure currently exists). The comments and suggestions noted after completion of the feasibility stage audit goes as an input to the design of the
proposed transport infrastructure.
 

Once the detailed design of the proposed infrastructure is completed, the design stage audit needs to be undertaken. The deficiencies identified in the design audit, if any, are to be addressed by making necessary changes in the design of the proposed infrastructure/facility.

The construction stage audit comes into picture when the project is under implementation after the approval of design drawings/ documents and the completion of the procurement process. The objective of this audit is to check whether adequate safety measures are taken during construction.

The final stage of the RSA process is termed as the monitoring stage. Monitoring stage audit needs to be carried out periodically during the service life of a project to ensure that the facility continues to serve road users in a safe manner. 

The list of people, responsible for Road Safety Audit at various stages of the project are:

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