Speed limits are just one step in reducing road crashes

An adult pedestrian has less than a 20 per cent chance of dying if struck by a car moving slower than 50kph but almost a 60 per cent risk of dying if hit by a car moving at 80kph, according to the World Health Organisation.

As average traffic speed increases, the likelihood of a crash does too. The risk of death and serious injury is greater at higher speed, especially for pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists.

Speed is a critical risk factor for road traffic injuries, but when the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) released areas marked within the boundaries of Nairobi metropolis where speed limit is restricted to 50kph in 2014, Kenyans were up in arms. The Law Society of Kenya even moved to court to challenge the 50kph speed limit.

“When you are walking from the car park to your office or in your neighbourhood you are a pedestrian, so give others the respect you expect to get.”

The hostile reaction was an indication of the behaviour and attitude of motorists in Kenya towards other road users, says NTSA Deputy Director, Safety Strategies & County Committees, Dr Duncan Kibogong.

Safety must be at the heart of any speed management strategy. The speed limit on a section of road takes account of safety, mobility and the needs of the different classes of road users, he says.

REDUCING SPEED

The World Health Organisation’s Global Status Report 2015 recommends that where motorised traffic mixes with pedestrians and cyclists, the speed limit be under 30kph. This is due to the vulnerability of these road users at increasing speed.

The same logic was behind NTSA’s 50kph speed limit and the 80kph speed limit for public service vehicles.

Besides the speed limits, Dr Kibogong says there is also appropriate speed. “Even if the speed limit on a section of the road is 100kph, if you come across cattle or children crossing the road or if the road is slippery because it has rained you don’t continue at that high speed. You must react in a way that ensures your safety and that of others,” he says.

He says we must remember that everyone is a pedestrian at one point. “When you are walking from the car park to your office or in your neighbourhood you are a pedestrian, so give others the respect you expect to get,” he says.

Countries with low road crash rates such as Sweden, which has an estimated rate of 2.8 deaths per 100,000 compared to Kenya’s 29.1 deaths per 100,000 people, have gone beyond establishing speed limits for different zones to adapting the Safe System approach which seeks to accommodate human error.

WHO says the safe system goes beyond establishing speed limits to managing interactions between the environment, infrastructure and physical vulnerability.

Within this approach, speed limits are a complementary intervention to creating safer roads, roadsides and vehicles that together work to accommodate driver error. According to WHO, all parts of the system need to be strengthened – roads, roadsides, speed restrictions and vehicles – so that if one part of the system fails, other parts still work to protect people.

Apart from speed, other key behavioural risk factors for road traffic injuries include drink-driving, distracted driving (use of mobile phones while driving), failure to use motorcycle helmets, seat-belts and child restraints. According to WHO there is a four-fold increase in crash risk when talking on a mobile phone while driving.

On a scale of 0-10 Kenya scores an average of six in the enforcement of speed laws, five on drink driving and seatbelt laws enforcement and four on applying rules on helmet wearing, according to the WHO report.

DRINK-DRIVING CRISIS

The other rule that Kenyans have had a difficult time obeying is the drink-driving law. At one point implementation of the rule was stopped by a court order.

An analysis of data from NTSA by Nation Newsplex reveals that there were 2,517 drink-driving violations between February and August this year with 44 of the cases involving PSV drivers. About one in four road traffic deaths globally are attributed to alcohol, according to the WHO.

In South Africa, about a third of non-fatally injured drivers in South Africa have Blood Alcohol Concentration (BAC) levels exceeding the country’s limit of 0.08 g/100 ml, which is the same as Kenya’s.

Kenya enacted its BAC in 2011 at 0.08 g/100ml which corresponds accurately to BAC of 35 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millitres of breath.

Kenya does not have a child restraint law.

The relationship between relative crash rate and BAC-level is exponential, says Dr Kibogong. For instance, the crash rate per kilometre driven for a driver with 0.08 g/100ml alcohol in his blood (Kenya’s legal limit) is almost three times higher than the rate for a sober driver.

He says the risk of a road crash begins to rise exponentially after 0.05g/100ml of blood alcohol. Kibogong says there is accurate correspondence between blood alcohol and breath alcohol levels.

MORE BREATHALYSER TESTS

Alcohol use results in impairment which increases the likelihood of a crash since it produces poor judgement, increased reaction time, lower vigilance and decreased visual acuity. Physiologically, alcohol also lowers blood pressure and depresses consciousness and respiration, says Kibogong.

Kibogong says in this festive season NTSA has increased random breathalyser tests. “Each driver, on being tested is asked to carry his mouthpiece with him to dispose it elsewhere to avoid perception that the law enforcers will re-use the mouth piece,” he says. The test which is used in several countries has been approved by the Kenya Bureau of Standard (KEBS).

He says NTSA is rolling out a massive road safety campaign and partnering with matatu Saccos to train drivers and conductors on road safety issues.

Other countries that have taken strong action on drink-driving have seen great progress. Some countries like Sweden, Norway, Morroco and Estonia have legal limits as low as 0.02g/100ml.

The report also states that most motorcycle deaths are as a result of head injuries, and that only 44 countries worldwide-excluding Kenya- have good helmet laws covering all users including children.

Wearing a standard good quality helmet can reduce the risk of death by 40 per cent and the risk of serious injuries by 70 per cent.

SCHOOL VEHICLES

Kibogong says that NTSA worked with KEBS and other stakeholders to revise the helmet standards to meet UN recommendations. “Since February KEBS have been inspecting to ensure that imported helmet and those manufactured locally meet UN standard. But still substandard ones still make it through Kenya's porous borders,” he says.

According to the US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, seat belts reduce serious crash-related injuries and deaths by about half.

The seat-belt regulation that forms part of the UN’s vehicle standard regulations ensures that seat-belts are fitted in vehicles when they are manufactured and assembled.

The anchorage regulation ensures that seat-belt anchor points can withstand the impact sustained during a crash, minimises the risk of belt slippage and ensures that passengers can be safely removed from their seats if there is a crash.

Kenya does not have a child restraint law.

The Traffic Amendment Bill 2014 has provisions that seek to improve safety of special road users including children. It seeks speed limits of 30kph around schools, hospitals, markets and other places. It also sets standards for the quality of school vehicles. “In other places school vehicles have extra safety measures because children are more vulnerable to injuries but in Kenya when vehicles become old they are converted to school buses,” says Kibogong.

He believes that road crashes should be declared a national disaster and a multi-sectoral approach taken to respond the issue. “We need action to the magnitude of what happened when HIV and Aids was declared a national disaster.”