Road accidents in Dhaka, Bangladesh: how to provide safer road?

Developing countries are now experiencing a serious road safety crisis. Like many other developing countries Bangladesh is experiencing a very severe road safety problem. The road safety situation of the country has been deteriorating with increasing number of road accident deaths, largely as direct consequences of rapid population growth and motorization, unplanned urbanization and lack of legitimate investment in road safety. It is predicted to be worsening the road safety situation in the coming years unless this critical problem of epidemic nature is seriously addressed with significant improvements in the relevant sectors. This paper mainly addresses the accident trends and the issues of road safety in Dhaka City, Bangladesh. It also discusses some contemporary issues needed to be addressed for ensuring road safety. Traffic accident data in Bangladesh is very fragmented and oftentimes very inaccurate because of poor reporting and under-reporting. However, injury and fatality rates per 100,000 population have been increasing constantly and the fatality rate per 100,000 vehicles has increased significantly in the past 10 years in Dhaka Metropolitan Area. Prevention of accidents or reduction of the damages are the two ways to ensure road safety, where the most effective way to reduce accident consequences is to prevent the occurrence of accidents. Proper neighborhood design or urban planning also can improve the road traffic safety. Whatever, this should be remembered that traffic safety is a cooperative effort and requires the involvement of all stakeholders and agencies.

• Corporate Authors:

  Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI)

  Linköping,   Sweden  SE-581 95
• Authors:
  • Rahman, M Shafiq-Ur
• Conference:
  • Road Safety on Four Continents: 14th International Conference
  • Location: Bangkok , Thailand
  • Date: 2007-11-14 to 2007-11-16
• Publication Date: 2007

Language

• English

Media Info

• Pagination: 15 s
• Monograph Title: Road safety on four continents. 14th international conference, Bangkok, Thailand 14-16 November 2007. Conference proceedings

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Classification; Conferences; Costs; Crashes; Developing countries; Policy; Prevention; Trend (Statistics)
• Uncontrolled Terms: Severity
• Geographic Terms: Bangladesh
• Subject Areas: Finance; Policy; Safety and Human Factors; Security and Emergencies;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01114801
• Record Type: Publication
• Source Agency: Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI)
• Files: ITRD, VTI
• Created Date: Nov 18 2008 11:45AM