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George Yannis   Safe Mobility everywhere and for all in 2025 This year we followed our dreams, promoting intensively road safety scientific excellence and safer mobility everywhere and for all, including also our major campaign for city-wide 30km/h speed limits; the new catalyzer for saving so many lives with so little change in our habits. At mid-way to the decade -50% target, we need to further strengthen our individual and collective efforts to sincerely include traffic safety into the mobility agenda and persist in implementing the vision zero traffic fatalities. We thank you all for the excellent cooperation and we are sending you our very best wishes for Merry Christmas and a Very Lucky New Year, full of personal and professional achievements.

Effectiveness of 30 km/h speed limit – A literature review, November 2024 A paper titled “Effectiveness of 30 km/h speed limit – A literature review” authored by George Yannis and Eva Michelaraki has been published in Journal of Safety Research. This study evaluates the impact of 30 km/h speed limits on road safety, emissions, fuel consumption, traffic flow, livability and public health. Results from 60 simulation studies and estimations demonstrated significant reductions of over 40% of road crash fatalities, alongside significant subsequent increase of active travelling (pedestrians, cyclists and e-scooters) and Public Transport passengers, as mobility conditions become more user friendly to the vulnerable road users. Such a high societal impact for such a small change in our habits.

Latest Developments

European Commission – Seniors Safety Thematic Report, January 2024 The European Commission with the active contribution of NTUA, SWOV and KFV has published at the European Road Safety Observatory, the Seniors Safety Thematic Report which refers to people aged 65 years and over. This Thematic Report describes how seniors participate in traffic, as well as seniors in relation to road safety hazards. Moreover, countermeasures about infrastructure, road users fitness-to-drive and training, vehicles systems, automation and bicycles for seniors are suggested.

ITF – Measuring New Mobility: Case Studies and Best Practices Report, December 2024 The International Transport Forum (ITF) has recently published a new Report titled "Measuring New Mobility: Case Studies and Best Practices". The Report features case studies from various countries, focusing on new mobility services such as ride-sharing, micro-mobility, and autonomous vehicles. Key findings emphasize the importance of robust data collection and analysis methods to assess the safety, efficiency, and environmental impacts of these services. The report provides recommendations for policymakers to design effective frameworks for integrating new mobility into existing transport systems.

European Council – Adaptation of Cross-Border Driving Disqualifications, December 2024 The European Council has recently adopted the negotiating position on driving disqualifications in order to improve road safety in the EU aimed at improving road safety through the mutual recognition of driving disqualifications across EU member states. This initiative focuses on strengthening enforcement measures for serious traffic offenses, such as speeding, driving under the influence, and dangerous driving, ensuring that penalties are upheld across borders. The proposed rules aim to enhance road safety by closing legal gaps that allow offenders to evade penalties when driving in other EU countries.

Statistics Corner

European Commission – Seniors Safety Facts and Figures Report, May 2024 The European Commission with the active contribution of NTUA, SWOV and KFV has published at the European Road Safety Observatory, the Seniors Safety Facts and Figures Report which refers to people aged 65 years and older. According to this report, seniors have the second highest mortality rate among all age groups, with an average of about 64 senior fatalities per million senior inhabitants in road traffic within the EU27. Moreover, when considering the mode of transportation, seniors experienced a considerably high number of fatalities in the most vulnerable modes. Specifically, in 2022 29% of senior fatalities were pedestrians, while 17% were cyclists.

ESRA3 – Distraction & Fatigue Thematic Report, July 2024 The Distraction & Fatigue Thematic Report of the European Survey of Road Users’ Safety Attitudes (ESRA) has been published, as prepared by the Portuguese Road Safety Association, with the support of NTUA, containing a wealth of information on road safety in 39 countries across Europe, America and Asia-Oceania, based on the ESRA3 survey. This Thematic ESRA3 Report concerns distraction and fatigue in traffic. Results on distraction focus on the use of a mobile phone while driving a car, while only results for car drivers are included for fatigued driving. The Report also includes comparisons among the regions as well as results by age and gender group within each region, by country, and the identification of factors that influence the self-declared behaviour of talking on a handheld mobile phone while driving a car and driving a car while fatigued.

Our Publications

POLIS – Safety and Security Working Group Meeting, Online, October 2024 POLIS, the European Cities Network, has organized with great success the Safety and Security Working Group Meeting which was held online on 30 October 2024. The POLIS Safety and Security Working Group Meeting focused on the effectiveness of lower speed limits and Low-Traffic Neighborhoods in enhancing road safety. NTUA Professor George Yannis actively contributed with the following presentation:   Review of 30 km/h speed limit benefits in Europe

IRTAD 38th Meeting, s’-Hertogenbosch, November 2024 The International Road Traffic Safety Analysis and Data (IRTAD) Group and the International Transport Forum (ITF) organised with great success the 38th Meeting which was hosted by VIA Traffic Solutions Software in s'-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands, on 13-14 November 2024. In this meeting, the latest international road safety developments were discussed. Members and observers from many countries enriched the discussion aimed to help improve road safety across the globe. Particular emphasis was given to road safety data collection and analysis.  NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation: Video recognition Machine Learning for automatic collection of Pedestrian Safety Performance Indicators

CSDD – 24th Road Safety Hackathon , Riga, November 2024 The Road Traffic Safety Directorate (CSDD) organized with great success the 24th Road Safety Hackathon, which took place in Riga, Latvia, on November 15-17, 2024. This event aimed to collaborate, innovate and create solutions to improve road safety. Particular emphasis was given to vulnerable road users and accessibility, emergency response and medical care, sustainability, smart infrastructure and urban design and vehicle safety.  NTUA actively contributed with the following presentations: Critical issues and priority actions for road safety in Europe  Artificial Intelligence and Big Data for Supporting Road Safety Actions

Modeling and Sustainability Implications of Harsh Driving Events: A Predictive Machine Learning Approach, July 2024 A paper titled “Modeling and Sustainability Implications of Harsh Driving Events: A Predictive Machine Learning Approach” authored by Antonis Kostopoulos, Thodoris Garefalakis, Eva Michelaraki, Christos Katrakazas and George Yannis has been published in Sustainability. This study addresses the complex task of predicting dangerous driving behaviors through a comprehensive analysis of over 356,000 trips, enhancing existing knowledge in the field and promoting sustainability and road safety. Findings indicate that Gradient Boosting and Multilayer Perceptron excel, achieving recall rates of approximately 67% to 68% for both harsh acceleration and braking events. The application of machine learning algorithms, feature selection, and k-means clustering offers a promising approach for improving road safety and reducing socio-economic costs through sustainable practices.

Ιnvestigation of dangerous driving behaviour by exploiting naturalistic driving data, October 2024 A NTUA Diploma Thesis titled “Ιnvestigation of dangerous driving behaviour by exploiting naturalistic driving data” was recently presented by Eleni Theodoraki. To achieve this goal, useful data related to driver behaviour were collected through a naturalistic driving experiment in real-life conditions in Belgium and England combining machine and deep learning algorithms. The results showed that the most significant variables were the occurrence or non-occurrence of harsh acceleration and the occurrence or non-occurrence of harsh braking in Belgium and the total travel distance and the occurrence or non-occurrence of harsh acceleration in England.

metaCCAZE – 1st Newsletter, July 2024 The Horizon Europe research project metaCCAZE has recently released the metaCCAZE 1st Newsletter, which provides information on the latest outcomes of the EU-funded metaCCAZE project aiming to accelerate the deployment of smart systems that combine electric, automated and connected technologies and infrastructure, enabling zero-emission shared mobility services for both passengers and goods in European cities. The potential of zero emission shared mobility solutions in real and diverse urban environments were tested in four Trailblazer Cities (i.e. Amsterdam, Munich, Limassol, Tampere).

Upcoming Events

WHO – 4th Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety, Marrakech, February 2025 The World Health Organisation (WHO) in cooperation with the Ministry of Transports and Logistics of Morocco are organising the 4th Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety which will be held at Marrakech, Morocco, on 18-20 February 2025. This conference with theme "Committed to Life", will bring leaders and experts together to assess the progress made in implementing the Global Plan 2021-2030 during its initial five-year period and to generate support for the new vision of safe and sustainable mobility. Registration until 10 February 2025.

ICTR2025 – 12th International Congress on Transportation Research, Thessaloniki, October 2025 The Hellenic Institute of Transport (HIT/CERTH) in cooperation with the Hellenic Institute of Transportation Engineers (HITE) are organizing the 12th International Congress on Transportation Research (ICTR 2025), which will take place on 16-18 October 2025 in Thessaloniki, Greece. The spotlight theme of the 2025 Congress is "Transportation in the era of Artificial Intelligence". Researchers can submit their abstracts until 31 January 2025.