Regional Traffic Safety Levels at a Glance... Development of the 'Traffic Safety Index'

Joint Development with Police and Others
Utilization Starting This Second Half of the Year

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Gwan-joo] The police have developed an index that comprehensively diagnoses the level of traffic safety across various regions nationwide, allowing it to be easily understood at a glance.

On the 29th, the National Police Agency announced that, in collaboration with the Office for Government Policy Coordination (Life Protection Promotion Team), the Korea Transport Institute, and the Korea Road Traffic Authority, it has developed the "Traffic Safety Management System Diagnostic Index" (hereinafter referred to as the Traffic Safety Index) and will begin conducting diagnostics using this index from the second half of this year.

The Traffic Safety Index is designed to objectively measure and three-dimensionally diagnose the traffic safety levels and vulnerabilities by region. It reorganizes the traffic safety management system standards certified by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) to fit domestic circumstances. Specifically, it is divided into four stages: institutional foundation, policy activities, intermediate outcomes, and final outcomes, evaluating a total of 20 items across these stages.

The National Police Agency finalized the index content after collecting field opinions and verifying reliability with traffic experts such as the Korean Society of Transportation. It plans to provide the traffic safety diagnostic results as reference materials to the city/provincial autonomous police committees and city/provincial police agencies during the first quarter of each year. Additionally, to establish clear legal grounds for the index and to facilitate smooth diagnostics and utilization of results, it plans to promote amendments to the Road Traffic Act concurrently.

Yang Woo-cheol, head of the Traffic Safety Division at the National Police Agency, said, "Through the development and diagnostics of this index, we expect to clearly analyze the causes of traffic accidents that occur due to complex reasons and provide proper directions for improvement." He added, "We will concentrate all our capabilities to achieve the goal set earlier this year of reducing traffic accident fatalities to the 2,000 range through continuous collaboration with related ministries."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.