HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam — October 28, 2020

AIP Foundation has recently piloted a new methodology to research and analyze “near misses” on the roads in Vietnam. Although far too common on our roads, crashes are actually a relatively rare event; near misses are much more common. Being able to analyze near misses gives us a much fuller picture of what is happening on the roads and gather evidence for targeted interventions in traffic blackspots. AIP Foundation partnered with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), its National Foundation (CDC Foundation), and FIA Foundation through the Child Health Initiative, in their development of the new Traffic Conflict Technique (TCT) toolkit for school zones.

The TCT toolkit examines traffic conflicts between vulnerable road users—students, pedestrians, and cyclists—and motorized traffic occurring in and around school zones in low- and middle-income countries. FIA Foundation representatives, who went through extensive training with the CDC, provided AIP Foundation with the tools and resources for analysis and assessment methods.

“TCT is a simple, evidence-based, low-cost approach to evaluate the impact of road safety interventions to prevent crashes, injuries, and deaths. By counting and studying traffic conflicts, TCT can help decision-makers select and evaluate the most effective strategies for improving road safety and preventing injuries. It is particularly helpful in locations where data are scarce,” FIA Foundation shared.

The TCT toolkit offers five pedestrian-vehicle traffic conflict data collection methods based on available resources and level of expertise, each of which can be tailored to different settings. AIP Foundation has been trained to utilize one of the most complex and comprehensive methods, which can capture the types of conflicts and their severity. This method required data collectors to collect pre- and post-intervention data and categorize pedestrian-vehicle conflicts and their severity. The team collected pre-intervention traffic conflict data at the marked crossing in front of the pilot school, which was then compared to the data recorded manually with the video footage to ensure data consistency. Data was sent to CDC for analysis with results to be published by the CDC later in the year.

The TCT toolkit will contribute to school zone safety assessment from a behavioral perspective, accounting for the fact that humans can interact with safe infrastructure in unsafe ways, and highlight where modifications should be made to encourage safer behavior. Adding TCT analysis to our school zone programs will provide us with a holistic approach to assess risks from, not only infrastructure aspects, but also from road users’ behavior.