Loads Off Roads: Shifting Freight to Rail Creates a Shift in Road Safety

Abstract

Australia is not meeting national road safety targets, national progress in reducing road trauma over recent years has been much slower than was originally projected, and we face a challenging future in which it will become increasingly more difficult to achieve reductions in road trauma without significant investment in the road network. Trucks are over-represented in road fatalities, and destructive crashes involving trucks occur across Australia far too often to be considered acceptable in either road safety, public health or the on-road transport workplace systems that it represents. Yet with political will, coupled to industry and community support and co-operation, we can choose to begin saving more lives quite quickly through compulsory shifting of more freight from road to rail, beginning with specifically targeted routes and freight type – particularly fuel products and other dangerous goods.