Reducing traffic accidents in China : strengthening the use of road safety audits

China's road network is quickly expanding and the number of new drivers is growing rapidly, increasing the need to improve the road safety of new and existing road projects and traffic schemes. Road safety audits, when systematically implemented by a qualified and independent audit team, can drastically increase road safety and reduce the number and seriousness of car accidents at a low cost to benefit ratio. This note reviews the specific role of road safety audits, international experience and practices, and specific recommendations for improving the use of road safety audits in China. The success of a road safety audit and its results in terms of reducing the number and impact of car accidents depends for a very large part on the qualifications and technical capacity of the audit team. The establishments of comprehensive national standard and provincial policies for road safety audits, training on road safety audits, along with an accreditation system for auditors are necessary for mainstreaming road safety audits in China. In addition to problems in the design of a new project, changes during project construction can also lead to a degradation of safety when the effects of those changes are not fully analyzed. Finally, a new project may also inadvertently increase hazards on adjacent roads.