Safety of Vulnerable Road Traffic Users in Urban Area – Case Study Zagreb

The problem of safety of the vulnerable users, that include children, pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists and young drivers, is not properly dealt with in European traffic policy and thus neither in the city of Zagreb. Traffic planners have lately done some positive shifts regarding improvement of mobility and flow of road motor vehicles but without enough attention paid to the safety and accessibility for the vulnerable users. Moreover these categories are often in contrast – increased mobility decreases the safety of traffic. As a result, experts in administering traffic policy, generally take therapeutic methods in sanitizing the problems that arise because of the insufficient traffic safety. The traffic analysis all over Europe shows that the risk of fatal accidents, according to the number of journeys taken, kilometres and time of the journey, is the highest for the motorcyclists. Pedestrians and cyclists have greater risk of getting hurt, regarding the above mentioned arguments, compared to the car passengers. Young drivers are exposed to a greater risk of getting killed per kilometre of journey than pedestrians and cyclists of the same age. The above mentioned participants: pedestrians, cyclist, riders of vehicles with two wheels (motorcyclists and moped riders) as well as young car drivers belong to the group of vulnerable road traffic users. This article focuses on the distress of the vulnerable road traffic users. The risks for the vulnerable road traffic users and protective measures are described in this article.