The human element [in road safety]

It is recognised that road user error, either alone or in combination with environmental and/or vehicular factors is responsible for the vast majority of collisions. Errors are regularly made by people when on the highway, either unintentionally or because they are not able to perform their tasks as a road user as they should. In addition, people are not always prepared to comply with the rules of the highway, and intentionally violate them. However, the highway, with all the assets which it encompasses, has an important role to play in road safety. The manner in which the highway is managed and the way it relates to, and makes sense in light of the environment by which it is surrounded, can make these unsafe actions performed by road users more or less likely. By tailoring the design and operation of the highway infrastructure to take into consideration human cognitive capacities and limitations, those parts of the system which result in human errors or traffic violations are, as far as possible, prevented. Highway condition can assist or hinder the user, and its infrastructure can increase or decrease the severity of the outcome when an incident occurs, by the extent to which they take into account human physical vulnerability. Of course, this is not to rule out the very significant contribution of vehicle design and role of road user education; the key principle is that the responsibility for road safety is shared between everyone.