Halving road deaths and injuries by 2030 will require a team effort. We need to scale up the proven interventions and partnerships worldwide and work together to achieve the UN Global Road Safety Performance Targets and save more than 450,000 lives a year.
At its most recent meeting the iRAP Board of Trustees signed off on the charity’s life-saving strategy for the decade and the fine details were locked in during a month-long series of team meetings in March 2021. The strategy, and our ability to continue to provide iRAP tools free for the world to use, is underpinned by the ongoing generous donor support of the FIA Foundation.
The new strategy will focus on supporting the partnerships for 2030 impact. We will take shared action and celebrate shared success as we manage speeds and improve safety at schools and on streets and highways. Development Banks and international financing institutions; national, regional and local governments; the consultant and construction industry; policy experts and researchers; NGOs and other safe system partners all working together with a common focus on achieving Targets 3 and 4. We are organised, we have the tools ready to use and we are ready to mobilise the partnerships for 2030 impact.
Partnership priorities for the 2nd Decade of Action for Road Safety include:
- Supporting the achievement of Global Road Safety Performance Target 3 with the Star Rating for Design (SR4D) initiative, enabling every road design around the world to be star rated for safety.
- Supporting the achievement of Global Road Safety Performance Target 4 by making safety assessments faster and more affordable with the AiRAP initiative and supporting the work of the Regional Road Safety Observatories to monitor progress.
- Supporting the policies and initiatives of our global partners, including the Multilateral Development Banks (MDB) as they implement the joint statement on an ambitious and integrated approach to road safety.
- Enabling results-based financing partnerships that accelerate public, private and donor investment in proven high-return road safety upgrades that will reduce deaths and injuries.
- Institutional partnerships to support the implementation of the Ten Step Plan for Safer Road Infrastructure in countries around the world.
- Working with governments, private companies, international institutions, non-government organizations and individuals to apply iRAP tools in proven and innovative ways to mobilise investment in safer roads.
- Enabling a scaling-up of Star Rating for Schools (SR4S) with Lead Partners and donors to accelerate the implementation of safety countermeasures at schools.
- Continuing to grow the number of people able to perform iRAP assessments through training and accreditation.
To implement the strategy, the iRAP leadership team will be organised as follows:
- Rob McInerney will continue to lead the programme as CEO.
- Shona Holroyd will continue as the CFO to lead iRAP Finance and Administration.
- Greg Smith will take on the new role of iRAP Global Programme Director, supporting iRAP’s more than 15,000 partners across 100+ countries who lead their own national activities and deploy and use the free iRAP protocols.
- Julio Urzua will take on the role of iRAP Strategic Projects Director, working with the team that supports partners implementing their road assessment project activities worldwide.
- James Bradford will take on the role of iRAP Global Technical Director and lead the re-named iRAP Innovation and Development team, overseeing the iRAP global standard and methodology, ViDA software and innovation partnerships. He will be supported by Monica Olyslagers in the role of Global Innovation Manager, and Andrejus Laugman as Technical Development Manager.
iRAP will continue to encourage local leadership and management of each national programme and support the development of local capacity and partner and supplier capability to undertake assessments using the iRAP global standard.
The world has stabilised the level of deaths on the world’s roads during the first Decade and iRAP is organised and ready to work with its partners to truly scale and mobilise upgrades that save lives. The shared success of iRAP and our partners so far is described in this powerful interactive summary and was recognised with a Prince Michael Award for International Road Safety in 2020.
Ensuring we meet the UN Global Road Safety Performance Targets for all new roads to be built to the 3-star or better global standard for all road users (Target 3) and raising at least 75% of travel on existing roads to the equivalent of 3-star or better performance for all road users (Target 4) has the potential to save at least 450,000 lives a year and over 100 million deaths and injuries over the life of the upgrades. We look forward to working with all our partners worldwide to make it happen!