The World Bank’s new Guide to Integrating Safety into Road Design recognises the iRAP Star Rating, the Star Rating for Designs Tool and Road Assessment Programmes as valuable measures for ensuring safety is systematically embedded in road designs to save lives.

Whilst existing road design guides may be technically sound, the new Guide highlights that they are not enough on their own to enable designers to achieve safety outcomes and UN Target 3 ensuring all new roads are built to a 3-star or better standard for all road users.

Designing strictly to existing guides will result in road designs that allow death and serious injury.

The Guide to Integrating Safety into Road Design, produced by the World Bank and Global Road Safety Facility, with funding from UKAid, has been developed in response to the ever-growing need for safe road and roadside design to save lives and serious injuries from road crashes.

Safe road infrastructure can reduce deaths and serious injury of up to 80 percent.

The Guide provides direct advice on safety related issues for designs in both urban and rural settings based on experience and knowledge of low and middle-income countries’ (LMIC) activity from around the world, with relevance also to those working in high-income countries.

It highlights the Safe System guiding principles to safe road design, common risk factors and respective evidence-based design elements to improve safety, and case studies which illustrate issues and solutions to maximise safety in road designs.

Designing to enhance safety for vulnerable road users, including for pedestrians, cyclists, and motorcyclists, is explored, as well as complementary changes to improve speeds, vehicle safety, road user behaviours, and post-crash care.

The Guide specifies the need to use additional tools and processes to help identify risk and maximize safety in road designs throughout the road or network lifecycle. These may include road safety audits/inspections, iRAP road infrastructure safety assessments, and Star Rating for Designs.

Road safety techniques for different stages of the lifecycle

Star Rating for Designs (SR4D) is a process and evidence-based programme of applications informed by the iRAP Methodology which enable the objective measure, and improvement, of the level of road safety ‘built in’ to a road design for vehicle occupants, motorcyclists, pedestrians and cyclists, before the commencement of civil works.

iRAP’s free SR4D tool and Road Safety Toolkit, both referenced in the guide, were developed with the support of the Global Road Safety Facility (GRSF).

Images shared in the Guide reflect the use of Star Rating for Designs to improve the safety of road designs and Star Rating for Schools to measure and improve the safety of school zones worldwide.

The World Bank Guide to Integrating Safety into Road Design is relevant for road designers and practitioners involved in road development projects, researchers and academics, as well as task team leaders of the World Bank and other Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) to identify safety-related issues in road design and provide guidance to embed good practices.

For more information:

• Download the guide HERE
• For more information on Star Rating for Designs, click HERE
• See how Arup is using SR4D to refine its understanding of road user risk inherent in their designs and maximise safety beyond existing standards HERE.
• Download the CAREC Star Ratings for Road Safety Audits Manual HERE explaining the linkage of Road Safety Audits and the iRAP Methdology.
• See the Road Safety Toolkit for free information on the causes and prevention of road crashes that result in death and injury HERE
• To celebrate the achievement of 3-star or better safety ratings in road designs, read more on iRAP Star Rating Certification HERE

Images credit: World Bank and iRAP in Guide to Integrating Safety into Road Design