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Mobility and Transport
News article4 April 2019Directorate-General for Mobility and Transport

Road safety: Data show improvements in 2018 but further concrete and swift actions are needed

Fewer people died on European roads last year but more efforts are needed to make a big leap forward, according to new, preliminary figures on road fatalities for 2018 published today by the European Commission.

In 2018, there were around 25 100 fatalities in road accidents in the EU 28. This is a decrease of 21% compared to 2010, and 1% compared to 2017. With an average of 49 road deaths per one million inhabitants, this confirms that European roads are by far the safest in the world. But it also shows we are off track to reach our target of halving the number of road deaths by 2020. This underlines the need for swift action by Member States and the entire road safety community to deliver on the EU’s strategic road safety action plan, published in May 2018 as part of the Juncker Commission's 'Europe on the Move' package, which set out specific actions envisaged under the current Commission mandate.

Commissioner for Transport Violeta Bulc said: "While I of course welcome any reduction in road traffic fatality figures, even a single road death is unacceptable. We have been assertive and ambitious in tackling road safety, adopting a strategic action plan, concrete actions on vehicle and infrastructure safety, and a policy framework for the next decade. As we continue to work towards ‘Vision Zero’ – zero road deaths by 2050, we are committed to working with all Member States, as well as the Parliament and road safety community, to provide a level of safety that EU citizens demand and deserve.”

The Commission has already delivered concrete measures on vehicles and infrastructure safety, and both were agreed upon by the Parliament and Council in early 2019. For infrastructure, risk mapping will be carried out for all motorways and for primary roads, and vulnerable road-users will have to be systematically taken into account in all safety assessments, audits and inspections. For vehicles, a number of safety features will be included in all new vehicles, such as Intelligent Speed Assistance to help drivers keep within the speed limit, and other proven new technologies such as Automated Emergency Braking and Lane Keeping Assistance.

For the majority of Member States, the road fatality rate was below 60 deaths per million inhabitants in 2018.

The EU countries with the best road safety results in 2018 were the United Kingdom (28 deaths/million inhabitants), Denmark (30/million), Ireland (31/million), and Sweden (32/million). The countries with a higher-than-average decrease in road deaths from 2017 to 2018 were Slovenia (-13%), Lithuania (-11%), Bulgaria (-9%) and Slovakia and Cyprus (both -8%).

Only two EU Member States recorded a fatality rate higher than 80 deaths per million inhabitants, against 7 in 2010. The countries with the highest fatality rate were Romania (96/million), Bulgaria (88/million), Latvia (78/million) and Croatia (77/million).

A large number of vulnerable road users were affected: pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists and the elderly, particularly in urban areas. With demographic changes and the ongoing trend towards active and sustainable mobility, these groups are expected to represent a higher proportion of road users in the future, and will require particular attention.

In addition to fatalities, the EU’s focus is also on the seriously injured: it is estimated that, for every road death, five more people were seriously injured on EU roads last year (around 135,000).

Next steps

In its road safety policy framework for 2021-2030 and strategic action plan on road safety, both published in May 2018 as part of the 'Europe on the Move' package, the Commission confirms the EU's long-term goal of moving close to zero fatalities and serious injuries in road transport by 2050. The new interim targets, responding to the 2017 Valletta Declaration by transport ministers are to cut the number of road deaths by 50% between 2020 and 2030, and to halve the number of serious injuries in the same period.

For more information

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Commission’s road safety work and EU road safety statistics

Road deaths per million inhabitants – preliminary country by country statistics for 2018:

(The 2018 figures are based on provisional data. There might be minor changes in the final data for individual countries.)

2010

2017

2018

2017-2018

2010-2018

Belgium

77

54

52

-4%

-30%

Bulgaria

105

96

88

-9%

-20%

Czech Republic

77

55

62

14%

-18%

Denmark

46

30

30

0%

-31%

Germany

45

39

39

3%

-10%

Estonia

59

36

51

40%

-15%

Ireland

47

33

31

-5%

-30%

Greece

113

68

64

-6%

-45%

Spain

53

39

39

-1%

-27%

France

64

51

48

-5%

-18%

Croatia

99

80

77

-4%

-26%

Italy

70

56

55

-2%

-20%

Cyprus

73

62

57

-8%

-18%

Latvia

103

70

78

10%

-31%

Lithuania

95

67

61

-11%

-43%

Luxembourg

64

42

60

44%

13%

Hungary

74

64

64

1%

-15%

Malta

31

41

38

-5%

38%

Netherlands*

32

31

-

-

-

Austria

66

47

45

-3%

-28%

Poland

103

75

76

2%

-26%

Portugal

80

58

59

1%

-35%

Romania

117

99

96

-4%

-21%

Slovenia

67

50

44

-13%

-34%

Slovakia

65

51

46

-8%

-28%

Finland

51

43

43

-1%

-13%

Sweden

28

25

32

28%

22%

United Kingdom**

28

28

-2%

-4%

EU 28

63

49

49

-1%

-21%

* The Netherlands have not released provisional data for 2018.

** Figures for the UK are an estimation based on data up to June 2018.

Details

Publication date
4 April 2019
Author
Directorate-General for Mobility and Transport