State Agency Road Safety, Bulgaria joined FERSI

We are very pleased to announce a new FERSI member: the State Agency Road Safety (SARS) of Bulgaria. SARS is a governmental body, established in 2019 with the mission to pursue an active policy to improve road safety based on systematic analysis, monitoring and evaluation with the aim to significantly reduce the adverse effects of road traffic crashes. With SARS we have another strong national road safety organisation on board. FERSI has now 22 members from an equal number of European countries. 

11th Young Researchers Seminar

The 11th Young Researchers Seminar took place from 15 to 17 May 2023 in Lisbon, Portugal, hosted and organised by LNEC, the Portuguese National Laboratory for Civil Engineering.

It was a great and inspiring event. Around 35 enthusiastic young researchers from a variety of European universities and research institutes participated and presented their work. Around 15 senior researchers acted as tutor and mentored two or three of these young researchers, helping them to improve their writing and presentation skills. Topics were diverse and included road, rail and maritime, and multimodal transport issues. Next to the technical sessions, the seminar offered plenty of opportunities for networking in an informal and constructive atmosphere. Three keynote speakers covered topics of particular interest to young researchers: Thierry Goger, Secretary General FEHRL, elaborated on the different aspects of proposal and project management; Karst Geurs, Professor of Transport Planning at the University of Twente and Editor-in-Chief of ETRR, explained the many steps of getting a research article published; and last but not least, José Manuel Viegas, Professor of Transport at the University of Lisbon and former secretary General of ITF, gave a personal perspective on research in a rapidly changing society.

The seminar was financially supported by the members of the European Transport Research Alliance (ETRA): ECTRI, FEHRL, FERSI, Humanist and EURNEX.

ICSC2023 – Call for abstracts

The 11th edition of the International Cycling Safety Conference (ICSC) will be hosted by SWOV in The Hague from 15 to 17 November 2023. ICSC is a forum for researchers and experts in the field of cycling safety, whose scientific and practical activities are aimed at making cycling safer. This conference will allow for ample exchange of knowledge and experiences, thus contributing to improving cycling safety. The societal relevance of this topic is ever increasing, as cycling safety is seen as a promising solution to various sustainability and health issues whereas the number of road deaths and seriously injured cyclists doesn’t seem to be improving.

Call for abstracts open until May 5th

The call for abstracts is now open until the 5th of May 2023 (extended deadline!). For more information: icsc-2023.net.

Final Event MEDIATOR project, 13 April 2023, the Hague

The Horizon 2020 project MEDIATOR cordially invites you to its Final Event on Thursday the 13th of April 2023 in The Hague, the Netherlands. The event is free of charge. For more information about the programme and for the registration (before 31 March!), check the final event page at the MEDIATOR website. 

MEDIATOR worked on developing a mediating system for drivers in semi-automated and highly automated vehicles, enhancing safe, real-time switching between the human driver and the automated system. The final event includes presentations of the project’s main accomplishments, various live demonstrations, interactive discussions with scientific, industrial and policy stakeholders and a keynote speech by Richard Schram, Technical Director Euro NCAP.

Essential European road safety research lacking

In a position paper, FERSI expresses its concern that European road safety research is no longer delivering what it ought to, impeding the improvements needed to achieve the European ambitious road safety targets. The paper details how the structure of road safety research funding in Europe impacts the potential progress that can be made in European road safety ánd provides some suggestions for solutions.

Download the position paper »

PIARC World Road Congress, 2-6 October 2023, Prague

Every four years, the World Road Association PIARC organises a World Road Congress (WRC) with the aim to share techniques and experiences worldwide in the field of road infrastructures and road transport. The XXVIIth WRC will be held in Prague (Czech Republic) from 2 to 6 October 2023. Registration is open now with early bird fees valid until 5 April. For more information see wrc2023prague.org.

Season’s greetings

Every year has its ups and downs. Unfortunately, 2022 was a year with many downs: COVID was still among us with restricting measures in many countries, a war started, as did an energy crisis, hugely rising inflation, as well as increasing numbers of absent people due to physical ánd mental health issues. However, there were also several notable ups. For FERSI and other researchers an important highlight in 2022 was the increased opportunity to meet again in person after almost two years of mainly two-dimensional screen contacts. One of these opportunities was the FERSI Conference early October in The Hague, the Netherlands: a meet-up of researchers and practitioners, lots of interesting new research results and insights, great discussions, and last but not least a social gathering strengthening existing contacts and creating new ones. 

Let’s hope 2023 will bring us health, happiness and success, for our families and friends, in the world and in our pursuit to more road safety.