UIC, the worldwide railway organisation, to launch the 10th edition of ILCAD, “International Level Crossing Awareness Day”, on 7 June 2018 in Zagreb (Croatia)

UIC, the worldwide railway organisation, to launch the 10th edition of ILCAD, “International Level Crossing Awareness Day”, on 7 June 2018 in Zagreb (Croatia)

June 4, 2018 • Rail, Transport

This 7 June, the International Union of Railways (UIC), together with railway industry stakeholders, road authorities, academics and international institutions will meet for the launch of the 10th edition of International Level Crossing Awareness Day (ILCAD). Building on previous successes in Brussels, Warsaw, Paris, Geneva, Lisbon, Istanbul, Riga and Montreal, Zagreb this year will play host to an international conference on safety at the road/rail interface, at an event co-organised by UIC, the Croatian railway infrastructure manager (HZ Infrastruktura) and the Croatian Faculty of Transport and Traffic Sciences.

Every year, ILCAD partners select an overarching theme for the awareness campaign. This year, the message will focus on “Young level crossing users”, who have mostly risky behaviours both on the roads and at the road/rail interface.

Human behaviour is mostly the leading factor to road collisions. The vast majority of collisions at level/grade crossings are caused by drivers not observing the highway code, whether deliberately or unintentionally. Driver errors can result from tiredness, stress, consumption of pharmaceutical products or other substances, or simply from going too fast – but they can also be caused by the inappropriate use of electronic devices. Most “hyperconnected” individuals are young people (aged between 15 and 35).
These behaviours can lead to serious injuries and even death and can also endanger others – not only other road users but also railway staff and passengers.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO): road traffic injuries are the biggest killer of teenagers globally. In 2015, more than 1.2 million adolescents died.
Road injuries were to blame for about one in 10 of these deaths. Road traffic injuries are the leading cause of death among people aged between 15 and 29 years. People aged between 15 and 44 years account for 48% of global road traffic deaths.
Road traffic injuries and deaths (including at level crossings) cause considerable economic losses to individuals, their families and to nations as a whole. Road traffic crashes cost most countries 3% of their gross domestic product.

Even if the number of fatalities at level crossings is low compared to all road traffic fatalities (1% in the EU) they represent about 28% of all railway fatalities.

This is why the railway sector with other sectors’ stakeholders has been trying to tackle this issue for so many years. Our accident-prevention message in 2018 is “Don’t beat the train!” and is aimed at everyone.
To better tackle this human behaviors’ issue some technological innovations are being studied to help users and improve safety at level crossings: Location of level crossings on GPS, dialogue between road/rail infrastructures, dialogue between vehicles, better information to users…

Did you know?

Over 40 countries take part in ILCAD: see list of participants
There are around 600,000 level/grade crossings in the world (213,000 in the USA, around 37,000 in Canada, 114,000 in the EU)

In Europe, level/grade crossing accidents represent 26% of all significant railway accidents and account for 1% of road deaths versus 28% of railway fatalities. In 2015, there were 469 collisions at level crossings, with 288 fatalities and 239 serious injured persons in the EU (ERA Safety interim report 2017).

For other data click on the links below:

UIC is Coordinator of a EU project called Safer-LC (Safer level crossing by integrating and optimizing road-rail infrastructure management and design)
According to WHO :

73% of all road traffic deaths occur among young males under the age of 25 years who are almost 3 times as likely to be killed in a road traffic crash, as young females. Most of the road fatalities involved males between the ages of 10 and 19.
Most young people killed by the top cause – road crashes – are “vulnerable” road users: pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists.
Males aged 15-19 make up the biggest share of these 115,302 fatalities, mostly in poorer countries in Europe, the Americas and the Eastern Mediterranean region.
Although far fewer in number, road injuries are still the leading cause of adolescent death in high-income countries.

Guidelines on level crossing safety for truck drivers to help save lives https://t.co/YPuYlw30QL #ArriveAlive #LevelCrossings @TruckAndFreight @uic pic.twitter.com/Vmq3vnkeZY

— Arrive Alive (@_ArriveAlive) June 4, 2018