Young drivers on Europe's roads

Young drivers on Europe's roads
By Euronews
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Elma from Bosnia Herzegovina posed the following question for U-talk:

“Do you think that better education and preparation of learner drivers can improve road safety? Because the fact is that young drivers are the main causes of traffic accidents.”

Ellen Townsend, the policy director for the European Transport Safety Council, replied:

“We had 30,000 deaths on Europe’s roads last year and 30 percent of those were aged between 15 and 30, so young drivers are indeed a high-risk group.

“We have a new target to reduce road traffic deaths by 50 percent in the European Union and one part of addressing this is through driver education but also vehicles, safety of course and safe roads.

“So in terms of driver education and training the goal there should be, of course, to train people technically in how to drive, but the other important thing is to increase their risk perception and teach them how to be safe and so increase their understanding of what it is that makes a safe driver.

“Traditionally, driver training concentrates more on vehicle manoeuvring and learning traffic codes, but we would also like to see more training which focuses on the goals for driver education.

“And therefore looking at the context of driving – why are you driving, is it night time, do you have people in the car? And the next level is what are your goals for life and how might that actually influence your driving?

“So coming back to the original question, driver training and education is one of the keys for reducing road traffic accidents, especially amongst young people.”

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