• Our 10 year target: reduce death and serious injury by 30 per cent, save 100 lives a year, prevent over 2,000 serious injuries; reduce the severity of serious injuries.
    Our 10 year target: reduce death and serious injury by 30 per cent, save 100 lives a year, prevent over 2,000 serious injuries; reduce the severity of serious injuries.
Home About the arrive alive strategy

About the arrive alive strategy

Victorians are more likely to die violently as the result of a road crash than from any other cause.

Every life we lose on our roads is one too many. Road trauma causes great pain and heartbreak to those Victorians who lose family and friends in road crashes – and places a huge economic burden on our entire community.

arrive alive 2008-2017 sets out how the Victorian Government will continue its leadership in road safety to deliver a safer system for all road users and make a significant reduction to road trauma.

Road safety is a shared responsibility and all Victorians can contribute to safer roads and safer driving behaviour. By working together, we can substantially reduce serious casualties from road crashes and spare many Victorian families the grief of suffering the loss or serious injury of a loved one on our roads.

HIGHLIGHTS

arrive alive 2008-2017 builds on Victoria’s strong road safety record and introduces new actions and targets to save lives, reduce road crashes and improve safety on Victoria’s roads over the 10 years from 2008 to 2017.

Our new targets

By the end of arrive alive 2008-2017, the Victorian Government aims to reduce deaths and serious injuries by 30 per cent. By the end of 2017 the strategy will:

  • save an extra 100 lives a year
  • prevent over 2,000 serious injuries
  • reduce the severity of serious injuries.

Meeting these targets will significantly reduce the emotional, physical and financial impact of road trauma on individuals, families and communities. It will keep Victoria at the forefront of Australian and international efforts to reduce road trauma, deliver further major improvements to our road transport system, and improve safety for all Victorian road users.

Our new actions

While continuing to deliver proven road safety measures, arrive alive 2008-2017 introduces major new initiatives with significant potential to reduce road trauma, including:

  • Introducing a requirement for registration that all new vehicles manufactured after 31 December 2010 be fitted with electronic stability control and all new vehicles manufactured after 31 December 2011 be fitted with head protecting technology (such as side curtain airbags) should a national system not be in place at this time.
  • New media and public awareness campaigns to encourage consumer demand for vehicles with high safety ratings and advanced safety features and technologies. The Government will play a vital leadership role by committing to purchase safer vehicles.
  • A new graduated licensing system (GLS) for young drivers is to commence on 1 July 2008 to ensure that young Victorians gain adequate supervision and experience as learners, and to introduce a new two stage P1 and P2 probationary licence system before moving to a full licence. This new system will also introduce a peer passenger restriction for P1 drivers in their first year.
  •  A major infrastructure program delivering unprecedented investment of $650 million to improve road and roadside infrastructure across Victoria, with a focus on reducing the most common types of crashes, together with an expanded Greyspot program and its emphasis on proactive treatments.
  • A tough new focus on reducing drug driving through public awareness campaigns and a heightened enforcement effort, including an expanded program of roadside drug testing and ensuring the routine alcohol and drug testing of all drivers involved in serious injury crashes.
  • A crackdown on road users who place the community at risk by using intelligence based policing to target specific anti-social behaviour, such as repeat drink driving and speeding offenders, hoons on country roads and heavy vehicle drivers and operators who fail to comply with safety standards and speed limits.
  • New media and public awareness campaigns to encourage consumer demand for vehicles with high safety ratings and advanced safety features and technologies. The government will play a vital leadership role by committing to purchase safer vehicles.
  • Introducing a requirement for registration that all new vehicles manufactured after 1 January 2011 be fitted with electronic stability control and all new vehicles manufactured after 1 January 2012 be fitted with head protecting technology (such as side curtain airbags).

These actions – and others – will be implemented over the duration of arrive alive 2008-2017 through the development of three short term action plans. These plans will keep the strategy on track and effective, respond to emerging road safety trends and challenges, and make sure that we achieve our targets.

Our new approach

For the first time, Victoria is formally incorporating the Safe System approach to road safety into the arrive alive 2008-2017 strategy. This approach aims to create a much safer road environment in which alert and responsible road users should not lose their lives – or be permanently disabled – as a result of a crash on our road system.

The Safe System values the health and wellbeing of road users and takes human error into account while focusing on:

  • Improving the safety of Victoria’s roads and roadsides.
  • Increasing the safety of vehicles on Victoria’s roads.
  • Improving the safe behaviour of Victorian road users.

While Victoria’s road safety agencies adopted the Safe System approach in 2003, arrive alive 2008-2017 formally endorses the approach as the foundation for the Victorian Government’s future road safety activities and investments. The Safe System commits the Government to developing a community-wide culture of road safety and to creating a safer road environment across Victoria.

 

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