Sponsored by
July 11-13, 2010
in Big Sky, Montana!
Why Traffic Safety Culture? Traffic crashes represent the largest cause of fatal injury for nearly all age groups, especially in rural America. Rural states such as Montana have the misfortune of having the highest traffic fatality rates both in terms of exposure (VMT) and population risk (per capita). Driver behavior represents the single largest causal factor for these traffic crashes. Specifically, most crashes result from poor decision making rather than misperceiving information or not having the requisite skills to act correctly. This implies that most crash-related behavior factors – such as speeding, drunk driving, failure to yield, seat belt non-compliance – are the direct result of deliberate decisions by drivers that increase crash risk and injury severity. Consequently, unless we can focus our research efforts on understanding how culture influences driver attitudes and decision-making processes, we cannot expect to engineer a fundamental and enduring change in driver behavior in our transportation systems.
Initiated in 2009, the first National Summit for Rural Traffic Safety Culture met with overwhelming success. Building on this success, the Summit has become an annual event with the second Summit to be held July 11-13, 2010 in Big Sky, Montana.
Our objective for the Second Annual Summit? Similar to the first Summit, we will continue to strive for increased understanding amongst traffic safety researchers, practitioners, and policy makers about the role of traffic safety culture on (1) behavioral factors that increase rural (and national) traffic crash risk; and (2) attitudinal barriers to public and political acceptance of traffic safety interventions. However, the second Summit will take these goals a step further by helping the audience to see the connections between theory and practice. Attendees should come prepared to listen, learn, share and discuss not only their experiences, but those of others in both facilitated small-group discussions and larger question/answer sessions.
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