[sustran] Re: FW: Annual Death Toll of Global Accidents

KISAN MEHTA kisansbc at vsnl.com
Tue Jul 15 01:03:33 JST 2003


Dear Friends,

Paul and Ayyad, Thanks for furnishing the global data on death and injury
due to
road accidents.

It is a fact that humans or their relations who have not faced the toll do
not realise the
gravity on road accidents on human life.  Those who have suffered can never
get out
of the trauma.  This is why we take this data as acedemic and impersonal.

At one time, it used to quoted that road fatality on the US roads during the
World War II
period was higher than than the number dying on the front for the same
period.  Despite
this reality, authorities have never considered avoiding such predicament.
Conditions on the
road have worsened since the WWII.

The World Bank while extending a loan of over US $ 500 million+ for the
Mumbai Urban
Transport Project bemoans that Mumbai has a very high road fatality rate in
the world and
pedestrians form 95% of these fatalities.  Yet it has extended loan upto 85%
on eight lane
road cost (sans pavements) in the centre of the city while no effort is made
to reduce motorised
traffic from congested roads.   Motorists do not pay and will not be
required to contrubute
cost of the MUTP while bus and railway fares are being increased for
repatriation the loan.

When the World Bank claiming to be working for the poor take such stand, how
can there
be any benefit the poor.

Too many cars on congested roads have affected the air quality which
increases the
human morbidity further. But this would not put as a result of too many
cars.
Best wishes.

Kisan Mehta
Tel: 00 91 22 2414 9688
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Barter, Paul <paulbarter at nus.edu.sg>
> To: sustran-discuss at jca.apc.org <sustran-discuss at jca.apc.org>
> Cc: aaltaai at erwda.gov.ae <aaltaai at erwda.gov.ae>
> Date: Sunday, July 13, 2003 9:54 PM
> Subject: [sustran] FW: Annual Death Toll of Global Accidents
>
>
Dear sustran-discussers
I thought this would be of interest to many of you. I have obtained Ayad
Altai's permission to share this.

Also, apologies for sending a message last week in mime format - those of
you using the digest version of the list would have seen only hex code.
Sorry!
As mentioned before, this list copes best with plain text only.
> >
> >Paul
> >
> >-----Original Message-----
From: Ayad Altaai [mailto:aaltaai at erwda.gov.ae]
Sent: Wednesday, 25 June 2003 7:38 PM
To: sustran at po.jaring.my
Subject: Re: Annual Death Toll of Global Accidents
Hi

I had the opportunity to scan through your new publication
"People-centered, Equitable and Sustainable Transport." I congratulate
you on this excellent effort. My immediate comment is to do with
reference to the total number of people killed in road accidents. In
para. 4 of Basic Principles..... the report states a figure of 500,000
people killed. Let me list the controversial figures that have been
going around for many years:
> >
1.                   WHO reported that in 1993 the annual road accident
fatalities were 895,000. This figure was quoted by WRI Report in 1996.
2.                   Allan Ross (WB Consultant) presented an annual
figure of 700,000 fatalities on 2 Feb 1999 at the launch of the GRSP
Initiative at the World Bank in Washington D.C.
3.                   After perhaps a year of work the GRSP issued a
figure of about 1.1 million fatalities.
4.                   The World recently stated that there the global
death toll is 500,000 fatalities.
5.                   Another department within the WB is stating that
the annual figure of global road fatalities is 1.17 million.
6.                   Years ago IATSA newsletter quoted the late Clinton
Admin Transportation Secretary using a figure of 500,000 fatalities. I
responded to the Editor-in-Chief that the figure was not valid.
7.                   Finally if we accept the 500,000 fatalities for the
globe, it
means the world average is similar to Sweden or Japan. Think about it.
> >
The 50 million injuries mentioned in para 4 is much closer to reality
that the fatality number. The debate on this number is much wider than
the fatality figure. However, a number of organisations still use a range of
10-30 million. We should always remind the experts and the public that
there is a high percentage of unreported road fatalities and injuries. This
percentage reaches 50% in some countries, but never been reported.
> >
> >My humble conservative estimates for 2002 are as follows:
> >
> >Global Road Accident Fatalities: 1.2 million
> >Global Road Accident Injuries: app 60 million.
> >
> >
> >Best regards,
> >
> >Ayad Altaai
> >General Coordinator
> >Abu Dhabi Global Environmental Data Initiative (AGEDI)
> >Abu Dhabi
> >UAE
> >Phone: +971-50-668 2616
> >Fax:     +971-2-681 4262



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