In its board resolution from October 2023, the DVR recommended a total of nine measures for monitoring dangerous traffic violations. These include:
● Comprehensive surveillance: This involves regular, visible monitoring to ensure adherence to traffic regulations. To encourage consistent compliance, monitoring should remain unpredictable for road users. Traffic authorities and municipalities are advised to prioritize enforcement at the most hazardous locations.
● Adjustment of penalties: Stricter penalties for high-risk traffic violations are needed, along with reforms to existing sanctioning systems.
● Basic infrastructure: A standardized nationwide legal framework for traffic monitoring would be highly beneficial. Methods such as section control (average speed checks) have already proven their effectiveness. Ideally, traffic monitoring infrastructure should be integrated into road planning and design from the outset, with appropriate financial considerations included.
Cutting-Edge Technologies for Effective Prevention
As early as 2004, the European Commission recommended that its member states establish national action plans for traffic monitoring. Finland has taken a leading role, reducing the number of road fatalities by 29 percent (compared to 16 percent EU-wide). The country’s road safety program includes investigating every fatal accident and the broad deployment of speed enforcement systems.
Since accident risk decreases exponentially with lower driving speeds, setting speed limits is essential. In practice, only consistency in speed enforcement can have a long-term positive impact on driver behavior and reduce the number of accidents. Speed limits without enforcement measures are often ignored, leading to a false sense of security.