This report summarises work undertaken as part of the three-year European Community DRIVE programme that began at the start of 1989. The aim of the project was to examine the feasibility of developing a traffic system that meets the needs of vulnerable road users (namely pedestrians and cyclists) both in terms of travel and safety. There are indications at present that the development of advanced traffic systems such as those envisaged by the DRIVE programme as a whole, may have detrimental effects on pedestrians and cyclists. Most current developments are exclusively directed at the improvement of the safety and efficiency of motorized traffic and tend to neglect the position of vulnerable road users (VRUs). As a result such systems may have negative safety and mobility effects for vulnerable road users which can seriously impair the positive effects on the traffic system as a whole. Two main steps were taken towards the creation of a system that meets the needs of vulnerable road users. Firstly, the projects has developed for planners, urban authorities, and road traffic engineers a set of models of the traffic system that incorporate vulnerable road users as an integral part. Secondly, the project evaluated a number of RTI applications in signalling and junction control, in order to ascertain what benefits can be obtained for vulnerable road users by such measures. A system that considers the needs of vulnerable road users as well as the needs for motorized traffic is not pure fiction; it may well correspond to the realistic state of affairs in many central cities. Furthermore, if such a system had only a small impact on traffic flows and network capacity outside central cities, it might well be worth adopting there, in the interests of encouraging pedestrian and bicycle trips and of reducing accidents for vulnerable road users.
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