Motorways are the safest roads by design. Yet in 2006 at least 3270 people were killed on the motorway network in the EU 25, representing about 8% of the total number of road deaths(1). Although motorways account for only 1% of the length of all paved roads, more than one quarter of all kilometres are driven on this part of the road network(2). The proportion of the traffic driven on motorways has been increasing over the past decade. This new ranking carried out under the Road Safety Performance Index (PIN) shows that, among the PIN countries, motorways are safest in Switzerland, Denmark and the Netherlands. In the past decade, Switzerland and Slovenia scored the highest average year-to-year reductions in deaths per billion vehicle-km on motorways. Drivers on Southern and Central European countries’ motorways, however, are exposed to higher risks of death. (Author/publisher)
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