Summary

This report presents the findings of the Case-control study of motorcycle crashes. The cases were 222 motorcycle crashes occurring on public roads in the Melbourne metropolitan area from late November 1995 to 30 January 1997 in which the rider or pillion was taken to one of the participating hospitals or died. The controls were 1195 motorcyclist trips which passed the crash site at the same time of day and day of week as the crash occurred.

The study collected three types of information:

Summary

A review of existing Commonwealth, State and Territory legislation relating to the transport of dangerous goods by rail, was undertaken. The review provides an overview of the status, coverage and adequacy of existing rail dangerous goods transport legislation. The review also examines options for the development of a nationally uniform regulatory regime for rail dangerous goods transport operations. Issues relating to inter-modal harmony with the road transport sector, and legislative options to achieve uniformity are also discussed.

Summary

Driving simulators have much to offer experimental research programs as they have the potential to provide a safe and controlled environment for testing driving performance without having to expose participants to the hazards of real world driving. However, they can also be disadvantaged if the participant’s behaviour is not normal while using the simulator, that is, if the simulator fails to elicit the same stresses and responses usually elicited while driving.

Summary

This report describes the application of a computer-based traffic network model to a set of synthetic test networks, to examine the effects of lower speed limits on traffic progression, travel times, speeds and delays, fuel consumption and emissions under different traffic control strategies and levels of traffic congestion. It suggests that although travel times increase with lower speed limits, the increases are proportionately less than those indicated by the differences between speed limits.

Summary

This Technical Report describes the design phase of a study to evaluate the safety effectiveness of certain minor traffic engineering and road safety projects undertaken in Australia. A review was made of sources of data available on accidents, traffic flows and minor taffic engineering improvements for road safety implemented in the States of Australia.

Summary

Legislation requiring seat belts to be worn has led to major reductions in casualties in Australia. However injuries have resulted from belt slackness, from the location of buckles in the abdominal region and from webbing twist. The design changes, which have been effected to minimise the occurrence of these problems, will take many years to permeate the vehicle population and as an interim measure a television publicity campaign was conducted to encourage occupants to better adjust their belts.

Summary

A set of ethanol ingestion studies was designed to test the feasibility of collecting frequent blood samples to construct an ethanol tolerance curve. Three methods of analysis were tested - gas chromatography, an enzyme method and the breathalyser. There was poor correlation between the weight of the individual, and the blood alcohol concentration on a fixed intake of ethanol. The effect of food on the blood alcohol concentration gave conflicting results.