Journal of Korean Society of Transportation ISSN:1229-1366(Print) 2234-4217(Online) 대한교통학회지

The development of risk indicators to evaluate road traffic safety is very important. The risk indicator is generally defined as the ratio of the traffic accident variable and the exposure variable. The exposure variable used in the risk indicator plays a role of adjusting the given socio-economic conditions and road traffic conditions that can be normalized and compared equally. The purpose of this study is to objectively evaluate Korea’s traffic accident risk by analyzing the current risk indicators for OECD member countries and selecting appropriate exposure variables, and finally to present a domestic traffic safety vision and goal. After correlation analysis was performed to develop exposure variables, population-vehicle coefficient and vehicle-road coefficient were selected through their combination. For an equal international comparison, four risk indicators were evaluated based on the mortality according to per capita GDP, motorisation rate, and road distribution rate. The analysis of these risk indicators shows that the risk of traffic accidents in Korea was very high compared to other 11 countries. The low wearing rate in Korea compared to the advanced countries in traffic safety was suggested as the cause of the high risk indicators for fatalities through the investigation of the rate of wearing seat belts and helmets on powered two-wheelers and cyclists in the countries to be compared.