|
Abstract
|
Fatality Free Friday is designed to focus public attention on road safety to encourage all road users to actively think and drive safely.
The core goal of the campaign is to ensure that there are no road crash fatalities around Australia during the target day. It is a call to action that serves as a platform for a targeted and ongoing approach to road safety nationally.
Road safety is a complex issue but we believe that if drivers consciously think about road safety and safe driving for just one Friday in the year, that day's toll - statistically about 5.3 deaths - could be reduced to zero. Just one 'Fatality Free Friday'.
Ultimately, it is our aim to use this approach to improve road safety awareness not only on one specific day but to enhance road user behaviour every day of the year.
Australians are urged to 'take the pledge' of Fatality Free Friday - it's a promise to 'drive to stay alive'. The aim is to see a zero road toll for 24 hours.
This type of approach has been successfully used in other fields. Examples of these programs include environmental and community campaigns. There is strong evidence to suggest that these campaigns have been highly successful in not only raising community awareness on a specific issue but are also successful in actively facilitating public action to assist in addressing the issue.
Whist there has been some research into community based campaigns, little research is available on the full scope of this kind campaign in terms of road safety. Since commencing in 2007 Fatality Free Friday has rapidly expanded into a national campaign that has successfully engaged community action on road safety. The campaign provided a focal point to help engage community activity whilst also providing a central and consistent theme for individual road safety activities.
Keywords: Community, road safety, awareness campaign |