Citation

Bhalla KS, Paichadze N, Gupta S, Kliavin V, Gritsenko E, Bishai DM, Hyder AA. Inj. Prev. 2015; 21(1): 53-56.

Affiliation

Johns Hopkins International Injury Research Unit, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2015, BMJ Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1136/injuryprev-2014-041189

PMID

25052496

Abstract

Reducing vehicle speed is among the most effective road safety strategies. We assess how a new policy in Russia that eliminates fines for driving up to 20 km/h above the speed limit has affected the prevalence of speeding. We measured speeds periodically in 13 districts of two Russian regions during 2011-2013 and analysed the effect of the policy using difference-in-differences to control for seasonality. We find that the prevalence of speeding was declining steadily but half of the gains since mid-2011 were lost immediately after the new policy. Overall speeding increased significantly by 13 percentage points (pp, 95% CI 4 to 19). Speeding more than 10 km/h above the limit increased significantly by 10 pp (95% CI 2 to 12), and extreme speeding increased but not significantly (1.7 pp, 95% CI -1.1 to 4.5). Road traffic injuries will likely increase in Russia unless speeding fines are reinstated.

Language: en