Road Safety Awareness

The Department’s activities in education and awareness form an important contribution to its efforts to foster road safety knowledge in the Emirate as they focus on the users of the DoT network, namely drivers, riders and pedestrians. Education and awareness measures, such as road safety campaigns, road safety information days and community outreach programmes continue to influence the attitudes and behaviours of all road users. The education of children and adolescents as future road users and drivers are a particular concern for the Department with its emphasis on road use as a lifelong learning process. The Department aims to further reduce the number of children affected in road accidents through a range of measures including better road safety education for motorists and children as well. Introducing school based road safety education can instill safe attitudes of young people early which will protect them later in life. Including the parents as the major role models children imitate is important in this context. Road safety awareness campaigns are an important tool the DoT utilizes to communicate with the road users in the Emirate and to share safe driving tips for example, on the distractive effect of using a mobile phone when driving or what to do when experiencing symptoms of fatigue. Campaigns are targeted to account for the considerable variety of cultural and language backgrounds of road users in Abu Dhabi. To ensure that all road safety campaigns are of the highest standard and can exert maximum impact on the road user group they target, DoT has led the design of a good practice manual for the development and evaluation of road safety campaigns together with partner agencies such as Abu Dhabi Police, Abu Dhabi Health Authority and the Emirates Driving Company.