Road Safety and resilience of rural areas

What is this call about?

The topic funds research on safety assessment, prevention and enforcement strategies and climate resilience tools for rural roads in at least three regions. Involvement of road authorities is strongly recommended.

What does this call fund?

Scope

More than half of all EU road fatalities occur in rural areas, so understanding and reducing risks on rural roads is key to the EU ambition of Vision Zero by 2050. The Road Infrastructure Safety Management Directive introduced network-wide road safety assessment, and a methodology exists for motorways and primary rural roads. Secondary and lower-class roads are not covered, and information on road user behaviour is inadequate. Local and regional authorities also face risks from floods, fires, storms and heavy snowfall.

Actions

Research should carry out all of the following in at least three regions, covering primary and secondary rural roads of adequate length for regional comparison:

• Demonstrate the practical use of the network-wide assessment methodology and extend it to all rural roads, for a low-cost, flexible, transparent and sufficiently accurate assessment of road infrastructure safety.
• Identify information gaps and propose ways to use available data to better understand crash causes and outcomes.
• Develop prevention strategies to reduce deaths and serious injuries at high-risk locations and in high-risk situations, including methods to quantify crash risk and risky behaviour, evidence-based enforcement measures combining traditional and innovative approaches, awareness and nudging measures, and incentive mechanisms for safe driving. Strategies should address health-related risk factors while keeping older people and people with health impairments mobile.
• Develop tools that give local authorities easy access to knowledge on climate-related risks, so they can keep rural roads safe and resilient in extreme conditions.

Expected outcomes

Implementation of the methodology for secondary rural roads; enforcement strategies, incentives and risk-awareness measures that encourage safer behaviour; prevention strategies with implementation guidelines and policy measures for regional authorities, police, healthcare professionals and national governments; and a GIS-based application to map the impact of extreme weather and natural disasters on road safety and resilience. Activities are expected to reach technology readiness level 6-7 by the end of the project.

What are proposals expected to do?

• Regions should be chosen for diversity in road network design, geography, climate conditions and road safety culture.

When is the deadline?

8 October 2026