Motorcycle safety (3)

4 July 2013

This article (together with the two previous ones, PJ, 28June & 2July’13), was influenced by the issue of motorcycle safety which came to fore because there has occurred in the past few years a drastic rise in the number of motorcycle related accidents, injuries and fatalities, which if not seriously addressed could further snowball, given the rapid rise also in the number of motorcycle users who by this time could be already more than 4 million.

Given that those who resort to the use of the motorcycle for transportation are our countrymen who are struggling to make both ends meet, I wondered about what steps the “concerned agencies” are doing to make using it safer. This is so that those who turn to using one can have a better chance of truly enjoying the economic benefit they expect to get from their investment, instead of a tragedy that can come from an accident.

In my last column I mentioned that it seems that the MMDA was the government agency among those that signed the “MMTTS Declaration 2010” that somehow sustained the effort initiated on December 3, 2010 (during the Metro Manila Transport and Traffic Management Summit) to  do something about improving motorcycle safety.

I say this because in my observation the agency  seems to be the only government unit that came up with concrete steps during the last two years which may have reduced the number of injuries/fatalities, as compared to what it could have been without the said concrete steps. And these steps I’m referring to are the initiation of the MMTTM Summit, the release of the 2011 MMARAS report, the 60 kph speed limit imposed on vehicles (including motorcycles) operating in some major roads, as well as the provision of blue lanes for the motorcycles.

In as far as Department of Public Works and Highway’s “Traffic Accident Recording and Analysis System” is concerned, I have so far gathered only two pieces of information that I consider relevant to the issue of pursuing motorcycle safety. The first one seems to be a report addressing a query about the site of high-severity accidents; and which enumerates (according to the frequency of accidents CY 2008-2010) the top 65 sites, or national roads, in the country where frequent accidents happen (http://www. Aaphilippines .org/roadsafety/files/dpwh-taras2010.pdf). The other piece of information is that of TARAS (which was started in 2004 to maintain a data base of traffic accidents/crashes – reported by PNP - outside of Metro Manila, as well as prepare an Annual Accident Report) being mentioned in “page 8” of the DPWH 2011 Year-end Report, as one of the tools to be used in improving road safety (http://www.dpwh.gov.ph/ about_us/annual _report/pdf/Microsoft%20Word%20-%20011312%202011 %20DPWH%20YEAR% 20END%20REPORT%20 _UPDATED_.pdf). I failed, however, to find an “Annual Accident Report” prepared by TARAS in the web.

The DOH on the other hand developed and implemented the “Online National Electronic Injury Surveillance System” that captures injury and fatality cases on accidents (e.g. traffic accidents, etc.) seen and reported in government and private hospitals all over the country (http://www.ched.gov .ph/chedwww/index.php/eng/Briefer-on-The-Philippine-Network-for-Injury-Data-Management-System-PNIDMS). Quarterly reports on the system’s traffic accident findings, the latest of which are for Quarters 1-4, CY 2012, are published in the DOH’s “Unified Health Management Information System” website, and classified under “Injury Fact Sheets” (http://uhmis1.doh.gov.ph/UnifiedHMIS/).

ONEISS, together with the TARAS (which collects reports on traffic accident that occurs in all the country’s national roads outside Metro Manila) and the MMARAS (which collects traffic accident reports that occurs in Metro Manila) forwards their data to the “Philippine Network for Injury Data Management System” where the various data sets are harmonized to improve the accuracy of the reported transportation related accidents/injuries/fatalities.

The PNIDMS is a multi-sectoral organization created in November 10, 2010 through the signing of a Memorandum of Agreement among representatives of various government and non-government offices, namely, Sec. Ona of DOH, Dr. Soe Nyunt-U of WHO, Ms. Vanessa Tobi of UNICEF, Sec. De Jesus of DOTC, Sec. Singson of DPWH, Police Chief Supt. Espina of the PNP-HPG, Chairman Tolentino of MMDA, Asec. Torres of LTO, and Dr. Rafael Consunji of Safekids Philippines. The organization later on was expanded and strengthened further with the participation through a second MOA signing, on May 28, 2012, by representatives of other government offices the DILG, DOLE, DSWD, DepEd, CHED, PHIC, PCW, NSO, NBI, BFP, UP-NCTS, and PIRA.

Meanwhile, with respect to the private sector’s participation, sometime in 2011 a team from the DLSU IE Department composed of Glaiza Flores, Maria Gotohio, Noel Paras and Rosemarie Seva conducted a study to assess the causes of the numerous motorcycle accidents in the country. They gathered motorcycle accident data from Quezon City Police Department reports (where they identified environment and driver dependent factors), and conducted a survey at the Land Transportation Office involving 186 motorcycle drivers (83 of them having experienced accidents) to gather objective data on “driver behavior” to explore its effects on the occurrence of an accident.

Analyzing the data they gathered using a regression analysis model (i.e. logistic regression), they concluded that three variables, or factors, namely, “age, weather and junction type” have significant influence on whether an accident can, or cannot occur. The details of their study is contained in a paper titled “Analysis Motorcycle Accidents Based on Environmental and Personal Factors” published sometime in 2011 (http://www.iieom.org/ieom2011/pdfs/IEOM126.pdf).

Due to space limitations, the continuation of this article will be featured as part 4 under the same title in my next column. Meanwhile, comments/reactions will be appreciated and can be sent through this writer’s email (sl3.mekaniko@gmail.com) or through this writer’s blog (http://mekaniko-sl3.blogspot.com).