This archive report was first published on 4 January 2020.
January 4, 2020, marked a significant milestone for Oslo, Norway, as the city celebrated a remarkable achievement in road safety. According to official figures from the Norwegian Public Roads Administration, no pedestrian, cyclist, or child under the age of 16 died in traffic in 2019. This achievement is all the more impressive when compared to the rising number of road accident deaths in Kenyan cities.
Anders Hartmann, an adviser at Oslo's municipal authority department for environment and transport, attributed the city's success to its Vision Zero plan, which aimed to reduce road accidents to zero. The plan, introduced in 2015, included measures such as reducing speed limits, barring cars from certain areas, expanding the bicycle network, and adding traffic calming measures around schools.
Oslo's commitment to road safety has paid off, with the city recording a significant reduction in road deaths since 1975. In contrast, Kenya continues to struggle with road safety, with at least one man dying every hour on Kenyan roads, according to a report by the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) released in October 2019.
NTSA reported that 3,123 people were killed in road accidents from January to November 2019, compared to 2,743 in a similar period in 2018. The authority noted that most victims were pedestrians, followed by motorcyclists, passengers, and drivers. The economic cost of road crashes in Kenya is estimated to be three to five percent of the country's Gross Domestic Product, or Sh300 billion annually.
Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang'i has bemoaned the numbers, saying road accidents are the highest contributors to disability, health burden, and poverty. His ministry has ordered NTSA to return to the roads, 10 months after President Uhuru Kenyatta withdrew the officers from Kenyan highways.
