China News Service, May 16 (Xinhua) According to Hong Kong's "Sing Tao Daily", 15 elderly people were killed in traffic accidents in Hong Kong from January to April this year.
In order to reduce traffic accidents involving the elderly, the Traffic Headquarters of the Hong Kong Police has set the theme of this month's road safety as "Pedestrian Safety for the Elderly". At the same time, it has formulated relevant publicity and law enforcement strategies, and plans to hold a "Blind Spot Experience Day" so that the elderly can personally understand Drivers of large vehicles have "blind spots" that enhance their traffic safety awareness.
Police figures show that 19 pedestrians died in traffic accidents from January to April last year, 11 of whom were elderly, accounting for about 58 percent of the overall death toll.
In the same period of this year, 18 pedestrians were killed in traffic accidents, a slight decrease of 5% compared with last year. Among them, 15 were elderly people. The number of deaths among the elderly increased by 36% compared with last year, and the death of the elderly accounted for 83% of the overall death toll. An increase of about 25% over last year.
Huang Bingbing, Superintendent of the Administration Division of the Traffic Headquarters of the Hong Kong Police Force, said that one accident is too many. The Traffic Headquarters has been conducting research on relevant topics, hoping to reduce the number of traffic accidents, and formulating publicity and law enforcement strategies based on the research results. This month's road safety theme is "Pedestrian Safety for the Elderly". At the same time, the "Pedestrian Project", which has been implemented since the previous year, will continue to be held to encourage the public to pay more attention to the elders around them when crossing the road, and encourage them to provide assistance to the elderly in a timely manner. Seeking more eyes, helping one by one”; the Traffic Headquarters also joined hands with the five major regions to organize street painting activities in various districts in Hong Kong, and painted murals related to the safety of elderly pedestrians on the walls with young people, so as to strengthen the elderly group’s awareness of Awareness of road safety.
"Blind Spot Experience Day" is one of the important road safety publicity activities of the "Peer Plan". Huang Bingbing pointed out that the special study found that more than half of fatal traffic accidents involving the elderly involved the "blind spots" of large vehicles. Continuing to ease, an experience day can be held, during which the elderly will be arranged to sit in a large vehicle to experience the driver's perspective from the first-person perspective, knowing that they are in the "blind spot" of the vehicle.
They can also experience that when pedestrians cross the road with a "camera" (interspersed in the gaps of moving vehicles), the driver's vision will be blocked by other vehicles, and the pedestrians will only be noticed at a very close distance, resulting in insufficient time to brake and increase the risk of accidents. risk.
Colleagues from various regions will also arrange road safety talks on the experience day to explain different road safety information to the elders, including how to properly use pedestrian crossing facilities.
At the same time, the road safety bus of the traffic headquarters will be dispatched to allow elderly passengers to enhance their road safety knowledge through interactive games in the car.
As for law enforcement, Huang Bingbing pointed out that the police conduct law enforcement actions against pedestrian violations code-named "travelers" from time to time throughout Hong Kong to ensure the safety of road users and increase pedestrians' awareness of law-abiding, calling on drivers and pedestrians to remember to "focus, Be patient and obey the law", don't be greedy for a moment, remember to be a responsible road user and avoid accidents.