“The government departments are taking care of traffic safety in Riyadh through a unified electronic system for exchanging information on traffic accidents,” an ADA spokesman told Arab News on Tuesday. ADA is the executive branch of the HCDA.
The departments referred to include the Riyadh municipality, the Ministry of Transport, the Traffic Administration, Saudi Red Crescent, Civil Defense and the Special Force for Road Security in Riyadh.
He said the new system links ADA's control rooms to all six departments, facilitating a faster exchange of information on traffic accidents and other incidents in the city.
“This will guarantee a prompt response from authorities to attend to accidents on site or take other measures,” he said, adding that the new system also helps study the causes of accidents to minimize them, if not altogether avoid them, in the future.
“The system will contribute in building a complete and renewable database on all incidents and basic information related to them,” he said.
The new system is part of the second five-year traffic safety strategy in the capital which is supervised by the Higher Committee for Traffic Safety chaired by Prince Sattam, deputy governor of Riyadh.
The Saudi economy annually loses about SR13 billion due to traffic violations and accidents, which kill a person every 90 minutes and injure or cripple another every 15 minutes, according to statistics released recently.
The new system comes as part of ADA's plan to use modern technology as one of the practical solutions to minimize traffic accidents.
“The new strategy is already paying off, particularly in cutting the loss of life and property,” the spokesman said.
