Determinants of speeding among bus drivers in Malaysia

Background In Malaysia traffic crashes are a huge problem with 414 421 road crashes and 6872 deaths in year 2010 (PDRM, 2011). In Malaysia, the main cause that leads to road crashes was speeding and aggressive driving, which contributes 54.1%. Objective The main objective of this study is to determine the factors that influence speeding among bus drivers in Malaysia. Methods A cross sectional study was conducted from December 2006 till January 2007. There were a total of 144 buses being observed. This research was conducted at the Rest and Recreational areas of a major expressway. A Radar Gun was used to get the speed-reading of the moving buses on the roadside. Meanwhile, the questionnaire survey was conducted on the bus drivers been tracked by the vehicle registration earlier using the Radar Gun. Results More than half (54.2%) of the buses observed were speeding. In this study, there are nine variables being tested through Logistic regression test and five variables were found significant. The five contributing variables of speeding are type of day (weekend and weekday), time of day, posted speed limits (90 km/h and 110 km/h), driver age and working experience among bus drivers (p<0.05). Significance Buses are at risk on road as they are speeding. Traffic enforcement activities need to be beefed up. Employer's strong involvement is needed to address this major traffic problem, which could endanger the driver, passengers and other road users sharing the road.