Proceedings of the 2018 Australasian Road Safety Conference - Sydney

These proceedings describe research, educational and policing program implementation and policy and management strategies related to all aspects of road safety and especially related to the conference theme of ‘Towards Zero – Making it Happen!’. It is the fourth in the series of annual Australasian Road Safety Conference, an amalgamation of the Road Safety Research, Policing and Education Conference and the Australasian College of Road Safety Conference. The conference provided a unique opportunity for those involved in all aspects of road safety, including researchers, practitioners, policymakers, police, and educators, to meet, present, and discuss their work. Some of the popular topic areas included young and ageing drivers; vulnerable road users; human factors related to distraction, inattention, and fatigue; policing, vehicle safety technology; and road design. The authors of accepted extended abstracts and full papers represent international and local institutions from all aspects of their respective communities including research centres, private companies, government agencies, and community groups. This set of papers is a wonderful indication of the work being done in Australia, New Zealand and abroad as part of the United Nations Decade of Action for Road Safety. The Conference Organising Committee allowed two manuscript types for the conference: ‘Extended Abstracts’ and peer-reviewed ‘Full Papers’. Using a similar format to the previous successful conference in 2017, the Conference Scientific sub-Committee initially called for submissions in the form of Extended Abstracts (approx. 1 to 3 pages). Groups of submissions around similar themes were assigned to Conference Handling Editors with senior peer status in the respective field of road safety, who then handled the review process for their assigned submissions. Each Extended Abstract was reviewed by two independent expert peer reviewers on the following selection criteria: content consistent with the conference theme, novelty of information or data, clarity, relevance to practice or policy, scientific merit, and interest to audience. Authors were also provided the option of submitting a Full Paper, which is HERDC* compliant for Australian Universities. Based on the outcome of the peer review of their Extended Abstract, some authors were provided the opportunity to extend their submission into a full paper which subsequently underwent further review by three independent peer reviewers for inclusion into the Journal of the Australasian College of Road Safety. A total of 186 manuscripts were accepted as Extended Abstracts and further 28 submissions were further reviewed as Full Papers.