ANALYSIS OF TRAFFIC ACCIDENTS IN THE AREA OF SMALL TOWNS IN THE REPUBLIC OF CROATIA

The safety of road traffic in small towns in the Republic of Croatia is not at a satisfactory level. As proof, the safety of road traffic participants in the area of the town of Nova Gradiška and its wider environment has been studied and analyzed. The paper includes the available data in the period from 2000 to 2007. The analysis and the assessment of road traffic safety can be applied also to other towns and counties of the Republic of Croatia. Having in mind that there are 531 settlements in the Republic of Croatia (119 towns and 412 districts), out of which only 78 are larger than 10,000 inhabitants or 14.69% of the total number, which means that the analysis could be made for any settlement in the Republic of Croatia. The road traffic safety assessment was conceived according to the modified Smeed model which may be applied for any settlement or town. The road traffic safety analysis has led to the conclusion that safety of all the traffic participants is endangered. This paper provides solutions about what has to be done in order to reduce the danger to all the road traffic factors.


INTRODUCTION
The statistics shows that the number of human victims in traffic accidents is constantly increasing and is acquiring very serious dimensions.
Of course, the basic problems of traffic safety include: human driver, motor vehicle, and road.The occurrence of traffic accidents can also be influenced by the atmospheric conditions (fog, rain, snow, ice, wind), lack of traffic regulation facilities (signs, warnings and other devices), incomplete legislation on traffic, and inadequate and inefficient control.
Among the factors that contribute to traffic accidents the biggest one is the effect of human-driver, ve-hicle and traffic surfaces.Wrong decisions, estimates and lack of skills in driving lead to traffic accidents, loss of human lives and to material losses.On the other hand, lack of other knowledge, skills and psycho-physical capabilities are the drawbacks that can be influenced, improved by education, in order to increase traffic safety.

Road network and level of motorization
In the wider area of the town of Nova Gradiška which is the coverage area of the Nova Gradiška Police Station, there is a network of state, county and local roads.The structure of road network consists of 29.08km state roads, 125.50km county roads and 46.05km local roads (Figure 1).
In the region of Nova Gradiška Police Station 15,160 motor vehicles were registered by 31 December 2007.Out of this number, regarding structure, 11,067 or 73.0%passenger vehicles, 1482 or 9.77% tractors, 1021 or 6.73% freight vehicles, 992 or 6.54% mopeds, etc. were registered.By comparing these data V. Višnjiae, M. Pušiae: Analysis of Traffic Accidents in the Area of Small Towns in the Republic of Croatia

Local roads 23%
Figure 1 -Structure of the existing road network [1] with the data from 2006 (Figure 2) one may find that the number of registered motor vehicles is greater by 672 or 4.43%.Also, 18,700 drivers were registered, out of which regarding gender, there were 12,632 or 67.94% male drivers and 6068 or 32.06% female drivers.Apart from this division and division that may be derived, it is also possible to make the breakdown according to age, in which the biggest group of drivers is between 35 and 44 with 4556 or 24.36% out of the total number of drivers.Comparing these data with the same period from 2006 leads to the conclusion that the total number of drivers is expanded by 413 persons or 2.25% of drivers.
However, when the analysis includes several years (Figure 2) of the number of registered motor vehicles and the number of registered driving licences, i. e. drivers, one obtains the differences from year to year, and for 2007 the difference is 3,540 driving permits.This number is in fact the number of drivers who have no motor vehicles but do have driving permits.It is precisely this number that can be considered minimum demand for motor vehicles.In other words, the town of Nova Gradiška requires 18,700 motor vehicles (currently 15,160 motor vehicles) or the actual demand is greater by 23.34% motor vehicles the use of which is not possible for numerous reasons (the biggest reason is the purchase power of the driving permit owners).

Classification of traffic accidents
In the area of Nova Gradiška, during 2007, there were 329 traffic accidents (Table 1 Comparing the data (Table 1) on traffic accidents with the data from 2006 one may see the larger number of traffic accidents by 10.40%, i. e. 41 traffic accidents.Here, the number of traffic accidents with fatalities is smaller by 2 persons or 33.33%, whereas the number of traffic accidents with injured persons is smaller by 8 traffic accidents or 6.69%; however, traffic accidents with material damage are reduced by 41 damages or 23.16%.However, when a longer time period is considered (Table 1), from 2000 to 2007, one may notice an increase in traffic accidents by 2.1% and in the number of victims by 35.4%.The situation is similar (Table 2) when an even longer time period (13 years) is considered, where the relations between the number of traffic accidents and the number of victims are even more pronounced (32.29% 1995 compared to 32.83% in 2007), noticing that the number of traffic accidents was falling until 2006, but marked an increase in 2007 with constant increase in the number of victims until 2006 and a light fall in 2007.This is especially expressed in injured persons where there is a constant increase of the injured from 1999 to 2006 (on the average 4.40% annually).
In case of fatalities the situation is very different.It is of variable character and unfortunately after 2003, 2004, and 2007 when there was a decreasing trend and levelling off in the number of fatalities, in 2006 there came to a sudden increase in the number of fatalities.

Traffic accidents according to road characteristics
Table 3 shows the structure of traffic accidents according to road characteristics indicating that the biggest number of traffic accidents is in the wider area of the coverage of the Nova Gradiška Police Station, i. e. from the total number of accidents 163 or 49.50% occurred on the straight sections of roads.
On the straight sections of the roads, the victims included 68 persons or 41.72% out of the total number of victims.Two persons or 50% were killed and 10 persons or 6.1% were seriously injured, while 53 persons or 32.32% were lightly injured.
There were 69 or 20.97% of traffic accidents at intersections.Fifty-one persons or 15.50% were victims, 1 person was killed, 12 persons suffered serious body injuries, and 38 persons suffered light injuries.
There were 63 or 19.15% traffic accidents in curves.Thirty-eight persons or 12.75% were victims, 11 persons suffered serious body injuries and 27 persons suffered light body injuries.

Traffic accidents according to the condition of road surface
Regarding the condition of the road surface, the largest number of traffic accidents (224 or 68.08%) occurred on dry and clean carriageway (Table 4).These traffic accidents had 104 victims or 42.95% out of which 3 were fatalities, 20 persons suffered serious, and 81 persons suffered light body injuries.There were 90 or 27.35% traffic accidents on wet carriageways, in which 59 persons were victims, out of which 1 person was killed, 14 persons suffered serious and 44 persons suffered light body injuries.

Traffic accidents regarding meteorological conditions
The majority of traffic accidents (169 or 51.36%) occurred in clear weather (Table 5).They involved 96 victims or 29.18%, with 3 fatalities, 16 seriously and 77 lightly injured persons.
There were 103 or 31.30%traffic accidents in cloudy weather.These traffic accidents involved 32 victims, with 11 persons suffering serious and 21 persons suffering light injuries.

Time of traffic accidents
Out of 329 traffic accidents, 226 or 68.69% occurred during the day and 99 or 30.09% at night, with 2 accidents that occurred at dusk and 2 at dawn.
According to days in a week, the largest number of traffic accidents occurred on Fridays -53 or 16.10% (Table 6), and the fewest on Mondays -41 traffic accidents.Identical is the situation with traffic accidents when taking into consideration the victims and material damage regarding days (Figure 3).
The largest number of traffic accidents, namely 41 or 12.46% from the total number of traffic accidents occurred in the time period between 6 p. m. and 8 p. m. (Table 7).In the time period from 6 a. m. to 2 p. m.  total number of victims regarding the time of traffic accidents.This time span is followed by afternoon accidents in the period from 2 p. m. to 8 p. m. which account for 34.04% of traffic accidents.

Locations of traffic accidents
Most of the traffic accidents occurred in the town of Nova Gradiška, namely 143 or 43.46%, followed by those on the county road Ã 4158 (N.Gradiška -Batrina) 68 or 20.66%; on the state road D 51 (Baniaeevactoll booths N. Gradiška) 24 or 7.29%, and on other roads 94 or 28.57%.
In the town of Nova Gradiška, most of the accidents occurred in the Street of Maksimilijan Benkoviae (18), followed by those in the street of Ljudevit Gaj (13), Štrosmajerova Street (13) and the street of M. A. Reljkoviae (10).

Types of traffic accidents
Side collisions of vehicles resulted in 91 or 27.66% traffic accidents, skidding off the road caused 67 or 20.36% of traffic accidents, driving in line resulted in 45 or 13.67% of traffic accidents (Table 8 and Figure 4).The victims differ also regarding age which can be clearly seen from Table 9.The comprehensive structure of victims per age is clearly defined by living activity of the population, so that it can be seen that mostly persons in the age from 15 to 35 suffered as victims.

Special conditions
Under the influence of alcohol there were: 88 drivers, 1 passenger and 1 pedestrian as victims (Table 10), with 1 fatality, 6 persons suffering serious and 15 persons suffering light body injuries.

Circumstances preceding the accident -participants' errors
Most of the traffic accidents, namely 310 or 94.22% occurred because of direct driver's error.Violation of right-of-way is the most frequent error causing 44 or 13.37% traffic accidents (Table 11 and Figure 5) with 1 fatality, 10 persons suffering serious and 28 persons light body injuries.
Speeding was cause of 34 or 10.33% traffic accidents (Table 11 and Figure 5) with 2 fatalities, 8 persons suffering serious and 14 persons suffering light body injuries.
Out of the total number of vehicles 36 or 6.31% were not registered vehicles or with an expired vehicle permit.Besides, 77% of victims were victims in passenger cars, and 23% in other vehicles.

Analysis of traffic accidents
During 2007, in the area of the Nova Gradiška Police Station 4572 traffic violations (Table 16) were registered, which is by 8.44% more than in the previous year.

SAFETY ASSESSMENT
The problem of assessing and evaluating the road traffic safety in a certain area is a complex problem, which understands the implementation of a certain methodology with a greater number of indicators.
In assessing the condition of road traffic safety in Nova Gradiška, a modified Smeed model can be used [3] in forecasting the fatalities, injured persons and the number of traffic accidents, which is defined by mathematical expressions: D = 0.00012 (n p 2 ) 1/3 O = 0.0048 (n p 2 ) 1/3 P n = 0.012 (n p 2 )  where: D -forecast number of fatalities over one year: n -number of registered motor vehicles; p -number of citizens; O -forecast number of injured persons in traffic accidents; P n -forecast number of traffic accidents (registered in the police system).Here the interdependence between the number of traffic accidents, the number of the injured and fatalities can be determined by this model with the given goals being defined in the road traffic safety programs.
The goals set in this way represent one of the acceptable and usual models that are used for the requirements of determining and assessing the condition of road traffic safety.D = 0.00012 (n p 2 )     7 shows that since 2001 the number of injured persons has been constantly increasing from the reference model.The basic reason for such a condition is direct consequence of the increase in the number of traffic vehicles which causes worries and requires a serious program of safety measures (preventive and repressive nature).
P n = 0.012 (n p 2 ) 1/3 P n = 0.012 (15,160 • 42 874 2 ) 1/3 P n = 363.825» 358.8 Figure 8 shows that 2002 and 2003 deviate from the set model.Although the remaining considered years could satisfy the set model with the obtained results, because of the number of fatalities and injured persons, the set goals were not realized.However, the existing measures have to be strictly implemented in order to realize the mentioned goals.
The interdependence between the number of the injured and the fatalities can result in the requirements even with traffic accidents on decline, to start developing new programs and plans to achieve the program goals, which would monitor and forecast measures to reduce both the number of fatalities and the number of the injured and traffic accidents which eventually result in certain consequences.
Such program should be harmonized at the local level with the "National Safety Program in Road Traffic".The basic characteristics of the National Program consist of the set quantitative and qualitative goals defined by programs, carriers of activities, methods of performing the planned measures, and monitoring of results and assessing the program.
Quantitative goals are determined in compliance with the European goals for the same period, referring to the number of fatalities in relation to the number of citizens (Figure 9).The goal of the European Union is the reduction in the number of fatalities in traffic on the roads until 2010 to the level of 7 fatalities per 100,000 citizens.
The tendency in Croatia should be, in fact, to realize the planned European goal.However, it is more realistic to expect a reduction from 13.8 to 10 fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants in 2010.In order to achieve this, it would be necessary to reduce the number of 608 fatalities in 2004 on the roads, to 440 in 2010, which would amount to an average reduction of 34 persons every year.
In the same way, the qualitative goals match the European goals recognizing at the same time all the specific characteristics of the Croatian space which actualize the planned quantitative goal.

CONCLUSION
The assessment of the road traffic safety condition in small towns in the Republic of Croatia is a complex procedure.This procedure understands the implementation of a certain methodology which indicates the need to make new programs and plans.According to the mentioned, local programs and plans need to reduce the number of fatalities and injured persons on roads.These programs should also be harmonized with the national goals, and in turn, national goals should be harmonized with the European goals regarding road traffic safety, in order to provide better valorisation of the territory of the Republic of Croatia in the European integrations.
Based on the presented Tables and Figures all the factors that influence the traffic accidents have been analyzed.The analysis of road traffic safety in the wider area of Nova Gradiška in 2007 is marked by the reduction in the total number of traffic accidents, increase in the number of fatalities and the lightly injured persons, with the equal number of seriously injured persons.
The analysis of the applied model has led to the conclusion that the applicability of this paper is multiple and it can be used as reference for any town, i. e. smaller districts or towns of similar sizes in the Republic of Croatia.
It is precisely because of greater safety of all the factors in road traffic, that it is necessary in small towns and districts to start repairing the existing condition in cooperation with the County Road Authorities.With the reconstruction of certain road sections, better visibility of vertical and horizontal traffic signalization, construction of over-and underpasses, roundabouts, etc. higher safety would be achieved, as well as reduction in the number of accidents and material goods would be protected.Of course, all this requires additional financial means which would resolve the observed drawbacks within a short period of time, and that would result in safer roads.

VFigure 2 -
Figure 2 -Drivers and vehicles over the time period from 2001 to 2007 [1] 40.73% of all persons were victims compared to the Promet -Traffic&Transportation, Vol.21, 2009, No. 2, 129-140 131 V. Višnjiae, M. Pušiae: Analysis of Traffic Accidents in the Area of Small Towns in the Republic of Croatia

Figure 5 -
Figure 5 -Traffic accidents and number of victims due to drivers' errors in 2007

Figure 9 -
Figure 9 -Number of fatalities in traffic accidents per 100,000 inhabitants with set goal

Table 4 -Number of traffic accidents according to the condition of road surface [1]
Analysis of Traffic Accidents in the Area of Small Towns in the Republic of Croatia Promet -Traffic&Transportation, Vol.21, 2009, No. 2, 129-140 133 V. Višnjiae, M. Pušiae:

Table 8 -Number of traffic accidents per types [1]
Analysis of Traffic Accidents in the Area of Small Towns in the Republic of Croatia V. Višnjiae, M. Pušiae: