The International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP) recently announced the launch of the updated Star Rating Model Version 3.10, marking a major milestone in the evolution of global road safety assessment. Following a comprehensive five-year review, this new version introduces a significantly enhanced, evidence-based framework for measuring road infrastructure risk and guiding life-saving investments worldwide. Used in more than 140 countries, iRAP Star Ratings provide an objective measure of the level of safety “built in” to the design of roads for all road users, including vehicle occupants, motorcyclists, pedestrians and cyclists.  

Politecnico of Milano organized with great success a Webinar titled “City 30 in Action: From Evidence to Implementation” which took place online, on 25 May 2026, within the framework of the Global Youth Coalition for Road Safety. Across Europe and beyond, City 30 policies are increasingly discussed not only as a technical road-safety measure, but also as a question of public acceptance, political feasibility, street design and quality of urban life. This youth-led Webinar connected the broader international evidence on 30 km/h cities with practical implementation lessons. NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation:

•  Benefits of the 30 km/h speed limit in cities

A paper titled Spatial dynamics of crash hotspots under autonomous vehicle adoption scenarios authored by Maria Oikonomou and George Yannis has been published in Accident Analysis & Prevention. This Paper conducts a spatial modelling analysis to predict crash hotspot occurrences under different AV deployment scenarios. The study combines microsimulation-derived conflict data, a quantitative crash-risk formulation, validated using field crash data, based on Time-To-Collision (TTC) thresholds, and spatial statistical analysis using the Getis-Ord Gi* statistic to detect statistically significant hotspots of elevated crash risk. The findings suggest that automation significantly alters the spatial distribution of crash risk, leading to a gradual reduction and spatial diffusion of hotspots as AV penetration increases. However, a temporary rise in the probability that conflict events occur within hotspot areas occurs under moderate automation shares, highlighting the transitional instability of mixed-traffic conditions. Furthermore, intersections and other high-interaction areas remained the most critical locations, while congested segments were associated with a higher probability that conflict events occur within hotspot areas.  

A paper titled Safety effects of take-over requests on vehicle conflicts in realistic mixed traffic simulation authored by Marios Sekadakis, Maria Oikonomou and George Yannis has been published in Accident Analysis & Prevention. This Paper investigates how take-over-related dynamics in Automated Driving (AD) influence safety interactions in mixed traffic using a spatial Generalized Additive Model (GAM) applied to a calibrated microsimulation of a real highway corridor in central Greece. Methodologically, this study combines microsimulation, SSAM-based surrogate safety analysis, and multivariate spatial GAM modeling to quantify TOR effects on AD-Human Driven Vehicle (HDV) interactions at the network level. The findings suggest that higher automation shares and speed limits were associated with longer Time-to-Collision (TTC) , reflecting smoother and more stable interactions, whereas take-over events consistently reduced TTC regardless of Time Budget (TB), confirming elevated short-term risk during control transitions. Furthermore, automation benefits scale with market share but are constrained by transition management and roadway geometry, emphasizing the importance of spatially aware, take-over-sensitive safety strategies in mixed traffic. 

The  International Road Federation (IRF Global) is organizing the IRF Global Summit on Funding  & Leveraging AI Applications for Roadway Innovations which will take place in Varna, Bulgaria on 3-4 June 2026. The two-day Summit combines strategic dialogue with applied and technical sessions, focusing on practical experience, case studies, and lessons learned from implementation with a particular emphasis on moving from concepts and pilots toward approaches that can be scaled and embedded within road agencies. This Event brings together senior policymakers, road agency leaders, engineers, and industry experts to examine how new approaches to funding, delivery, and system management can support more sustainable, efficient, and safer road networks. The Programme can be found here. Researchers can register here. 

The Traffic Department of Police Headquarters Cyprus together with the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) organized with great success a High-Level Road Safety Performance Index titled “Improving the safety of young drivers & riders” which took place Nicosia, Cyprus on 14 May 2026. This Event mainly focused on the safety of young drivers and riders. The event included statements from high-level speakers including the Minister of Transport, Communications and Works, the Minister of Justice and Public Order and the Chief of Cyprus Police, as well as presentations from the Cyprus Road Safety Council, the Ministry of Education, Sport and Youth, the Road Transport Department and the Cyprus Motorcycle Federation.    NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation:

•    Safety of young drivers and riders in Greece

The Greek Auxiliary Fund organized with great success a 50 Year Anniversary Conference which took place in Athens, Greece on 12 May 2026, marking 50 years of uninterrupted service to the Greek society. This Event aimed to highlight the Auxiliary Fund’s social role and to foster public dialogue on critical issues related to road safety, auto insurance in Greece and Europe and the safety of citizens. Some of the topics included road safety in Greece, protection of road accident victims and the role of organizations in Europe.    NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation:

•   Road Safety in Greece: Policies, Data, and New Challenges

The Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP) organized with great success a “Brown Bag” Session Event which was held online, on 12 May 2026. Brown Bag Sessions are an informal platform for GRSP team to discuss, present, and share knowledge on good practices, success stories, and road safety research, and they have a particular focus on implementation and impact of evidence based approaches to road safety. NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation:

•   30 km/h Success Story in Greece

The European Platform of Transport Sciences (EPTS) together with  ÖVG organized with great success the 24th European Transport Congress which was held in Vienna, Austria on 7-8 May 2026, under the theme “Resilient and Reliable Mobility Systems“. Key topics discussed in this Conference were labor and diversity, climate change and resilience, asset management & availability, as well as geopolitical change and strategic dependencies.  NTUA actively contributed with the following paper and poster presentation:

•   Analysis of Risk Factors Affecting the Driver Safety Tolerance Zone Using Driving Simulator Data for Enhanced Mobility Resilience

Eurocities recently published the results of a Survey on 30 km/h speed limits in European cities, based on responses from 38 cities in 19 European countries. 75% of cities report clear positive results, with fewer road deaths and injuries, while 91% report at least one positive impact on urban life, such as a lower number of crashes and fatalities, a decrease in air and noise pollution, and an increase in active mobility modes. Cities report reductions in crashes, fatalities and serious injuries for all road users, alongside lower vehicle speeds and reduced noise pollution. Crucially, these gains come without trade-offs: respondents report no overall negative effects on congestion, traffic volumes or journey times, and only limited, manageable impacts on public transport. 

The Department of Transportation Planning and Engineering of NTUA organized with great success a Workshop titled “Emerging Challenges in Road Geometric Design” which was held on 7 May 2026 in Athens, Greece. This Workshop explored emerging challenges in road geometric design in the context of rapidly evolving mobility systems and user needs. It brought together insights from three complementary perspectives: the integration of lane support systems supported by machine learning, international experience with turbo roundabouts based on Polish practice, and innovative approaches from Japan addressing pedestrian–vehicle coexistence. 

The Sustainable Mobility and Road Safety Committee of the Cyprus Scientific and Technical Chamber (ETEK) organized with great success a Meeting on Sustainable Mobility and 30 km/h speed limit in cities, which was held online on 5 May 2026. This Event focused on relevant policy recommendations, supporting Cyprus cities to adopt 30 km/h speed limits. NTUA actively contributed with the following presentation:

•   Benefits of the 30km/h speed limit in cities

The European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) has published the 50th PIN Flash Report titled “Improving the safety of cycling in Europe“. This Report analyses recent trends in cyclist deaths and serious injuries across Europe and identifies the key risk factors affecting cyclists on European roads. Furthermore, it examines the policies and measures that can help improve cycling safety while supporting the continued growth of cycling as a safe, healthy and sustainable mode of transport such as the introduction and enforcement 30 km/h speed limits on urban roads. The European Union has committed to reducing road deaths and serious injuries by 50% by 2030, as part of its Vision Zero ambition. Ensuring that cyclists benefit from progress towards these targets is essential, especially as cycling levels continue to grow.   

The  International Road Federation (IRF Global) is organizing the 9th IRF Global R2T Conference which will be held in San Francisco, USA on 3-6 November 2026. This year’s Theme is “Transforming the Future of Mobility”.  This Event will offer a dynamic platform for learning, collaboration, and forging influential partnerships—ensuring you stay at the forefront of a rapidly changing industry. Programme is available here. Early Bird registration is available until 3 September 2026. 

Virginia Petraki has successfully defended her PhD thesis titled “A Multilevel Integrated Assessment of Safe and Green Mobility”, under the supervision of NTUA Prof. George Yannis. Sustainable mobility is a multidimensional phenomenon encompassing road safety, as well as economic and environmental impacts. This doctoral dissertation develops a data-driven framework for the multilevel assessment of safe and green mobility, spanning from individual trips to the road network, by fusing road infrastructure, traffic, and weather-related data with high-resolution naturalistic driving behavior data. The developed framework is structured around three complementary analytical modules, including (i) the identification of safe and green mobility patterns, (ii) the joint modeling of safe and green driving outcomes, and (iii) the assessment of sustainable driving efficiency. The results reveal that safe and green mobility are strongly interconnected yet context-dependent, exhibiting both synergies and trade-offs across levels of analysis, while highlighting the critical role of driving behavior and external conditions in shaping these interactions. Overall, the dissertation provides a comprehensive and interpretable analytical framework that supports informed and targeted interventions towards more sustainable mobility for all.    

The Horizon Europe research project IMPROVA has recently released its 4th Newsletter, focusing on enhancing road safety by addressing the complexities of long-term consequences (LTC) caused by road traffic crashes. This version of the Newsletter focuses on WP updates and advancements, as well as two IMPROVA papers presented during the IRTAD 2026 Conference in Athens. Key WP updates include the launch of the Functional Capacity Index and the integration of European crash data into a new head-injury metamodel. Furthermore, the Newsletter announces the upcoming IMPROVA General Assembly in Athens.

The Horizon Europe research project CulturalRoad is hosting a Webinar titled “Co-Creating Mobility Solutions with Local Communities: Insights from the CulturalRoad Demo Sites” which will take place online, on 13 May 2026. This webinar will explore how CulturalRoad is working with local stakeholders across its five demonstration sites — in Catalonia, Karlsruhe, Eilat, Ljubljana and the United Kingdom (West Midlands and Oxfordshire) — to better understand expectations, challenges and opportunities related to automated mobility. City representatives, mobility planners, public authorities and stakeholders from the sector are welcome to join the discussion and contribute with their perspectives. Participation is free upon registration.  

The EU co-funded research project GreCO successfully participated in a direct dialogue with the European Commission and in a Focused Policy Lab of the European Urban Initiative on Sustainable Tourism, held on 22–23 April 2026 in Copenhagen. GreCO Project in collaboration with the Municipality of Elliniko-Argyroupoli, actively contributed to the discussions focused on the green transition, digitalization, inclusion and balanced tourism management, as well as the promotion of sustainable behaviours and experiences, directly contributing to the shaping of the upcoming European Strategy for Sustainable Tourism. This participation was an important opportunity for the exchange of knowledge and experience with representatives from the European Commission, policymakers and professionals from across Europe.  

A paper titled Tram or Bus? A Stated-Preference Analysis of Road User Mode Choice in Larissa, Greece authored by Athanasios Theofilatos, Apostolos Ziakopoulos, Apostolos Anagnostopoulos, Georgios Georgiadis, Ioannis Politis and Nikolaos Eliou has been published in Systems. This Paper aims to investigate Public Transport (PT) preferences in the city of Larissa, Greece. To this end, a SP survey was designed and implemented, resulting in 972 observations that were collected for further statistical analysis. Survey results show a slight preference for trams over buses, with 54.63% selecting the tram and 45.37% favoring the buses. The findings also indicate that passengers place a high value on the quality of infrastructure related to access and waiting times, underlining the need to improve the overall user experience beyond the vehicle itself. In summary, the present research offers valuable insights into how the introduction of a tram system could possibly reshape PT usage patterns when compared with the legacy existing bus services.

Micro-Mobility for Europe (MMfE) recently published its latest incident data, covering more than 450 million trips across the EU27, Israel, Norway, Switzerland and the UK. The data confirms that injury risk for shared e-scooters and e-bikes continued to decline for the fifth consecutive year, with shared e-bike injuries per million trips falling by 18.4% compared to 2024, and a 24% reduction in shared e-scooter injury risk per million trips since 2021. MMfE is currently working together with NTUA on a more detailed analysis of micro-mobility safety trends, aimed at further strengthening the evidence base for policymaking and infrastructure improvements. Despite the positive trajectory, reductions in serious injuries and fatalities are not yet happening fast enough to meet European Commission targets under its Vision Zero objective. 

The Australasian College of Road Safety (ACRS) is organizing the Australasian Road Safety Conference 2026 (ARSC), which will be held in Sydney, Australia on 26-29 October 2026. This Conference under the theme “From Evidence to Action: Shaping a Brighter Future” will bring together road safety stakeholders and decision-makers from Australasia and international jurisdictions to facilitate collaboration and share information. Early Bird registration is available until 24 July 2026. 

The President of the United Nations General Assembly, Ms. Annalena Baerbock, recently submitted the Draft Resolution “Scope, modalities, format and organization of the high-level meeting on improving global road safety“. Τhe Draft Resolution is leading the discussion towards the High-Level Meeting on Improving Global Road Safety in New York, on 20-21 July 2026, under the theme “Scaling up and accelerating implementation of commitments to halving road traffic deaths and injuries by 2030”, in line with the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety 2021–2030 and the Sustainable Development Goals. It also initiated a multi-stakeholder hearing, bringing together Governments, civil society organizations, academia and the private sector. 

Τhe African Road Safety Charter has recently been ratified by 15 African Union Member States, which is the minimum threshold required for it to come into force. This marks an important step towards stronger accountability, coordinated action, and safer roads across the continent. To support members in understanding this development, the Alliance recently held a capacity building session focused on the Charter and its implications. 

The International Traffic Safety Data and Analysis Group (IRTAD) of the International Transport Forum (ITF/OECD), the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) and the Hellenic Institute of Transportation Engineers (HITE) co-organized with great success the 8th IRTAD International Conference: Better Road Safety Data for Better Safety Performance which took place in Athens, Greece, on 15-17 April 2026, with the support of FERSI and ECTRI, under the auspices of the Hellenic Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport. The objective of the Conference was to explore improvements in the quality of data systems and related analyses globally, achieved through three days of vivid discussions with more than 330 road safety experts from 45 countries and 146 road safety Organisations, with focus on human factors, speeding behaviour, safety of vulnerable road users, automation, artificial intelligence, big data, and advanced modelling to support evidence-based policies and measures for safer roads everywhere and for all.   

• Conference Proceedings
• Press Release
• Conference Book
• Conference Photos

Eleni Karydi passed away on 18 April 2026. Karydi was a founding member and President of the Association for the Support of Road Accident Victims (EYTHYTA – Road Safety Observatory) since its establishment in 2004, serving with unparalleled resilience, vision and international recognition. She also served as a Member of the Board of Directors of the European Federation of Road Traffic Victims (FEVR), dedicating her life to the fight for road safety and the protection of road accident victims in Greece and beyond.

The International Traffic Safety Data and Analysis Group (IRTAD) of the International Transport Forum (ITF/OECD), the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) and the Hellenic Institute of Transportation Engineers (HITE) co-organized with great success the 8th IRTAD International Conference: Better Road Safety Data for Better Safety Performance which was held in Athens, Greece, on 15-17 April 2026, with the support of FERSI and ECTRI, under the auspices of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport. NTUA actively contributed with the following papers and presentations:

•   Development of a road safety impact tool for policy assessment
•   Attitudes and Self-Declared Behaviours Among Greek Road Users: Evidence from the ESRA3 survey
•   Probabilistic Modeling for Node-Based Partitioning of Telematics-Informed Road Networks
•   Transformer-Based Driver Behavior Recognition Using the UAH-DriveSet Dataset
•   Temporal Modeling of Heart Rate Variability for Driver Drowsiness Detection with LSTM Networks
•   Comparative assessment of speed characteristics in the European Union
•   The European Road Safety Observatory (ERSO): Supporting evidence-based policy for safer EU roads
•   A Cross-City Survey on Personal Protective Equipment Use in Vulnerable Road Users
•   A method to estimate the number of people suffering from long-term consequences
•   Integrating Telematics and Video-Based Recognition for Vehicle Behavior Analysis in Athens
•   Assessing public opinions on city-wide 30 km/h speed limits: The case of Athens
•   Do Key Performance Indicators really measure road safety performance?
•   Towards a Traffic Sustainability Culture: Integrating Safety and Sustainability in Line with the Stockholm Declaration
•   Development of a conceptual model for traffic safety culture
•   Evaluating Self-Reported and Attitudinal Indicators as Proxies for Observed Road Safety Behaviour
•   Subjective Safety of Vulnerable Road Users from a European Perspective – Insights from the ESRA3 Survey
•   Examining Driver Behaviour along Motorway Exit Ramp Terminals
• Opening Speech

The Horizon 2020 research project PHOEBE has recently released the PHOEBE 7th Newsletter, which provides information on the latest outcomes of the EU-funded ‘Predictive Approaches for Safer Urban Environment’ (PHOEBE) project aiming to increase the road safety of vulnerable road users, especially those who use active mobility and e-scooters. Final PHOEBE consortium meeting took place in the West-Midlands, where PHOEBE partners planned the upcoming final conference and focused on the topics of systems integration, transferability, and exploitation of PHOEBE results. Additionally, this edition of the newsletter announces the Final PHOEBE Workshop at RSS 2026 Conference. 

Road fatalities in Greece in 2025 presented a significant decrease (22.1%) compared to 2024 figures, according to the provisional ELSTAT and Traffic Police data. This is the result of the intensification of enforcement of helmet wearing and drink-and-drive by the Police, together with the new Road Traffic Code in Greece (voted in June and in force since September) which led to an astonishing improvement of driver behaviour and consequently to this very significant reduction or road crash fatalities.

These highly successful initiatives of the Greek Authorities led to a record saving of 147 lives: 517 in 2025 in comparison to 664 in 2024. With these results (49,7 fatalities per million population), Greece is leaving the zone of lowest performance EU countries (63,8 fatalities per million population in 2024), and is approaching the EU average road safety performance (43 fatalities per million population).

We are proud having contributed actively through our systematic advocacy interventions to the Authorities and the media, for prioritizing motorcycle safety and helmet wearing as the catalysers for significant reduction of road casualties in Greece.    

The European Road Safety Charter of the European Commission, has recently published a new Article focusing on safer children journeys to school. While the European Union has made long-term progress in reducing road deaths, recent data shows improvement has slowed, highlighting the need for renewed action – especially for vulnerable road users such as children. There are several factors that may contribute to risk during school travel, such as the increase in private car as default mode to travel to school, traffic congestion, infrastructure and vehicle safety. Some countermeasures include school streets, improved infrastructure such as crossings and good visibility around schools and road safety education and awareness for children and parents. 

A NTUA Diploma Thesis titled “Investigation of the Acceptance of Autonomous Vehicles by Greek Drivers” was recently presented by Konstantina Roumelioti. The aim of this study was to investigate the acceptance of autonomous vehicles by Greek drivers, as well as their intention for future purchase, focusing on the factors that shape their attitude towards this new technology. Data collection was carried out through a properly designed questionnaire, which included hypothetical travel scenarios with varying parameters, such as safety, cost, and time, in order to capture users’ preferences and perceptions. The results indicated that the acceptance of autonomous vehicles depends, among other factors, on cost, travel time and vehicle safety level. Furthermore, the need and possibility of being able to take control of the vehicle at any time increased the likelihood of choosing autonomous vehicles, positively influencing their acceptance.