According to Dekra, the number of road deaths in Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia is still far too high despite positive developments in the area of road safety. "We cannot simply accept the fact that Saxony-Anhalt, Saxony and Thuringia - along with Lower Saxony - are the federal states with the highest number of road deaths per 1 million inhabitants," said Schwarz in Leipzig at the presentation of the testing company's Road Safety Report 2024. He called for the infrastructure to be adapted more quickly to the rapid change in mobility behavior. At the same time, the conversion and expansion must always be safety-oriented.
The development in Saxony is particularly dramatic. The number of road deaths there rose from 118 in 2022 to 188 in the previous year. In almost 60 percent of cases, the cause of the accident could not be clearly determined. Schwarz assumes that "quite a few of these can certainly be attributed to the road infrastructure".
According to Dekra, the focus of fatal road accidents is not in major cities, but in rural areas. The reasons for this are higher speeds, winding and confusing roads and poor visibility due to trees at the side of the road.
Dekra therefore called for more funding and shorter approval periods for infrastructure projects. The expansion of sections with a third lane in the change of direction on accident-prone stretches of road should also be accelerated to enable safe overtaking, while overtaking bans should be introduced and enforced more frequently on critical stretches of road.
In addition, the sides of rural roads should be free of obstacles such as trees or poles wherever possible. The expert organization also called for more traffic circles. "These ensure greater road safety and, due to the significantly reduced speed, fewer accidents," emphasized Schwarz.
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