We were really interested to see the news from Norway that Oslo saw no pedestrian and cyclist deaths in 2019 and wanted to know more about this. There is an excellent article about this from Curbed titled Oslo saw zero pedestrian and cyclist deaths in 2019. Here’s how the city did it but we went back to the original article in the daily newspaper Aftenpost to find some more detail. We have translated the article from the Norwegian 1975: 41 døde i Oslo-trafikken. 2019: Én død i Oslo-trafikken and this can be downloaded here
There are some interesting themes from a UK point of view, some of which are starting to appear in the UK approach and some that are not. The key ones seem to be:
- Reducing vehicle access to areas/streets in built-up areas – fewer cars in the center of Oslo.
- Safe infrastructure for cycling.
- Reducing speed limits.
- Safety around schools…creating “heart zones” – a car free zone around a school where it is not permitted to drop off or pick up pupils by car.
- Less transit traffic in residential areas (similar to Low Traffic Neighbourhoods).
- Improvements to car safety.
- Enforcement against speeding, other forms of dangerous driving and driver distractions (eg mobile phone use).
