The Committee for Roads of the Ministry of Industry and Infrastructure Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan and SweRoad, together with the Kazakh Scientific Research Institute for Road Safety, are implementing a project to introduce the iRAP international road safety assessment system in Kazakhstan under a World Bank loan.
As part of the project, 5,000 kilometres of national roads have been surveyed. The survey is carried out by trained specialists of the National Center for Road Asset Quality and KazdorNII JSC with the support of SweRoad and the Kazakh Scientific Research Institute for Road Safety LLP. One of the project's main aims is to build the capacity of national road safety experts and to develop specialists competent to carry out assessments to international standards.
The next stage after the survey is coding the road attributes recorded for each road section. To obtain a full and comprehensive picture of road safety, coding covers more than 60 parameters every 100 metres. This level of detail is needed to rule out the possibility of missing any road characteristics that matter for safety.
Computers meeting iRAP criteria have now been installed at KazdorNII JSC for coding, and on 28 October this year KazdorNII specialists began the coding process.
Similar equipment will be installed at the head office of the National Center for Road Asset Quality, and its specialists will also begin coding.
Once coding is complete, each road section will be given a Star Rating in line with iRAP standards and guidelines, and the data obtained will be used to draw up an investment plan for further action to remedy existing shortcomings, with the ultimate goal of reducing crashes and, above all, deaths and injuries on our country's roads.
