EVALUATION OF TRANSPORT ACCIDENT COMMISSION ROAD SAFETY TELEVISION ADVERTISING

Abstract

MUARC has evaluated the benefits of TAC's television advertising campaigns. Part I of this report describes the campaigns and summarises an attempt to estimate their role in Victoria's road safety performance. Part 2 builds on recent evaluations of two major road safety programs which combined TAC advertising with increased police enforcement efforts. An economic analysis of the effects on crashes of the TAC advertising supporting enforcement is described. Part 3 describes an attempt to evaluate the Concentrate or Kill campaign, which differs from the speed and drink-driving campaigns in that it was not designed to support enforcement. The overall findings are synthesised in Part 4. The research indicates clear links between levels of TAC publicity supporting the speed and alcohol enforcement programs and reductions in casualty crashes. The estimated benefits in terms of reduced TAC payments were respectively 3.9 and 7.9 times the costs of advertising. The road safety effects of publicity with themes not related to enforcement are less clear. The Concentrate or Kill advertisements appear to raise awareness of the issue, but there is no conclusive evidence at this stage that they have reduced the crash involvement of the specific target group of the advertisements, namely young country drivers.