With road traffic
accidents
resulting
in far more
insurance claims than
hijackings – and with SA
road safety campaigns
making little impact – there’s
perhaps a message to be
learnt from further afield.
According to Sampie
Swanepoel, MD of Transvaal
Heavy Transport, the SA
road transport industry
could learn a lot about how
to convey a road safety
message from its fellow
truckers in Australia.
The Aussie road haulage
industry has quite a few
tricks up its sleeve in
presenting a road safety
campaign, he told FTW.
“The primary strategy
is to intimately involve the
public in conveying your
message,” he said. “Not
through a bald recitation
of road safety tips. Rather
to make your presentation
entertaining, but with a
road safety theme.”
At truck shows in
Australia, for example,
they organise events which
involve the whole family.
“Having the kids involved
is vital,” Swanepoel
said.
“After
all, they
are the
drivers of
tomorrow.”
For the adults,
one of the tricks
would be to let
them all sit in the
cab of a truck, seeing
what the driver sees.
While demonstrating all
the controls, you could also
be pointing out the safety
element for each of them.
“Just take one main
message you’d want to get
over,” Swanepoel said.
That now standard sign on
all big rigs: ‘If you can’t see
my mirrors, I can’t see you’.
“To highlight this, you’d
park a car alongside the rig
– but in its blind spot. Let
the public look in the truck
mirrors, and see nothing.
Then make them look out of
the passenger window, and
see that car right alongside.
That gets the message
across. And they’ll pass
the story on to
their friends
and family, and
spread the road
safety message
around the
town.”
That’s
what public
involvement
should be,
Swanepoel
added. “It
should be
something fun that
kids and parents
all remember,
with an almost
subliminal presentation of
the road safety theme.”
Swanepoel will take on
the task of spreading the
road safety sermon to his
fellow truckers at this year’s
Road Freight Association
(RFA) Annual Convention
in June.
“I will also be asking RFA
members and other people,
like your readers, to give
me any ideas on how best
to present and promote the
road safety theme,” he said.
INSERT & CAPTION
The primary strategy
is to intimately
involve the public
in conveying your
message.
– Sampie Swanepoel
