Where are the road safety enthusiasts coming from?

Website analytics provide important information on the behavior of visitors - as well as interesting insights with regards to these visitors. The Arrive Alive Road Safety website has been developed not only with a focus towards road safety in South Africa but also with the objective to create international awareness on road safety.

It is always inspirational to find that visitors reach the Arrive Alive website from across the globe and that others can benefit from the content provided. The above short summary reveals that visitors are from different continents. May we be able to promote road safety in the remotest of areas to the most interesting and needy people imaginable!

Huge demand for licence renewals

Continuing a trend that has been evident since December 2007, driving licence card orders once again featured prominently on the National Traffic Information System (eNaTIS) in February 2008.

On 28 February 14,616 such transactions were recorded, the highest number for a single day since the inception of the eNaTIS in April last year. ‘In March and April 2003 there was a last-minute rush by members of the public to convert their driving licences contained in identity documents to the credit card format,’ says Werner Koekemoer, eNaTIS project manager. ‘We’ve now passed the end of the first five-year card validity period. Thus, most of the drivers who converted last are now applying for their second credit-card-format driving licence.

An elevated demand is expected until the end of April this year. In addition to the increase in driving licence card orders, learner’s licence transactions also rose by more than 12% in February. The system handled the increased volumes effortlessly and system users reported satisfactory transaction speeds. Moreover, zero downtime during business hours ensured optimal system availability.’

12,622,524 transactions were recorded during February 2008. This represents a slight month-on-month decrease of 4.31% compared to January 2008 (when 13,190,971 transactions were recorded). This reduction is represented mainly in the system-to-system interfaces, as transactions performed by users showed a 0,85% increase from January to February.

The breakdown of the transactions performed during February 2008 is as follows: 75,571 learner’s licence authorisations, 254,890 driving licence card orders, 68,775 vehicle record introductions, 284,524 vehicle registrations and 891,168 vehicle licensing transactions. In addition, 100,885 reports were executed on the system. These reports are utilised for, among others, financial reconciliations and audits.

Daily transaction volumes exceeded the 600,000 mark on three occasions during the month, with 28 February being the busiest day (633,236 transactions performed).

A total number of 3,325,750 transactions were performed on other computer systems that have interfaces to the eNaTIS (such as those of the South African Police Service, vehicle manufacturers, banks and insurance companies), while users of the eNaTIS application at registering authorities, testing stations and provincial authorities performed 9,296,774 transactions.

The Johannesburg service centre once again performed the most transactions (822,229) followed by Pretoria (608,074) the City of Cape Town (574,836), Durban (299,767) and Germiston (186,956).

With 66,324 transactions Mercedes-Benz SA was the most active non-governmental entity using a system-to-system interface with the eNaTIS, followed by Volkswagen SA (52,020), Toyota SA (46,777), General Motors SA (43,083) and TransUnion HPI (33,809).

Detailed information with a breakdown of daily transactions is available from the eNaTIS Website.

Hit and run truck injures 4 before overturning on highway.

At approximately 3:39am, Friday 07 March 2008, Netcare 911 paramedics responded to a report of a very serious collision on the M1 near the Marlboro drive onramp.
 
A large refrigerated truck that was travelling on the M1 highway towards Pretoria collided with a police vehicle and continued driving for several kilometres before overturning in the hairpin bend where the highway splits towards Germiston in the Buccleuch Interchange.
The police car sustained severe side and frontal damage from the impact with the truck. The cars passenger was in a serious condition but the driver sustained critical head and chest injuries and was placed onto emergency life support by the paramedics at the scene. Both these patients were transported by ambulances to the Netcare Sunninghill hospital for further assessment and treatment. Another vehicle was also involved in the incident and a 3rd police officer who was injured was also taken to the Netcare Sunninghill hospital. The 4th patient, a member of the public, was in a stable condition and was transported by ambulance to the Johannesburg hospital.
 
The split from the M1 to the N3 towards Germiston has been closed and traffic in the area is severely affected.
 
This incident was attended to by Netcare 911, provincial fire and ambulance services, SAPS and the Metro Police.

[ Information provided by Netcare911 to the Road Safety & Arrive Alive Blog]

NETCARE 911
Emergency No. 082 911