Monday, May 26, 2014

CANBERRA ROAD SAFETY CAMPAIGN 2014

The Canberra Road Safety Campaign was officially launched by Grassroots Adviser Dr Lim Wee Kiak on 5th May 2014 at Northoaks Primary School.  Dr Lim is seen here chatting with Mr Tan Teng Lip (SMSA President), Bingo (with helmet) and Mr Peter Burns (FleetSafe Asia).


For this year's campaign, the objective of SMSA Mobility and Road Safety Commission is to demonstrate and educate young children on the various blind spots of a heavy vehicle. As exemplified in the picture below, the motorcycles are in the blind spots of the truck and hence cannot be seen by the truck driver.

However, it will be too challenging for us to arrange an actual truck into the school premises and carry out the exercise.  Hence, with the help of Karl Daruwalla, Paul Lincoln and Peter Burns, we created a prop (shown in the picture below) that's not only portable but could be erected within minutes!

For our demonstrations, Peter was the presenter while Carmen played the  role of the truck driver.  A webcam was mounted on her head for the purpose of transmitting live feed to a connected projector. This in turn enabled the audience to witness the exact view from the driver's perspective.

Bingo would then move around the truck to illustrate where the various blind spots are to the audience i.e. areas that were not visible to the driver. 

Last Friday, our team conducted its 2nd demonstration at Wellington Primary School where I was warmly greeted by the Principal, Mr Gary Tsu (center).  I was also pleasantly surprised to have the Road Safety team from Traffic Police Department and their Commanding Officer DSP Soh Wan Khuan (left) there to watch our demonstration.

This morning, we witnessed the largest turnout (more than 1,500 students) for our 3rd and final show at Endeavour Primary School.  In order to ensure that the signals from Carmen's webcam were properly transmitted, I checked out the AV room located on top of the school hall. Very glad to see the controls were manned by 2 very young students!

Our shows may have ended but we are proud to have found a new 'home' for our truck.  It is now parked within the Road Safety Park at East Coast where the teaching of blind spots shall continue.....

Wednesday, May 7, 2014

POLICY & DONOR FORUM 2014

Michelle Yeoh, Global Road Safety Ambassador, was the special guest at the Decade of Action Policy & Donor Forum 2014.  We had a chat during the Welcome Reception on Monday evening and she commended Singapore for its road safety standards.

The forum was held yesterday at the RACV City Club in Melbourne.  The Chair of the Session, Mr Colin Jordan (Managing Director & CEO of RACV) is seen here thanking Michelle for her moving speech to lobby support for Road Safety as UN's post-2015 main priority.

Dr Zhou Wei was among the speakers to deliver perspectives on Road Safety in the Asia Pacific region. 

HRH Prince Michael of Kent GCVO (cousin of HM The Queen) praised the State of Victoria, Australia for its road safety achievements before presenting his prestigious 'Decade of Action' Award.

The participants gathered once again this morning for an interactive workshop on Fatality Free Roads.  Future road designs, automotive technologies and the possible impacts were among the subjects that were discussed.

There were several obvious takeaways from this Forum.  But, most importantly, I had the opportunity to see some old friends, made new contacts and shared a light moment with fellow participant from Singapore - Mr Bernard Tay, President of AAS.