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Accident Costs: Details of Calculations
Tables 11 and 12 opposite provide the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions’ estimates of the values assigned to the cost of road casualties and accidents in Great Britain, for use in cost-benefit analysis of the prevention of road casualties and accidents in road schemes. They were published by the DETR in its "Highways Economic Note Number 1" in September 1999.
The valuation of casualty costs calculated for Great Britain for all levels of severity are now based on a "willingness to pay human cost" approach. This is intended to encompass all aspects of the costs of casualties including both the human cost and the direct economic cost. The human cost covers an amount to reflect the pain, grief and suffering to the casualty, relatives and friends, and, for fatal casualties, the intrinsic loss of enjoyment of life over and above the consumption of goods and services. The economic cost covers loss of output due to injury and medical costs.
The cost of an accident also includes:
i. the cost of damage to vehicles and property; and
ii. the cost of police and insurance administration.
Further information about the methods used by DETR
to produce the estimates shown in Tables 11 and 12 is available from:-
Kevin Mantle
Road Safety branch
Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions
Room 2/15
Great Minster House
76 Marsham Street
LONDON
SW1P 4DR
(Tel: 0171 890 2038)
The cost per accident in Scotland and the total cost of all accidents in Scotland are given in Tables 13 and 14 opposite. These costs for Scotland are calculated using the casualty costs for Great Britain and the number of casualties by severity in accidents in Scotland. The costs per accident are higher in Scotland than in Great Britain because Scotland has more casualties per accident and has a higher proportion of fatal and serious casualties in an accident.
Also estimated are the number of "damage only" accidents (about 14 times the number of injury accidents) and their average costs.
The estimated total costs at 1998 prices of accidents in 1997 and earlier years are calculated by applying the estimated "per accident" costs for 1998 to the number of accidents of each type in 1997 and earlier years.
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