The Transport for London Bus Safety Standard: Vulnerable Road User (VRU) Frontal Crashworthiness: Evaluation of Safety Measure

Document summary

The Bus Safety Standard (BSS) is focussed on vehicle design and safety system performance and their contribution to the Mayor of London’s Transport Strategy. This sets a target to achieve zero road collision deaths involving buses in London by 2030.

All TfL buses conform to regulatory requirements. TfL already uses a more demanding specification when contracting services and this requires higher standards in areas including environmental and noise emissions, accessibility, construction, operational requirements, and more. Many safety aspects are covered in the specification such as fire suppression systems, door and fittings safety, handrails, day time running lights, and others. However, the new BSS goes further with a range of additional requirements, developed by TRL and their partners and peer-reviewed by independent safety experts.

The cost-effectiveness of several proposed solutions were assessed for the Vulnerable Road User (VRU) Frontal Crashworthiness (VCW) safety measure throughout this project. A range of solutions for redesigning the front end of buses to improve the outcomes of collisions with pedestrians and cyclists were investigated for four key functions including; enhanced Front End Designs (FED), VRU Impact Protection (VIP), VRU Run-over Protection (VRP) and Mirror Strikes (MST). The technical feasibility, target population, effectiveness, fleet fitment rate and costs for implementing each safety measure solution as a requirement of the Bus Vehicle Specification were established, whilst the cost-effectiveness and casualty saving benefits of each solution were calculated. These results were then used to finalise the below list of VCW safety measure solutions recommended for implementation in the Bus Vehicle Specification:

Minimum bus front end geometry requirement
Enhanced bus front end geometry requirement
Repositioning of windscreen wipers requirement
Energy absorbing bus front end structures requirement
Replacement of Class II mirrors with a Class II camera monitor system