The ATA (Australian Trucking Association) engaged strategic communications agency Hard Edge to redesign the Volvo ATA Safety Truck and develop the SafeT360 website, cementing Hard Edge’s reputation for engaging young audiences with effective road safety campaigns.

Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack, who yesterday launched the interactive Safety Truck ‘experience’, said it “will play a crucial role in helping to reduce the number of deaths and serious injuries caused in crashes involving trucks”.

The new Safety Truck provides an interactive experience and educates through an inclusive approach. Virtual reality, videos, quizzes and interactive messaging put young road users in the virtual driver’s seat and shows them how to share the road safely with trucks, educating them about truck blind spots, stopping distances, overtaking and the risks of distraction.

The hands-on experience is augmented by the SafeT360 website, developed as part of the redesign project, which makes the Safety Truck experience also available online.

Hard Edge Managing Director Andrew Hardwick said the major Safety Truck redesign required extensive planning, testing and research to ensure content was easily understood and recalled by the young audience, and delivered in an engaging and memorable way.

The Safety Truck collaboration built on the ATA’s involvement in the Re:act road safety behaviour change program, founded and run by Hard Edge, that aims to raise awareness of road safety issues and change behaviour among 18-25 year olds.

“Research shows young drivers are overrepresented in casualty crashes involving a truck, and that inexperienced drivers are ignorant of the challenges truck drivers face on the roads and how to stay safe around heavy vehicles,” Andrew Hardwick said.

“The interactive and experiential nature of the redesigned Safety Truck is designed to make road safety messages memorable for young drivers at a time when they are being licenced to drive on our roads and engage them to the point where they make positive choices on the road at critical times.

“I commend the ATA for its thought leadership in further developing the Safety Truck to be more targeted and effective. This project didn’t just happen overnight and is a symbol of everyone’s commitment to road safety.”

ATA Chair Geoff Crouch said: “SafeT360 is the new face of road safety education that will deliver an engaging and hands-on behavioural change experience.”

Visit www.safet360.com.au to view the new Volvo ATA Safety Truck ‘experience’ or www.truck.net.au/public/volvo-ata-safetytruck for more information.

In addition to the Australian Government’s funding towards the redesign project, the Safety Truck is supported by ATA Foundation Sponsors BP, Volvo and National Transport Insurance, as well as Australia Post, Bridgestone and 3M.

The Safety Truck educates the public on how to share the road safely with trucks and has been delivering road safety exhibitions via high school, TAFE and university visits and community events since 2008. The new-look Safety Truck is expected to travel 100,000km and engage 55,000 young Australians with road safety messages in its first 12 months.

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