Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC)

Who is MUARC?

MUARC was established in 1987, and is Australia’s largest and leading multi-disciplinary research centre specialising in injury prevention research and training, including road transport.  Led by Professor Judith Charlton, the Centre’s research is interdisciplinary and applies a systems framework to address injury prevention needs in transport, workplace, home and community settings.  MUARC is unique in being grounded in scientific and academic excellence, while producing research with real-life implications that underpin Government- and Industry-led road safety policy and practice.  Through the highest quality research, training and provision of independent recommendations, the Centre strives to challenge and support citizens, governments and industries to eliminate serious health losses due to injury.

What is the size of the organisation or fleet?

What sector?

Education, research, training

What does Road Safety mean to MUARC?

Over the past three decades, MUARC has developed evidence-based solutions that have led directly to ensuring the safety of Australians populations in other countries – and have made the Centre an acknowledged international leader in the fields of transport, workplace and community-related injury prevention.  MUARC is committed to the excellence of its research, the independence of its recommendations and the engagement it has with the local and international communities it serves.

Why host the NRSPP?

MUARC offers several benefits as Host of the NRSPP:

• Strength of alignment between MUARC’s vision for an injury free society and the NRSPP’s objectives to develop a positive road safety culture to reduce work-related road trauma;
• Capacity to leverage Monash University’s and MUARC’s exceptional research and training reputation and commitment to impact to optimise the transfer of evidence-based knowledge to enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of investment within the NRSPP;
• Monash has a strong track record of an enterprising approach to partnerships and interdisciplinary collaborations with industries which will further increase the NRSPP’s national networks and collaborations across industries to improve road safety; and
• Strong international links with transport research agencies and universities (eg WHO, UMTRI, SWOV, TRB, EuroNCAP) which can be accessed to promote the NRSPP globally.

What are MUARC’s road safety action commitments through NRSPP?

For more than 30 years MUARC has been translating innovative road safety research into solutions with real world impact. MUARC’s work has informed government policy, evaluated public safety programs and helped shape the products and direction of industry. MUARC is a trusted partner of government, industry and community groups, with a reputation for rigorous strategy development and modelling, expansive data collection and analysis, policy advice, economic analysis and in-depth evidence-based research.
MUARC researchers have led innovative workplace road safety projects to better understand how elements across all levels of a work system can shape safe driving performance and safety. Projects have focused on optimising safe purchasing decisions, speed compliance, fatigue management and implementation of electronic work diaries and the creation of simulated driving environments. The research findings focus on providing practical recommendations and guidelines that can be easily adopted by the client in translating the research into practice.

MUARC has also developed an innovative behavioural approach to managing workplace driving safety. The programs are designed to challenge drivers’ key beliefs regarding unsafe driving practices and develop the skills of supervisors in identifying situations in which their drivers may be at risk on the road and in managing these situations effectively.

MUARC’s commitment to road safety research offers several opportunities to strengthen the overall goals and objectives of the NRSPP. To illustrate, the NRSPP would have access to MUARC’s simulation facilities. MUARC has a long history of undertaking cutting-edge projects using a unique range of driving simulators. MUARC possesses full car, portable car, truck, motorbike and cycle simulators. The simulators are supported by our simulator technicians, human factors specialists and behavioural safety scientists. These facilities could be made available to the NRSPP members for the development of research and/or training agendas, with the support of MUARC staff.

MUARC also has a large and growing cohort of graduate students and a key performance development activity for our students is industry engagement. There is opportunity to explore various engagement arrangements between our students and partners of the NRSPP such as joint PhD projects and industry placements. This opportunity not only offers unique professional development for our students but it would provide NRSPP industry partners opportunities to contribute to training future transport safety leaders and access to independent expertise, across a broad range of transport safety disciplines including the behavioural and social sciences, medicine, epidemiology, statistics, industrial design, and engineering.

Supporting Actions Delivered by MUARC

• NRSPP secured a 2015 ACT Road Safety Trust Grant, Dr Sharon Newnam was part of the NRSPP Consortium that delivered:
  • NRSPP Research: Fleet Safety Benchmarking Project: Literature Review
  • NRSPP Research: Fleet Safety Benchmarking: Stage 1 Literature Summary, and Stage 2 Consultation and Framework Development
• In 2016, Sharon Newnam assisted the Safe Use of Mobiles in Vehicles Working Group in designing the Baseline Survey to understand workers mobile phone use in vehicles.
• In 2018, Sharon Newnam won the Australasian Road Safety Conference (ARSC) NRSPP sponsored best paper with implications for workplace road safety. As part of the award included:
  • Thought Leadership: Risk and Reward – Translating managing risks into real, proven safety and business benefits
  • Webinar: The leadership practices that support and constrain safe driver behaviour.
• In 2020, Dr Kristie Young assisted NRSPP in developing its first organisational road safety driver distraction campaign, What’s on your mind? No distraction