Skip to main content

IRF appoints new global road safety champion

The International Road Federation has a new spearhead for its global road safety programme. Michael Dreznes will serve as the Federation's (IRF) executive vice president with worldwide leadership on training, policy and capacity-building activities.
March 2, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
The 713 International Road Federation has a new spearhead for its global road safety programme. Michael Dreznes will serve as the Federation’s (IRF) executive vice president with worldwide leadership on training, policy and capacity-building activities.

"Mike has spent the last twenty-six years working to make roads safer around the world," said Patrick Sankey, president and chief executive of IRF in Washington DC, the United States, where Dreznes will be based. "He is recognised as one of the world's leading experts on roadside safety, pioneering the concept of Forgiving Highways, and we are thrilled to have him lead the road safety initiatives of IRF."

Sankey said one of Dreznes’s key areas of responsibility will be to work with road authorities around the world to use IRF's Safer Roads by Design executive road safety training.

Speaking about his new role Dreznes said: "IRF is where I can truly make a difference. Too many countries around the world are using obsolete roadside safety measures and technologies that should have been replaced twenty years ago.

"I will collaborate with road authorities, concessionaires, design consulting engineers, academia and other safety stakeholders to encourage the replacement of outdated technology and to introduce state-of-the-art practices in countries around the world, thereby assisting governments with their commitment to the 3262 United Nations Decade of Action to reduce fatalities by 50% by 2020," Dreznes said.

The co-chairman of the 2774 Transportation Research Board Roadside Safety Design Subcommittee on International Research Activities, Dreznes is also a member of the TRB AFB20 Committee on Roadside Safety Design.

Founded in 1948, the IRF is a non-governmental, not-for-profit organization with members from both the public and private sectors in 90 countries worldwide.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Call for Abstracts, for IRF Europe & Central Asia Regional Congress
    March 9, 2015
    Istanbul is often said to be where Europe meets Asia, geographically and culturally. This September the great city will also be the focus of the International Road Federation’s 1st Europe & Central Asia Regional Congress. The congress will be an exceptional opportunity for anyone, especially from Europe and Asia, involved in major road projects to connect and network with ministers, road agency heads and local government leaders. But time is running out to be among the prestigious speakers and presenters at
  • EVENT: wildlife-vehicle collision reduction
    May 9, 2024
    A symposium this month in Sydney by the Australasian Network for Ecology and Transportation (ANET) and the Environment Institute of Australia and New Zealand (EIANZ) will explore how new and emerging technologies are helping reduce the millions of mammal deaths annually – an estimated four million in Australia alone.
  • IRF Geneva to support Qatar on its recycling strategy
    June 12, 2018
    IRF Geneva was at the Pavement Preservation and Recycling Summit (PPRS) 2018 in Nice The Pavement Preservation and Recycling Summit (PPRS) 2018 in Nice (26th – 28th March 2018) set the scene for the signature of an important Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between between Ashghal, the Qatari Public Works Authority and the International Road Federation (Geneva). Ashghal’s participation in the summit was part of its endeavour to open opportunities for cooperation and investment in the road sector and recy
  • IRF Geneva takes centre stage at Movin’ On event in Canada
    September 27, 2017
    The Challenge Bibendum organised by Michelin for the past 20 years had now become “Movin’On”. Organised in Canada on 13th-15the June 2017, in this new avatar and focus, the event had attracted 4,000 participants from the transportation industry from 31 countries around the world. IRF Geneva was represented by its executive director, Susanna Zammataro.