The results are not yet final, nor official.
The government will not communicate it until the very end of January, or even early February.
But even without waiting for the December figures, the year 2020 will be historic on the road safety front.
Both in statistics and in changes in driving behavior.
From January to November 2020, 2,326 people lost their lives in a traffic accident in mainland France.
The bar of 3,000 killed, never reached for 60 years and the advent of the modern automobile, will therefore not be crossed, even by adding to this figure the victims recorded during the last month of the year.
With this historically low threshold, France has reached the objective set in 2010 by the President of the Republic Nicolas Sarkozy… for 2012.
This result is certainly a trompe-l'oeil performance, as the Covid-19 pandemic has shaken up our daily lives and, for its part, has caused countless victims.
In detail, however, this annual drop in road fatalities is not only the consequence of successive periods of confinement and curfews.
The effects of teleworking
If, in April, during which the whole of France was under bell, the number of road deaths fell by 55.8% thanks to a reduction in traffic of 75% compared to the Usually, the "busiest" months also show a net drop in road traffic victims: -11.3% in July and even - 19% in August, while the summer holidays, particularly in France last year, have largely encouraged the French to take the wheel to go on vacation.
Rather, radical changes in habits must be found to explain such a decline.
“We are, for the first time and beyond simple figures, facing a major behavioral assessment, estimates Anne Lavaud, general delegate of the Prévention Routière association.
The introduction of teleworking measures has had a very positive effect.
We estimated during a study carried out in 2019 that we could bet on fifty fewer deaths per month on the roads if half of the 23 million working people in France stayed at home one day a week by teleworking. .
"
We take our car less
The road improvements favoring the sharing of public space with different modes of travel have also produced their effect.
"The circulation zones reserved for bicycles or scooters, which have become very popular with city-dwellers, are another important marker of the past year," notes Anne Lavaud.
By choosing to walk, cycle or scooter for their daily trips, many French people have helped to reduce road traffic and therefore the risk of being the victim of a serious traffic accident.
"
READ ALSO>
"I tell myself that I am going to die": the poignant testimony of a road victim to high school students in Oise
For the General Delegate of Road Safety, these changes in behavior can still have real positive effects in the months and years to come and once the pandemic is behind us, because "they will certainly continue in our habits".
Conversely, Anne Lavaud is worried about other trends.
"I am thinking, for example, of the reluctance of the French to take public transport to prefer the car, considered safer in a pandemic period, but also the looming economic crisis, with a fleet that is aging more or the risk of seeing more drivers without a license and without insurance.
"
Morning essentials newsletter
A tour of the news to start the day
Subscribe to the newsletterAll newsletters
Another cause for concern, this time pointed out by Road Safety: the increase in excessive speeding, boosted by the drop in traffic and the number of traffic jams.
During the first 55 days of confinement, the number of these offenses increased by 40% compared to the same period in 2019, despite a 75% drop in traffic, according to figures from the Center for Studies and Expertise on risks, environment, mobility and planning (Cerema).