Abu Dhabi: The Integrated Transport Centre (ITC) of the Department of Municipalities and Transport (DMT) in Abu Dhabi, has been awarded the Royal Society for Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) Gold Award for the ‘Fleet Safety’ category, in recognition of its efforts in implementing the school transport system through the ‘Salama’ system.

The winning project, the ‘Salama’ System, contributes to supporting the ITC’s journey in implementing the best practices and procedures in the field of safety. The system works to elevate levels of safety and security among students while using school transport, in addition to managing and following the emirate’s school transport operators’s processes, who conduct more than 17,000 school bus trips daily, run by 199 school transport operators to serve more than 666 public and private schools, as well as nurseries in the emirate. It also follows up processes of checkups and inspections, and ensures compliance with the school bus schedule. Furthermore, the system aims to raise the level of reassurance among parents and elevate their trust in the school transport sector, through enhancing communication between parents and schools, and allowing to track their children and ensure their safe arrival to schools. Parents are also provided with the option to receive notifications through the recently launched “Salama” Mobile Application.

The ITC is keen to implement high-quality initiatives that enhance the security and safety of students, in particular through the ‘Salama’ system. Therefore, the ITC has worked closely with its strategic stakeholders in order to improve levels of security and safety in the emirate’s school transport sector.

Moreover, the ITC highlighted the importance of receiving the award from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents in the United Kingdom, calling it a remarkable achievement that significantly adds to its record of accomplishments. The ITC emphasized that the RoSPA is one of the world's leading health and safety institutions, adding that the achievement is the result of the relentless efforts by all task forces involved, demonstrating their commitment to enhancing safety levels in the transport sector in Abu Dhabi. The RoSPA award aims to shed light on the most prominent efforts of institutions around the world in maintaining health and safety, at both the community and business systems levels.

The RoSPA award evaluates the organizations’ occupational health and safety management system according to specific criteria, with nearly 2,000 participants annually from 50 countries around the world, and more than 7 million employees.