Page 54 - Operation Lifesaver Estonia Annual Report 2011

Railway Safety in Estonia - 52 - Annual Report 2011
OLE’s last year’s calendar of events was very
comprehensive and eventful. We are very pleased to see
that the times when we were looking for events to deliver
our railway safety message are now long gone. Today
we are receiving a vast number of E-mails inviting us to
participate at round tables, conferences, public events,
etc. This is something we can just be happy about and, if
possible, we pack our gear and be there as agreed.
The key event from last year was undoubtedly the
international educational railway safety conference ‘’Let’s
save lives’’ that OLE organised in Tallinn in cooperation
with UIC and ELFC. The conference focused on the latest
trends in the field of ensuring railway safety from all over
the globe. The conference hosted speakers and audience
from European, US, Canadian and Russian railway
companies, state agencies, law enforcement agencies
and other organisations engaged in promoting railway
safety. Two conference days were followed by the second
level crossing safety workshop organised jointly by the
European Commission and UIC. Both successful events
had a high number of participants and the listeners heard
a number of interesting presentations.
We invested in this event a lot of time and effort and it
was all worth it – we had almost 150 participants from
23 countries, grateful handshakes, E-mails and phone
calls. Organising such a large event gave
also a lot of personal experience and
knowledge for organising OLE’s future
events. It was extremely pleasant to see
that our activities are understood and
supported. We are hopeful that after
participating at our conference, some of
the countries consider it worthwhile to
keep an eye on Operation Lifesaver and
maybe some day, even join it. We would be sincerely glad.
Naturally, we tried to be present at as many safety events
as possible to share our knowledge about crossing
railway safely. We were glad to meet at these events our
old acquaintances with whom we had changed views
and maybe even argued in the previous years. There are
also many young people who come to our tent to re-test
the knowledge they obtained in the previous years. So, it
I am glad to see that people are becoming more
aware of the dangers related to railways and OLE
is more and more involved in the teams organising
public events, safety camps and other projects.
BIRGIT VAHEMETS
Project Manager
PUBLIC EVENTS