ADAPT. INNOVATE. INVENT.

Mexico is increasingly using technology in an ever-smarter way, but it is not yet a country whose road-safety strategy is principally technology-led. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this story is that Mexico has adopted and adapted many of the ideas associated with successful road-safety countries - Safe System thinking, data-led risk mapping, automated enforcement, road assessment, fleet monitoring - and is gradually building the institutional machinery to deploy them. The technology is often imported, but the potentially distinctive Mexican innovation is in how it is being combined with a huge, fragmented road network, a large freight sector, urban surveillance infrastructure and local technology companies, as Montserrat Azcárate Sosa, Urban Mobility Consultant at ITS Mexico, explains.

Road safety in Mexico is entering a stage where simply building more roads or installing signs is no longer enough. The challenge lies in adapting the infrastructure, innovating with technology, and, when conditions demand it, developing its own solutions capable of responding to the diversity of Mexico's territory and the budgetary constraints inherent in its economy. High-speed federal highways, competitive logistics corridors for leveraging nearshoring, metropolitan streets, rural areas, and pedestrian environments all require different solutions, but they share a common principle: designing the mobility system so that human error does not necessarily result in death or serious injury.
 

In recent years, Mexico has made progress toward this systemic approach. The National Mobility and Road Safety Strategy (ENAMOV) 2023-2042 includes 163 actions distributed across five pillars:

• Linking mobility with land-use planning and management
• Improve public passenger transport services
• Active mobility
• Road safety
• Transport systems with an intersectional gender perspective

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The second pillar, the professionalization of public transport and the transition from the "man-truck" model to Integrated Transport Systems, is particularly noteworthy. The commitment of stakeholders to this significant step was achieved thanks to the benefits of digital transformation for the operation and use of transport, with tools such as electronic fare collection, the Electronic Transportation System, telemetry, and onboard safety features, among others.

Gradual improvements are also observed in planning and governance processes; at the same time, the National Mobility and Road Safety System has strengthened coordination between all levels of government.

An important step has been the issuance of regulations aimed at safety on the roads of the country's major cities, considering the growing presence of motorcycles and light personal vehicles such as scooters, bicycles, among others.
 

“An important step has been the issuance of regulations aimed at safety on the roads of the country's major cities, considering the growing presence of motorcycles and light personal vehicles such as scooters, bicycles, among others”
 

ADAPTING: TRANSFORMING KNOWLEDGE INTO MEXICAN SOLUTIONS

Mexico's greatest technological strength lies in adapting existing solutions to local problems. A safety barrier, a monitoring system, or a road safety audit may be internationally recognized technologies; their true value emerges when they are modified for the conditions of Mexican roads and cities, and when similar solutions are developed with a budget aligned with the national context.
 

The Mexican Transportation Institute (IMT) is a key player in this process. Its activities include applied research, technological innovation, road safety audits, and the evaluation of intelligent transportation systems. By the end of 2026, it will even maintain specialised road safety training programs covering infrastructure, human factors, accident investigation, and application projects.

A particularly relevant example is the National Road Network, whose updates integrate information on highways, urban roads, and infrastructure characteristics using satellite imagery, geospatial modelling, and field verifications. The 2025 edition records 178,609 km of paved roads and 280,185 km of urban roads and connecting infrastructure. This information base transforms the territory into a measurable object and allows for progress toward data-driven infrastructure decisions.

“A particularly relevant example is the National Road Network, whose updates integrate information on highways, urban roads, and infrastructure characteristics using satellite imagery, geospatial modelling, and field verifications”

INNOVATING: MAKING INFRASTRUCTURE “THINK”

Mexican innovation is evolving from passive infrastructure toward systems capable of detecting, communicating, and responding. On federal highways, the strategy announced for priority corridors since 2025 incorporated the closure of unauthorized access points, dynamic toll plazas, infrastructure modernization, and integrated rest stops. These measures combine engineering, surveillance, operational management, and technology.

In the urban sphere, innovation manifests itself differently: using data to modify behaviour and redesign space and its use. Mexico City, for example, has developed video analytics elements that combine electronic systems for detecting speeding and traffic violations with a model of civic and economic sanctions. In the first six months of 2025, more than 1.8 million fines were issued, primarily for speeding and encroaching on spaces designated for pedestrians, bicycles, and public transportation.
 

“Mexico City, for example, has developed video analytics elements that combine electronic systems for detecting speeding and traffic violations with a model of civic and economic sanctions”

This represents innovation because technology is no longer simply a surveillance tool but rather an integral part of a preventative policy: measuring, identifying risk, intervening, and modifying behaviour.

INVENTING: WHEN MEXICO DEVELOPS SOLUTIONS FROM ITS OWN PROBLEMS

Talking about invention doesn't mean claiming that every technological component is created from scratch in Mexico. It means recognizing the capacity to design new combinations, methodologies, and applications based on national needs.

Tactical urbanism is a good example. In Cancún, during 2025, pilot interventions were implemented at 10 priority intersections using signage, vehicle and pedestrian counts, surveys, and monitoring of traffic behaviour before consolidating permanent works.

The logic is powerful: first experiment, then measure, and finally scale up. It's a form of innovation particularly appropriate for Mexico, where urban conditions change rapidly and municipal budgets require seeking high-impact, cost-effective solutions.
 

“In Mexico where urban conditions change rapidly and municipal budgets require seeking high-impact, cost-effective solutions”

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Regulatory design is also advancing. The NOM-004-SEDATU-2023 standard establishes criteria for the structure and design of urban roads to directly contribute to the safety of pedestrians, drivers, and passengers. In 2026, SEDATU (the Ministry of Agrarian, Territorial, and Urban Development) called on municipalities to use it as a tool for building safe, accessible, and inclusive streets.

It is integrated into the General Law on Mobility and Road Safety, established in 2022 because of the United Nations Decade of Action for Road Safety, which highlights the importance of the regulatory framework for reducing deaths and injuries from road accidents. This period of analysis also emphasizes the fight against disabling public spaces, placing universal and accessible design in cities as a priority for urban development.

THE NEXT STEP: ROAD ENGINEERING MADE FOR MEXICO

The true technological opportunity lies in integrating these capabilities. Adapting, appropriating global knowledge and making it work in local conditions. Innovating, combining infrastructure, data, regulations, and technology to solve specific problems. Inventing, to develop new methodologies and solutions when existing ones do not adequately address the Mexican reality.

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The future of road safety in Mexico will not depend solely on smarter vehicles or more modern roads. It will depend on the country's ability to implement a system in which infrastructure, technology, authorities, and users work together, considering and despite the budgetary constraints currently faced by public administrations at all levels of government.
 

“The future of road safety in Mexico will not depend solely on smarter vehicles or more modern roads. It will depend on the country's ability to implement a system in which infrastructure, technology, authorities, and users work together”

Mexico has a significant advantage: an extraordinarily diverse territory that serves as a vast mobility laboratory, in addition to the inventiveness and adaptability of its road engineering professionals. The response should not be simply to import solutions without modification, but rather to learn from them, adapt them, test them, and transform Mexican experience into exportable knowledge, given that Mexico is an important benchmark in the region. Therein lies the difference between simply adopting technology and developing a true national capacity for innovation in road safety.