Simple Measures Save Lives: Tracking Data 2011

According to this year’s tracking survey by the Road Safety Foundation, ‘more than 300 people in the UK are alive today or have avoided the prospect of a lifetime of special care because just 15 roads have had simple improvements put in place’. On the 15 roads, fatal and serious crashes dropped 62% from 494 to 190. Entitled ‘Simple Measures Save Lives’,

This report shows that elementary safety measures are paying back the costs of investment in an average of 10 weeks: the savings are worth over £50m annually to emergency services, the NHS, local authority care, businesses and families.

This year’s most improved road is an 11km section of the A4128 through Buckinghamshire from Great Missenden to High Wycombe. Over the last two surveys, it has moved from one of Britain’s highest risk roads with to one of the safest. Over this time, fatal and serious collisions dropped by 89%, from 19 to two. Safety measures put in place include some new speed restrictions; and an innovative use of solar-powered road studs to improve night-time visibility.

Britain’s most persistently high risk roads are concentrated in the North West and East Midlands. Routes in these areas are rural single carriageway, challenging to drive, with frequent blind corners and sweeping bends. Lighter traffic allows higher speeds and opportunities for safe overtaking can be restricted.

Topping the list, once more, is the A537 Macclesfield to Buxton, known nationally as the Cat and Fiddle. This 12km section across the Peak District National Park has seen crashes rise by 62% in the last three years, with the equivalent of three fatal or serious injury crashes for every 3km. A 50mph single carriageway, the route has severe bends, steep falls from the carriageway and is edged by dry-stone walls or rock face for almost all of its length. Even with motorcycle collisions removed, the same road tops Britain’s 10 high risk roads.

This latest report marks 10 years of data from the Road Safety Foundation, and comes as the world joins together to tackle road casualties in the first UN Decade of Action for Road Safety.