Memorandum from Transport for London (TfL)
(RS 43)
INTRODUCTION
Transport for London (TfL) is grateful for the
opportunity to contribute to the Committee's inquiry into Road
Safety. We have set out our comments in accordance with the inquiry's
terms of reference as follows.
1. TARGETS
To what extent have targets for casualty reduction
been a useful tool for focusing professional activity?
1.1 Road safety professionals agree that
the original road safety target setting in the mid/late 1980s
was instrumental in raising the profile of road deaths and increasing
the resources allocated to casualty prevention. The national targets
provided a focus for road safety activities, demonstrated real
and long-term support from national government that cascaded to
local government and led to increased resources for road safety.
2. MEASURES
What further measures need to be adopted to reduce
deaths and injuries arising from drinking and driving?
2.1 Our view is that this is very largely
an enforcement issue. The research supports the view that good
benefits could be achieved if the current levels of blood alcohol
were better enforced. This would require significantly higher
levels of traffic policing and more police resources. The Select
Committee is well aware of the view of road safety professionals,
who as a body oppose the recent trend of less roads policing.
There would be very substantial road safety benefits from higher
levels of visible policing.
2.2 There is evidence that drivers without
licences, MOT, tax, insurance, etc are much more likely to be
involved in serious road traffic collisions. Hit and run collisions
make up a quarter of all collisions in some London boroughs and
these are often linked to criminality. A recent TfL-Metropolitan
Police Force operation (FOIST) impounded 1,894 "illegal"
vehicles in a month.
2.3 The issue of driving while under the
influence of drugs (both legal and illegal) is also very important.
Although it is difficult to obtain robust data, the view is held
that in London drug driving is an equal problem to drink driving.
3. GB VERSUS
EU
How does Great Britain compare with other EU countries
in its approach to reducing deaths and injuries?
3.1 This is a difficult question to answer
as there is no single approach to road safety in UK authorities,
just as there is no single approach across Europe. Our response
to this question is therefore more of a comparison between countries
identifying where UK is in the lead and where we could learn from
others.
3.2 Many UK authorities have strong data
collection (Stats 19) systems, which provide a good understanding
of the collision problems and allow value-for-money interventions
aimed at achieving targets. The data collection (Stats 19) process
is well-developed and generally well supported in the UK, whereas
some other EU countries are less well served in terms of data.
We identify collision data, collection, analysis and research
as areas where the UK is strong and other countries could look
to the UK. The importance of data is not always understood in
some EU countries. The idea of getting best value for road safety
interventions is also not as well developed in other EU countries.
3.3 Numerous EU projects over the past 20
years have encouraged contact between EU countries on the subject
of road safety and while more could be done, many European ideas
have been taken on board in the UK. An example is the Dutch "woonerf"
city traffic calming concept. This has been adapted to UK conditions
in the form of 20 mph zones, which offer much better value-for-money.
3.4 The issue of National Government support
is very important for road safety, as evidenced by the astonishingly
successful French initiative to reduce road deaths—largely
by reducing speeds on main rural roads using enforcement and cameras—led
by President Jacques Chirac in 2002. Deaths on French roads fell
from 7,721 in 2001 to 5,232 in 2004. Our view is that road safety
would benefit hugely from a Government champion (Cabinet Minister
or the Prime Minister) and strong Government support.
4. ROAD VERSUS
OTHER MODES
How do approaches in reductions in risk on the
roads compare to those adopted in other modes of transport?
4.1 The other travel modes that are most
often compared with roads are train, air and water. Relative risk
figures are published every year by the DfT and highlight the
differences in both numbers killed and risk per kilometre travelled.
The figures of killed per billion km for 2005 are: Air = 0.0;
Rail = 0.4; Water = 0.3; Bus/coach = 0.2; Car = 2.6; Motorcycle
= 111; Cycle = 33; Pedestrian = 36.
4.2 Why does society accept much higher
injury/death rates on the roads? There is a view that it is linked
with control. For modes where one is just a passenger and someone
else is doing the driving, a high level of safety is demanded.
Major rail/air accidents give rise to public enquiries with recommendations
that often lead to new legislation. Wholesale changes are made
to fleets of aeroplanes and trains. A classic example is the removal
of all slam-door trains, which entailed the investment of hundreds
of millions of pounds, in order to save one or two deaths every
year. The equivalent investment in road safety could have saved
hundreds of lives.
4.3 The car is seen by society as an instrument
of freedom and the price of this freedom is accepted as the occasional
crash. Society appears to accept this cost, sublimely believing
that a crash will never happen to them. This is obviously not
true as crashes happen to somebody. For a car driver, particularly
in London, any crash is likely to involve serious injury to someone
outside the vehicle (not the driver). This cost is therefore largely
borne by cyclists and pedestrians. The threat from motorised traffic
is a major issue for cycling and walking lobby groups, as the
use of sustainable travel becomes increasingly important.
5. STAFF SKILLS
Are there specific blockages caused by shortages
of appropriately trained and skilled staff?
5.1 TfL and our suppliers are facing increasing
difficulty in recruiting and retaining skilled and experienced
engineering and planning staff. Many of the problems relate to
an ageing base of engineers and planners which, in the main, is
due to a decline in numbers of trainees and graduates entering
the professions in recent years. This is exacerbated by a buoyant
national and international market.
5.2 The relatively small number of road
safety professionals is a major limitation on what can be achieved
and how quickly. While there are good levels of skill and knowledge
in the road safety profession, it is still a very small community.
Road safety is not seen as a career in itself, but rather as something
to be done for a limited time to broaden the CV. This needs to
change.
5.3 What would encourage more people into
road safety? Having more resources available would be a starting
point. If budgets were larger then teams would be bigger, jobs
more challenging and salaries higher. Heads of road safety need
to have a senior position and influence in the Authority. It is
currently very rare for this to be the case; far more frequently
road safety is part of "Environment" or "Transport".
It is also important to have continuity of funding and the knowledge
that the team and projects are going to be sustained into the
future.
5.4 Rather than think about road safety
in isolation, it is becoming more usual to link road safety with
other agendas such as health, environment and sustainability.
This has benefits in ensuring that solutions meet a number of
policy priorities and initiatives do not happen in isolation.
6. OTHER POLICIES
What further policies, not already widely used,
might be considered for adoption and what evidence there is for
their success?
6.1 New technology has an increasingly important
part to play in reducing collisions. In London we are keen to
pilot the use of time-distance cameras to enforce low speeds in
20 mph zones. New technology time-distance cameras have been developed
that do not require expensive cabling between camera sites. Once
these have received Home Office approval, we intend to use them
to enforce speeds in 20 mph zones, as well as on lengths of major
trunk road in London. There is a lot of research evidence which
shows that these cameras have the potential to halve collisions
on the routes and zones they cover.
6.2 A second initiative is Intelligent Speed
Adaptation (ISA), which ultimately could use vehicle technology
to encourage and indeed keep cars to the posted speed limit. The
first requirement of an ISA system is a reliable and regularly
updated digital speed limit map. Such a map has been developed
for London and will be launched in Spring 2008. Research by Leeds
University has indicated that, if all vehicles had advisory ISA
(where the driver is warned of the speed limit), collisions would
reduce by more than 10%. For mandatory ISA systems (where vehicle
speed is controlled to the speed limit automatically, other than
when emergency driver override is necessary), benefits could be
up to a 35% reduction in casualties.
6.3 As mentioned in paragraph 3.4 above,
there is potential in having centralised initiatives and a senior
Government champion, similar to the French example. Road Safety
professionals often feel isolated and not supported by Government
and would be encouraged and motivated by more centrally championed
programmes.
6.4 Previous DfT initiatives have centred
on demonstration projects and they have provided money to authorities
to undertake trials. Examples are "Safer City" in Gloucester
and "Inner City" in Birmingham. While these have been
beneficial, they have not led to major changes or higher levels
of road safety interventions across the UK.
6.5 One possible way to secure major change
and increase the level of intervention would be for DfT to produce
a digital speed limit map of England and support the introduction
of ISA; firstly as an advisory option and later as mandatory on
selected vehicle fleets. This would be a far more effective way
to encourage motor manufacturers to factory equip vehicles for
ISA, than for London to have to do this more or less alone.
6.6 Another policy change option would be
to review the funding of Safety Camera Partnerships to encourage
the use of technology and to provide additional funding streams.
Much more could be achieved with safety cameras if the fine income
could be used for increasing the camera activity and funding other
road safety activities. The current arrangements provide fixed
funding to Partnerships which are not directly linked to the amount
of fine income generated. If the grant funding were linked to
the previous year's fine income, then Partnerships with the potential
to increase activity could continue to grow. Under current arrangements
this is not possible as grants are more-or-less fixed for the
foreseeable future. We know that safety cameras reduce collisions
by 40-50%, so encouraging more usage has proven safety benefits.
It would be important to communicate this sensitively to avoid
criticism of cameras as just a revenue generating exercise, but
this could be linked to a more coherent approach to safety camera
communication across the country.
7. PRIORITIES
POST 2010
What should be the priorities for government in
considering further targets for casualty reduction beyond 2010?
7.1 Priorities should shift away from vehicle
occupants towards vulnerable road users.
7.2 Road Safety should not be seen in isolation
but as an integral part of other policies including health, environment
and sustainability.
7.3 The problems associated with an ageing
population will also need consideration in the near future. Older
people are more fragile and are over-represented in serious and
fatal collisions.
7.4 More resources need to be made available
to the road safety profession. Road safety is a relatively straight-forward
business. The more resources that can be applied, the greater
the benefits and results achieved. Increased resourcing would
also reflect positively on road safety as a profession and encourage
others to join a worthwhile enterprise. The techniques are largely
tried and tested and well understood by the profession. The number
of road safety professionals could be increased and staff "brought
up to speed" relatively quickly, if the budgets were available.
There are sufficient professionals to give confidence that enlarged
road safety programmes could be delivered and provide value-for-money.
7.5 Targets have worked in the past and
should be continued into the future. Simple numerical targets
are the easiest to understand, but can prove too challenging when
numbers change quickly over time. Casualty rate targets can be
useful for modes where numbers are changing relatively rapidly,
but need clear guidance and support in terms of measurements of
exposure (eg measure cycling km per year). This could be costly.
7.6 GB should adopt "vision zero".
This is a very powerful vision that has the same philosophy as
used on other modes—air, rail and water—that no deaths
are acceptable and we should work towards reducing them to zero.
For roads this is a very, very long-term vision and is by no means
incompatible with having casualty reduction targets.
7.7 The DfT could (and should) get more
directly involved in supporting road safety interventions. The
time for research is over; we should be doing things. Rather than
fund "pilot trials" we need funded interventions that
make a difference.
7.8 The DfT should take the lead on encouraging
new technology—cameras and speed limiters. More could be
done to allow camera fine income to be used back in road safety
(rather than disappearing into the Treasury). Providing a digital
speed limit map of England to encourage the introduction of ISA
would not be difficult. London did this in less than 12 months.
Controlling vehicle speeds through ISA, coupled with a lowering
of speed limits, would significantly reduce deaths and serious
injuries and provide for greater opportunities for cyclists and
pedestrians to share the road safely, without costly special measures
applied to constrained road space.
CONCLUSIONS
— Road safety needs more resources.
The more resources that can be applied, the greater the benefits
and results achieved.
— While the risk of using the roads
will remain much higher than using trains, aeroplanes or ships
for the foreseeable future, we should be doing much more to equalise
the level of acceptable risk across the modes. Why does Society
accept over 3,000 deaths a year on the roads? We know how to prevent
these deaths, and should do more to change society's view about
road deaths.
— The main threat posed by car drivers
is to pedestrians and cyclists and we need to make this clearer
to society and do more to protect the vulnerable road users. The
risks of an ageing population also need to be considered and we
need to continue to educate the young in safe use of the roads.
— We need to encourage the road safety
profession by increasing the size of budgets and giving confidence
that funding will be available into the future.
— New technology has a major part to
play in the future of road safety. Time-distance cameras could
be used to enforce low speeds in 20 mph zones, replacing road
humps. Intelligent Speed Adaptation (ISA) also has huge potential
for casualty savings, especially when it is mandatory. Keeping
traffic to the speed limit could reduce average speeds by 5 to
10 mph; reducing the number of people killed or seriously injured
by a third.
February 2008
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