Memorandum from the Technical Advisors
Group (TAG) (RS 62)
As you may recall the Technical Advisors Group
(TAG) represents a large number of local authorities in the country,
these include those with highway and transport responsibilities;
such as Transport for London, most London boroughs, Metropolitan
authorities, Unitary authorities and also many of the districts
and towns in two tier authorities—where the county is responsible
for Transport Issues. All our authorities have road safety responsibilities.
We are 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?
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.
In hindsight, having targets was probably the
most important factor in the achievement of GB's excellent casualty
reductions through the 1990s.
2. MEASURES
What further measures need to be adopted to reduce
deaths and injuries arising from drinking and driving?
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. Given society's support of the drink-drive laws, it
should be politically possible to have a regime where there is
a high likelihood of being stopped and tested. 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.
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 possibly
other metropolitan areas and these are very likely linked to criminality.
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
some areas of the country 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?
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.
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.
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.
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?
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. But this is not the whole story accidents
per trip would also be a useful comparator when a common objective
of transport is to provide accessibility not mobility.
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.
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 urban areas, 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?
Many of our authorities report increasing difficulty
in recruiting and retaining skilled and experienced engineering,
road safety and planning staff. Many of the problems relate to
an ageing base of professional staff 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.
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 generally 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.
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. 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.
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.
Professionally recognised qualifications are
also an issue that needs to be considered. Nationally there are
a number of academic and vocational qualifications, which could
serve the industry well. However without the support and endorsement
by Government and it's respective departments, especially in the
area of vocational qualifications, they will not be well supported
by employers.
6. OTHER POLICIES
What further policies, not already widely used,
might be considered for adoption and what evidence there is for
their success?
New technology has an increasingly important
part to play in reducing collisions. In a number of authorities
we are keen to pilot the use of time-distance cameras to enforce
low speeds in 20mph 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
should be in a position to use them to enforce speeds in 20mph
zones, as well as on lengths of major roads. 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.
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.
As mentioned in para 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.
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.
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.
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.
TAG has consistently regretted the changes which
make camera positions very obvious. This has engendered a large
group of scoff laws who know the positions of cameras and flagrantly
disobey the limits between cameras. Motorists are far more likely
to keep to limits if they do not know where cameras are located.
Speeding seems to be the only area of crime enforcement where
criminals have to be informed so well that they may be being observed.
We would however suggest that any changes to the present regime
of highly visible cameras is accompanied by appropriate publicity,
improvement in speed signing and efforts from the highest level
on culture change.
7. PRIORITIES
POST 2010
What should be the priorities for government in
considering further targets for casualty reduction beyond 2010?
Priorities should shift away from vehicle occupants
towards vulnerable road users.
Road Safety should not be seen in isolation
but as an integral part of other policies including health, environment
and sustainability.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
— GB should adopt the "vision
zero" as an over-arching philosophy, supported by more casualty
reduction targets.
February 2008
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