Road Safety Report What Do We Know?
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Road Safety Report What do we know? Acknowledgements We would like to thank our partners in working with us to provide this overview of road safety across Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Portsmouth and Southampton. With the sustained efforts of all those involved we can keep our communities SAFER. Data presented in this report has been supplied by each participating authority and organisation, and reflects their specific geographical areas covered. 2 Contents 1 Summary 2 Introduction 3 Methodology 4 What do we mean by road safety? 5 Hampshire Constabulary 5.1 Data analysis 5.2 Tackling road safety 6 Hampshire County Council 6.1 Data analysis 6.2 Tackling road safety 7 Hampshire Fire and Rescue 7.1 Data analysis 7.2 Tackling road safety 8 Isle of Wight Fire and Rescue 8.1 Data analysis 8.2 Tackling road safety 9 Portsmouth City Council 9.1 Data analysis 9.2 Tackling road safety 10 Southampton City Council 10.1 Data analysis 10.2 Tackling road safety 11 South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust 11.1 Data analysis 11.2 Tackling road safety 12 SpeedWatch 12.1 Data analysis 12.2 Tackling road safety 13 Survey 500 13.1 Data analysis 13.2 Public perceptions 14 Summary 15 Recommendations and Road Safety Priorities 16 Next Steps 17 References 3 1 Summary It is clear that there are many interconnected facets to road safety, many of which are interconnected. Road safety is not only about the physical aspects of driving such as the type of car, time of travel, or the weather conditions, but also increasingly about education and behaviour change. The influence of technology such as SatNavs, in-car Bluetooth, touch screens and multimedia in cars, can all be a factor in leading to a lapse in concentration and in the worst cases a fatal collision. Environmental factors such as road design and road signs, roads conditions (e.g. pot holes), glare and view obstructions can also feature. Road safety efforts combine the work of several agencies. Each organisation brings their expertise, a different perspective and innovation in how to raise awareness of road safety and reduce road casualties. We fully support the Hampshire County Council’s Economy Transport & Environment Select Committee Road Safety Task & Finish Group: Outcomes Report1 and seek to work in partnership to further support and enhance the work already being undertaken. The number of vehicles on the roads continues to increase. Since 2011, the number has increased by about 1.6 million in England, 142,000 in Scotland and 69,000 in Wales. With local and leisure drivers to commuters and tourists both from the UK and abroad, the driving experience of each person behind the wheel varies greatly, leading our roads to be unpredictable in nature. What we have seen is the variance in the boundaries that different authorities operate within. The only authorities covering the whole of Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Portsmouth and Southampton are the Police and Crime Commissioner’s Office and Hampshire Constabulary. The Police and Crime Commissioner’s plan is structured to deliver work that strengthens partnership working, acting as a facilitator between authorities to keep our communities SAFER. It is the Police and Crime Commissioner’s vision that Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, Portsmouth and Southampton are amongst the safest places to live, work and visit, with the PCC working to keep you, your family, your community SAFER2. 1 http://democracy.hants.gov.uk/documents/s14840/Road%20Safety%20Task%20and%20Finish%20Ou tcomes%20Report.pdf 2 https://www.hampshire-pcc.gov.uk/plan 4 2 Introduction Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Portsmouth and Southampton contain extensive road networks, as highlighted in the Cutting the Cost of Dangerous Roads: Full British EuroRAP 2017 results report. The road infrastructure across our region must withstand the wide variety of travel from residents, commuters, tourists and business to name a few. Hampshire has over 5,300 miles of roads, 1.9 million residents3 and an average of 39.75million4 day tourists visiting our region every year. The impact of road safety to families and communities who have lost someone to a fatality on the roads is immeasurable. What we can measure are the number and severity of accidents on our roads, enforcement activity (tickets issued, speed enforcement etc.), road improvements made following an accident and other recordable outcomes related to road safety. Hampshire has both a diverse rural and urban population. The contrast of lifestyles is mirrored on our roads, generating operational challenges for each authority responding to road safety and incidents. For example the Fire and Rescue service are concerned with the age of the vehicle as this affects the methods of rescue, and the severity of injury and risk to life following a collision. Where appropriate, Hampshire County Council will be able to facilitate the development and implementation of traffic management enhancements on a full cost recovery basis. All proposals are subject to assessment in order that any new measures are consistent with those implemented by the County Council across the Hampshire County Council area. Traffic management enhancements Town and Parish, District and Borough Councils can consider in their local communities include: Village gateways Enhanced village place name signs Traditional finger post signing Sign de-clutter works Temporary electronic Speed Limit Reminder signs Minor signs and carriageway lining alterations Bollards to prevent footway overrun Informal crossing points for pedestrians Keeping our communities SAFER is central to the delivery of the work being undertaken by the Police and Crime Commissioner’s office. Our PCC is committed to strengthening partnerships to work together to reduce crime, promote public safety and create vibrant, inclusive communities. Collaborative working with relevant authorities can strengthen and align good practice, raising the profile of road safety 3 2017 mid-year is 1,969,000 4 www.tourismsoutheast.com 5 through the Police and Crime Commissioner’s office. The findings will allow for consultation and form the basis for steering collaborative activity and campaigns. This report aims to summarise key areas of road safety for different authorities, look at differences between our local authority areas and public perception of road safety. 6 3 Methodology Road safety ‘What do we know?’ has been produced in recognition of risk of harm to Hampshire residents. Road safety impacts all our local authority areas and the topic sits across: Enforcement (Police) Rescue (Fire and Rescue) Accident and emergency (South Central Ambulance Service) Local authorities (prevention and enforcement) We coordinated and instigated this report through directly contacting partner agencies and requesting road safety data and information, utilising our public survey and open source information. Each relevant authority has a different operational response to road safety, and therefore different data. Efforts of each are relevant to and can be streamlined by aligning information. The Performance and Information team at the PCC’s office collated and analysed the information, and chaired a joint meeting to review the proposal to ensure a comprehensive report plan. We have used Police data5 (KSI Report for RPU6) and YouGov Profiles Data (market- based research). A data visualisation programme ‘Tableau’ has been utilised to visually represent some of the data gathered and public perceptions of road safety: https://public.tableau.com/profile/police.and.crime.commissioner.for.hampshire.isl e.of.wig#!/vizhome/Roadsafetywhatdoweknow_0/Story1 Each contributory authority has been summarised. 5 Business Objects 6 Killed and Seriously Injured report for Roads Policing Unit 7 4 What do we mean by road safety? Road safety can have many interpretations. Public understanding of road safety and road incidents can vary widely. Each authority taking part in the report provided their interpretation on what they believe constitutes road safety and killed and seriously injury (KSI). Key definitions used by the Department for Transport7 are widely adopted by authorities: Accident: Involves personal injury occurring on the public highway (including footways) in which at least one road vehicle or a vehicle in collision with a pedestrian is involved and which becomes known to the police within 30 days of its occurrence. Damage-only accidents, with no human casualties or accidents on private roads or car parks are not included. Each accident is classified according to the severity of the injury to the most seriously injured person involved in the accident. An injured casualty is coded as killed or as seriously or slightly injured by the police on the basis of information available within a short time of the accident. Casualty: A person killed or injured in an accident. Casualties are sub-divided into killed, seriously injured and slightly injured. Fatal accident: An accident in which at least one person is killed; other casualties (if any) may have serious or slightly injuries. Killed: Human casualties who sustained injuries which caused death less than 30 days. 7 https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-transport 8 5 Hampshire Constabulary 5.1 Data analysis Hampshire Constabulary has a dedicated Roads Policing Unit (RPU) which forms a part of the Joint Operations Unit (JOU) in collaboration with Thames Valley Police. This specialist policing unit focuses on keeping our roads safe and deploying an active presence across our communities. With 3 bases covering north, east and west of Hampshire and a combined Roads Policing/Firearms team on the Isle of Wight. There are three teams at each base covering our roads 24/7 with cover extending to the Isle of Wight out of hours. For 2016/17 RPU dealt with 33,000 calls for service for road related incidents and attended 17,000 additional calls for service in support of local policing. RPU were deployed to one in five of all Hampshire Constabulary’s emergency incidents, with an average response time of 13 minutes.