Watchdog criticises British government cycle safety policy

6 comments
By Richard Peace | Tuesday, May 19, 2009 7.03pm

A recent report from the Audit Commission - the body charged by the British government with measuring the effectiveness of its own policies - has concluded its policy to reduce cycling and walking deaths and casualties is a victim of its own rather confusing information.

Of particular concern is the fact -- revealed in the report -- that the number of cyclists killed or seriously injured fell from 2000 to 2004, but rose again by 11 percent from 2004 to 2007, despite the amount of cycling staying broadly constant.

Whilst there is a general pat on the back -- the Department of Transport (DfT) is currently on track to meet its overall targets for big reductions in the number of killed and seriously injured on the roads -- the report questions the statistical methods and information gathering on which its cyclist and pedestrian injury figures are based.

The two most damning overall criticisms are:

1. The DfT 'does not have an explicit strategy' for working with those who are supposed to deliver reductions in cyclist and pedestrian injuries and deaths.

2. The DfT 'disseminates to much information that is insufficiently focused.' Overall, information should be more detailed, more technical and more practical.  

Other weaknesses include:

* The department's own figures under the 'Killed and Seriously Injured' (KSI) heading do not distinguish between the two categories, so masking the complex reality of what is actually happening.

* Some types of serious injury are under-recorded. Specifically the DfT should compare the police data they use alongside hospital admissions as well as looking at other sources of information such as motor injury compensation claims. All this would help give a more rounded view of trends.

* Evidence shows 20mph limits can reduce cycle casualties by up to nearly a third. However the DfT has been ineffective in sharing such success stories with poorly performing local councils and encouraging their take up nationally.

The report also provides some eye-opening background statistics when setting the context for its report:

* The Department for Transport’s budget for its own road safety activities in 2008-9 was £36 million.

Related articles

Related links

BikeRadar is not responsible for the content of external websites

* In 2007 over 30,000 pedestrians and over 16,000 cyclists were injured with 646 pedestrians and 136 cyclists killed. The National Audit Office (NAO) estimates that casualties for these two groups cost the economy over £3.4 billion in addition to the inevitable distress and health problems for the victims and their families.

* The UK was fourth highest out of 14 European nations in 2006 for the least number of cyclist deaths per head of population.

* Over the last 30 years the average distance people cycle annually has fallen by 24 percent. Although cycling levels have stabilised over the last decade they have shown no sign of a major recovery on a national level.

For more information, visit www.nao.org.uk.

You can follow BikeRadar on Twitter at twitter.com/bikeradar and on Facebook at facebook.com/BikeRadar.

You might also like...

User Comments

There are 6 comments on this post

Showing 1 - 6 of 6 comments

  • 20mph limits reduce cycling deaths by a third? If deaths are the only criteria for governing our road policy then why not make it 10mph, or 5mph?

    I think there is good argument for temporary speed restriction zones like we currently have around some schools at arrival and home time. However we all know that putting 20mph zones all over cities and reducing the national speed limit to 50mph will simply be used to generate income from cameras.

  • Groan! No 20 MPH is fine because of the difference in survival rates that exsist when a hard object (a car) hits a soft object (a pedestrian or a cyclist) Oh and Daz where exactly are you going that you NEED to do 30MPH rather than 20? I think death and serious injury as a criteria for speed limits is more important than a few minutes journey time to the newsagent or car boot sale

  • The car that nearly killed me was going slower than me, probably about 10-15mph; the problem was that he wasn't looking, not how fast he was going.

    Slapping 20mph limits on urban roads will just lead to widespread defiance of the law unless ruthlessly enforced by cameras, and people are already upset enough about that.

  • Interesting that the speedophiles always say that they support lowered limits but only around schools and for restricted time periods.I guess they must think it is OK for children to be killed in the streets outside their homes or on the way to school, as long as it doesn`t actually happen right outside the school gates at 8.30 - 9am or 3.30 - 4pm!

    Whilst it is true that `The Great British Motorist` is notoriously resistant to any attempts to control their behaviour, countries like Holland show that the widespead use of 20 Mph zones can be made to work. Perhaps the real answer is the rapid introduction of Intelligent Speed Adaptation systems. Surely any responsible driver would welcome such technolgy, given that it guarantees that they will never `accidentally drift over the limit` and get a fine as a consequence? It would also deprive the government of the revenue from fines. Sorted!

  • I wonder if the 11 percent increase in the "killed or seriously injured" statistics between 2004 and 2007 is linked to the trend for more people wearing a helmet?

  • While I believe 20mph zones in the correct areas should be implemented, blanket application would cause even more disrespect to speed limits because they may not be valid for the road/area/conditions.

    The biggest improvements in safety would be if we improved training and awareness for all road users (cars, lorries, buses and cyclists). I am not aware of any other skill where we have to pass a test but can then be left without further training or top ups for the rest of our lives. How often do people refer to the Highway Code once they've passed their tests? What slim percentage of drivers have passed IAM/RoSPA advanced driver training? How often do we drive somewhere and not actually think about where we've been or where we are, mindlessly going through a series of actions without really paying full attention to the road, conditions and other users. Speed is one factor to be addressed, but is heavily dependent on the conditions and environment, a limit should not be applied wholesale.

    If you could fix the skill and awareness levels, the accident and KSI rates would plummet.

Post a Comment:

You need to login or register to post comments.