People killed or seriously injured in road traffic accidents
This measures people killed or seriously injured (KSI) in road traffic accidents per billion vehicle miles.
2019 benchmarking performance
December 2020 performance
Between 1 January and 30
November 2020, the total number of reported injury collisions in West Sussex
dropped 22% against the same period in 2019. The decrease in collisions has led
to a 27% reduction in the number of casualties but most of these reductions
will mainly be a result of Covid 19 related travel restrictions. The number of
“Fatal” plus “Serious” casualties (KSIs) is down 10% on 2019 and while
car-occupants have seen a large drop in KSIs, the opposite is true of pedal
cyclists where there has been a disappointing 34% increase. The increase in
cycling KSIs appears to correspond with an uptake of cycling beginning in the
spring, at the time of the first pandemic lockdown.
The change to a new accident
recording system has meant it is not possible to directly compare KSI data with
years prior to 2019. However, adjusted KSI figures, provided by the Department
for Transport (DfT), suggests West Sussex is seeing a small year on year
increase. Following the DfT’s recent national release of the 2019 collision
data our reduction targets have been updated to include the performance of the
CIPFA local authorities.
Our on-going road safety
engineering schemes, education, training and publicity include:
- Our partnership with The
Sussex Safer Roads Partnership, which promotes a wide range of behavioural
change programmes.
- Our Road Safety Facebook
page, which allows us to engage with the community on road safety issues,
run educational campaigns and generates discussion and dialogue between
road users.
- 13 locations were
treated last year as part of an annual local safety programme that looks
to make road improvements to areas that have historically higher number of
road traffic accidents. Measures ranged from signing improvements,
resurfacing with high skid resistant materials, to altering junction
layouts.
Actions
The Road Safety Framework is being reviewed
and updated during 2020 with a stronger emphasis on the introduction of a "Safe Systems" approach to managing the network and identifying road safety
interventions.
In October 2019 two members of staff
completed the RoSPA Road Safety Engineering course; this is 10 days formal
Collision Investigation/Road Safety Engineering training, recognised as the
industry standard for road safety engineers.
Our new WSCC Road Safety Facebook page
expands our digital presence and allows us to engage with the community on road
safety issues, run educational campaigns and generate discussion and dialogue
between road users.
In 2018/19 a number of road safety schemes were developed including the introduction of a £2.4m road safety scheme on the A285 between Halnaker and Petworth. The works consist of building a hard strip between the road and the verge and a ribbed edge line, similar to the ones found on motorways and dual carriageways. More than half of the serious accidents on the A285 involve drivers leaving the road; the ribbed edge line will introduce an audible and tactile warning to drivers if they leave their lane.
Major road safety schemes comprising of road surfacing improvement were completed on the A280 Cricket Club and Waterworks bends and a junction improvement introduced on the A24 and Warnham.
Continued investment with £600k for road safety investigation and improvement schemes in 2019 comprising of a number of larger schemes including resurfacing and profiling bends on the B2133 Hughes Hill, Wisborough Green, reconfiguration of mini-roundabout junction on Portsmouth Road Lindfield, the design of a junction improvement at New Road on the A285 Boxgrove and treatments at 15 identified “black Spots” across the county. However it should be recognised that the benefits from road safety engineering schemes take time to translate into reductions in the casualty figures.
We are continuing to be an active partner within the Sussex Safer Roads Partnership promoting a wide range of behavioural change programmes and we are on target to train 10,000 year 6 pupils in BikeAbility Cycle Proficiency.