SECTION 3

SPEED MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES

3.1 City of York Speed Management Plan

York City Council has pioneered a danger reduction approach to speed management since the 1980s, and as a result has met national casualty reduction targets well in advance of target dates. The Road Danger Reduction Charter is the basis of its Road Safety Strategy. The Charter pledges the Council to:

• Seek a genuine reduction in danger for all road users by identifying and controlling the principal sources of threat.
• Find new measures to define the level of danger on our roads. These would more accurately monitor the use of and threat to benign modes.
• Discourage the unnecessary use of private motor transport where alternative benign modes or public transport are equally or more viable.
• Pursue a transport strategy for environmentally sustainable travel based on developing efficient, integrated public transport systems. This recognises that current levels of motor traffic should not increase.
• Actively promote cycling and walking, which pose little threat to other road users, by taking positive and coordinated action to increase the safety and mobility of these benign modes.
• Promote the adoption of this charter as the basis of both national and international transport policy.

(a) Traffic routes

Defined as: the busy main roads important for getting about the city and also the main bus and emergency vehicle routes; target speed 40mph and above.
Measures to achieve the target: ‘soft traffic calming’ such as pedestrian crossings and cycle lanes. This network is generally free from vertical measures (eg road humps).

(b) Mixed priority routes

Defined as: also important for getting around but which go through villages and past schools, where slower speeds are appropriate; target speed 30mph.
Measures to achieve the target: some vertical measures (speed cushions, road humps) targeted at areas where there are concerns.

(c) Residential areas

Defined as: all the other roads on the plan, where the needs of residents will generally have priority over traffic; target speed 20mph. Measures to achieve the target: a full range of traffic calming measures could be applied (road humps, chicanes, mini-roundabouts etc) where there are casualty problems and residents support the measures.

The Council consulted widely on a draft plan, which was then amended in the light of comments from the emergency services, parish councils and groups representing the mobility impaired. The consultation involved:

• a mobile exhibition
• a survey of the views of 1,500 residents
• parish councils and neighbourhood forums
• emergency services and road user organisations
• direct contact by the public with officers drafting the plan

Indicators

• proportion of residential areas which are home zones or 20mph zones
• compliance with speed limits in urban areas

• all of York’s 60 primary schools and 12 secondary schools to have 20mph school safety zones (at a rate of about 12 per year)

York City Council also works in partnership with North Yorkshire Police in an anti-speeding campaign to highlight that speeding is not likely to save motorists time, since they often just reach the next traffic queue sooner and have to wait longer. They may, on the other hand, be caught for speeding.

Contact:

Ken Spence
Road Safety Team
Environment and Development Services
City of York Council
9 St Leonard’s Place
York YO1 7ET
(tel: 01904 613 161)

3.2 Devon County Council Speed Management Strategy

The Devon and Cornwall Constabulary report speeding to be the prime contributory factor in a third of all crashes involving injury in Devon. As part of its strategy to address road safety, Devon County Council has produced its own definition of speed management:

There are nine objectives for the implementation of the strategy. These are divided into three headings focused on (a) driver awareness and attitudes, (b) designing for lower speeds, and (c) improving compliance with speed limits:

(a) Influencing the awareness and attitudes of the driving community

Devon County Council has also developed a community-based campaign with video and action packs, entitled Driving Speeds Down in Devon. The campaign seeks not only to reduce the number of casualties but also to improve the quality of life in communities throughout the county by reducing the impact that excessive vehicle speeds have upon them. The campaign gives support and resources to local communities to play an active role in driving down speeds – for example, by establishing local traffic groups, getting residents who are motorists to sign a pledge committing them to ‘drive at a safe speed, treating the speed limit as an ABSOLUTE MAXIMUM’.

The initial assumption is that every community is as much perpetrator as it is victim – in other words, that speed problems are generated by the very communities which suffer from them. According to the County Council, this is not a moral judgement but a practical one. The approach recognises that there is a need to get beyond the arguments that others are to blame, that the community is defenceless against the faceless, inconsiderate drivers who destroy the quality of life of a locality simply by passing through it – and also that the community can do nothing without the assistance of the local authority and the police (Phillips, 2000).

Contact:

Road Safety Group
Environment Directorate
Lucombe House
County Hall
Exeter EX2 4QW
(tel: 01392 382 118)

3. 3 Gloucester Safer City: City-wide demonstration project

The Gloucester Safer City project is a city-wide demonstration project running from April 1996 to March 2001, the only one of its kind in the UK. Over £5 million of road safety improvements in the city, funded through DETR, have been planned (equivalent to 30 years’ worth of road safety work in the space of five years). The project is based on a comprehensive approach to speed management, with the following key ingredients:

• working within the framework set by Gloucestershire’s Sustainable Transport Plan
• extensive education and awareness campaigning, consultation and partnership, including the involvement of emergency services, bus operators and the police
• analysis of traffic flows and speeds, crash casualty records for the entire city and existing land uses
• a new road hierarchy for the city

Area-wide traffic calming measures on mixed use and residential roads (which now cover 70% of the city) lengthen journey times and encourage commuter traffic to use the main roads. Traffic volumes on the sensitive roads are thereby reduced, allowing reallocation of road space to pedestrians, cyclists and public transport. Facilities which give greater priority to non-car modes are managed so that they also contribute to speed reduction. For example, pedestrian delays at signal-controlled crossings have been cut by 50%, reducing risk-taking by pedestrians while slowing traffic with minimal complaint from motorists.

On main roads, high-profile enforcement of speed limits is used as a speed control tool. The aim is to achieve wholesale reductions in speed by raising driver awareness of issues such as the consequences of speeding, and thus changing behaviour. This is achieved by convincing drivers that there is an active speed reduction campaign in place throughout the city.

In particular, Gloucester Safer City has recognised that the majority of drivers perceive the risk of getting caught for speeding as low, as typically it is only the worst offenders who are prosecuted. To ensure better compliance with speed limits, Safer City and the police established a partnership to develop a comprehensive programme of enforcement, both mobile and at fixed locations.

A service level agreement with the police sets out terms and conditions for the use of in-car video and recording equipment purchased by Gloucester County Council, including a requirement that the police provide the Council with quarterly records of successful prosecutions brought through use of the equipment. The agreement also requires the police to take part in publicity campaigns and to provide video footage of offending behaviour for use in such campaigns.

Mobile detection

A laser gun (similar to a radar gun but more sophisticated) is in daily use by dedicated police enforcement officers. Mobile speed detection routinely takes place at agreed sites that have a history of speed-related crashes. As the project progresses and more speed reduction improvements are installed, the police will be able to focus more attention on the remainder of the road network. During 1999 a total of 1,920 drivers were caught for speeding from mobile detection sites in Gloucester. In addition, in-car video cameras have been installed in two patrol cars. Both cars travel approximately 800 miles a week and the video camera continuously records the behaviour of drivers (Gloucester Safer City, 1998).

Fixed detection

Speed cameras have been installed at sites with a history of speed-related crashes. An automatic film processor has been in use since May 1997 to deal with red light running and speeding offences. In just over a year, nearly 15,000 offenders have been caught in the county of Gloucestershire, with offences being processed within 24 hours. Since April 1997 a conditional offer system has been in operation whereby motorists not contesting the offence are given a fixed penalty rather than being taken to court. During 1999 a total of 1,477 drivers were caught for speeding from fixed detection sites in Gloucester.

The seven permanent speed camera sites are visible and prominent to drivers, and alert them to the high profile given to camera-based enforcement in the city. Together with signs warning drivers to slow down when entering Gloucester and posters stating the total of fines paid and driving licence points issued, the message conveyed is that if drivers choose to speed, then it is only a matter of time before they get caught. The implication of speeding and its routine enforcement is also a frequent subject in Safer City’s monthly advertisements in a local newspaper.

Results

The results indicate that the project has already been a success. By July 1999 Gloucester Safer City had achieved:

• 47% reduction in personal injury casualties
• 5mph reduction in speeds on treated main roads and 10mph reduction on mixed use and residential roads
• a significant (1.2mph) reduction in speeds on 49 roads in the city
• 15% reduction in motor traffic on mixed used and residential roads
• evidence of traffic evaporation and modal shift for journeys to work through increased cycling and use of public transport
• 60% of people surveyed feeling safer than they did five years ago

Paul Bellotti
Safer City Project
Herbert Warehouse
The Docks
Gloucester GL1 2EQ
(tel: 01452 396 873)

3.4 References for Section 3

Bellotti, P (2000) Safer City Project – Gloucester, paper presented at Aston University conference, Reducing Traffic Impacts on Local Communities, November 2000

City of York Council (1996) Killing Speed – Saving Lives: Speed Management Plan

City of York Council (1997) Planning and Transport Committee, Speed Management Plan – Consultation Results, 19 June 1997

City of York Council (1999) Safely Together – Road Safety in York

City of York Council (1999) What’s the point of speeding?

City of York Council (2000) Local Transport Plan 2000, Executive Summary

City of York Council (2000) Road Safety Strategy 2000

Devon County Council (undated) Driving Speeds Down in Devon: Community Action Pack

Devon County Council (undated) Driving Speeds Down in Devon: Business Action Pack

Devon County Council (1999) Speed Management Strategy for Devon

Devon County Council (1999) Driving Speeds Down in Devon: Community Action Video

Gloucester Safer City (1998) A mid term report, Gloucester: Gloucester Safer City

Phillips, J (2000) Speed management in rural communities: A local authority approach, IHT Southwest seminar, 12 July 2000

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