£50M boost for safer roads
Almost £50M is to be invested in road safety improvements through the third round of the government’s Safer Roads Fund.
Improvements will be made to 27 of the most high-risk roads in England, which will help prevent fatal and serious injuries.
Safety improvements covered by the fund include re-designing junctions and improving signage and road markings.
The programme will reduce the risk of collisions which will in turn reduce congestion, journey times and emissions. As part of the fund, government is continuing to deliver a wide range of improvements across all roads, while working with local authorities and safety groups.
To date, £100M has been provided through the programme to improve the 50 most dangerous roads in England, the majority of which are rural roads.
Transport Secretary Mark Harper said: “Britain’s roads are some of the safest in the world, but we are always looking at ways to help keep drivers and all road users safe.
“We’re injecting £47.5M so that local councils around the country have the support they need to keep everyone safe, while reducing congestion and emissions and supporting local economies.”
The allocation to 27 different schemes has been based on data independently surveyed and provided by the Road Safety Foundation. The data analysed is based on a road safety risk, looking at data on those killed and seriously injured alongside traffic levels.
The previous rounds of the Safer Roads Fund programme focused on treating the 50 highest-risk local ‘A road’ sections in England with enhanced road safety engineering interventions. The scheme is set to prevent around 1,450 fatal and serious injuries over the next 20 years.
According to Road Safety Foundation analysis, early estimates suggest that the investment should prevent around 760 fatal and serious injuries over the next 20 years.
This additional investment builds on the government’s plans to recruit a specialised team of inspectors to build the country’s first ever Road Safety Investigation Branch. The team will look at how and why incidents happen and build an enhanced understanding of how we can better mitigate collisions.
The 27 schemes receiving funding from the Safer Roads Fund 3 are:
Road Local authority Funding
A586 Blackpool Council £1,100,000
A35 Bournemouth Borough Council £1,890,625
A2010 Brighton and Hove City Council £600,000
A52 Derby City £475,000
A104 Essex County Council £1,360,000
A35 Hampshire County Council £6,040,000
A5183 Hertfordshire County Council £1,800,000
A165 Hull City Council £2,990,625
A3056 Isle of Wight Council £2,140,000
A5105 Lancashire County Council £920,000
A5038 Liverpool City Council £859,375
A186 Newcastle Upon Tyne City Council £3,650,000
A6130 Nottingham City Council £950,000
A609 Nottingham City Council £475,000
A4158 Oxfordshire County Council £800,000
A4165 Oxfordshire County Council £875,000
A2047 Portsmouth City Council £1,300,000
A6022 Rotherham Metro. Borough Council £750,000
A6042 Salford City Council £743,750
A4030 Sandwell Metro. Borough Council £750,000
A625 Sheffield City Council £1,425,000
A3025 Southampton City Council £875,000
A13 Southend-on-Sea Council £3,425,000
A1156 Suffolk County Council £1,275,000
A25 Surrey County Council £1,800,000
A439 Warwickshire County Council £1,320,000
A3102 Wiltshire Council £6,980,000