Work ongoing to make town’s roads safer as Warrington ranked 8th most dangerous place to drive in North West

WORK is ongoing to make Warrington’s roads safer as new research suggests the town is one of the most dangerous places to drive in the North West.

During Global Road Safety Week earlier this month, a report from consumer law company, Slater and Gordon, highlighted the most dangerous areas to travel, with Warrington ranked 8th in the North West. But Warrington Borough Council’s highway chiefs say the analysis has ranked the regions by ‘accidents per person’ and does not allow a reliable comparison to be made between areas where the nature of the road network, population, and travel cultures can vary significantly.

However, work is already underway to make the town’s roads safer. The council has recently removed the majority of traffic travelling through the town centre and is also launching two low traffic neighbourhoods projects which support this theme. This will reshape residential areas to make streets safer and more appealing for people to walk and cycle.

The Slater and Gordon report used the Department for Transport’s available road traffic accident data from 2018-2020 and expert insights and analysis from Slater and Gordon. It assesses incident hotspots involving personal injury, including the severity of injury, age of the victim and type of vehicle involved.

Liverpool came out top in the North West as the area where road users are most likely to be injured in a road accident with approximately 2,530 people, being injured in some type of collision. Manchester took second spot with approximately 2,450 people being hurt in a collision over the three-year period. Cheshire East saw 1,862, Cheshire West and Chester 1,656, Wirral 1,239 and Sefton, 1,145. Bolton experienced 1,105 on the roads and Warrington 1,061. To account for a variance in population numbers, the regions were ranked in relation to accidents per person.

The worst regions to travel in the North West, are as follows:
1. Liverpool
2. Manchester
3. Cheshire East
4. Cheshire West and Chester
5. Wirral
6. Sefton
7. Bolton
8. Warrington

While the most injuries on the road per capita in the North West occurred in Liverpool, those living in Scotland and Wales were most likely to be involved in a serious or fatal collision with 31% of accidents in Scotland and 24% in Wales deemed to be serious or fatal. Perhaps surprisingly given its size and volume of traffic, London came bottom of this list with 15% of accidents in the area classed as serious or fatal.

When it comes to cyclists, London was the least safe with one in five (19%) accidents in the city involving a bicycle user compared to 15% in the North West. Likewise, London was the least safe city for motorbike users with more than one in five (21%) accidents involving a motorbike whereas just 9% of accidents in the North West involved a motorbike.

Matt Jarvis, Chief Commercial & Insurance Services Officer at Slater and Gordon, said: “The data regarding road accidents and collisions is concerning to see. Collectively, drivers have a responsibility to ensure they are using the road in the safest way possible.

“Accidents will of course always happen but by raising awareness of the data during Road Safety Week, we really hope that those in the most prolific accident hotspots really take notice and think about their driving behaviours. Ultimately, we want to make the UK’s roads safer for everyone.”

“Of course, this data dates from before the Covid-19 pandemic and we know that the number of road traffic accidents did decrease significantly during periods of lockdown. However, we haven’t yet seen the full impact of post-Covid changes in road usage behaviour, nor the impact of recent changes to road policy or innovation in car manufacturing. It will be incredibly interesting to see the impact on our roads in 2021 and beyond and what measures road users, car manufacturers, and the Government take to safeguard all road users.”

A Warrington Borough Council spokesperson said: “Road safety is embedded across our transport policies and we continue to seek opportunities to prevent injury as a result of road traffic collisions through infrastructure improvements and promoting safer behaviour. Taking a comparison from the three-year averages from 2008 to 2010 and 2018 to 2020, the number of road traffic-related casualties in Warrington has reduced by 51%.

“The Slater & Gordon analysis has ranked the regions by ‘accidents per person’. The use of population is not always a useful denominator to indicate exposure to risk and does not allow a reliable comparison to be made between areas where the nature of the road network, population, and travel cultures can vary significantly. It may have been more useful for a second denominator to be used in the analysis such as miles travelled.

“Warrington is a good example of this as it is surrounded by motorway, meaning that the mileage covered is high for our population and geographical area. For example, in 2020, the Department for Transport estimated that Warrington saw 1.46 billion miles travelled on roads within its area. This is similar to Liverpool, which was noted as the most unsafe area, which saw 1.45 billion. Sefton, also noted in the table, saw 0.68 billion miles, which is 53% less than Warrington.

“We have ambitions to transform the way people travel and keeping people safe on our roads is a main priority. This report has been announced to coincide with Global Road Safety Week where the theme is ‘Streets for Life’. We have recently removed the majority of traffic travelling through our town centre and we are launching two low traffic neighbourhoods projects which supports this theme. This will reshape residential areas to make streets safer and more appealing for people to walk and cycle. We are also supporting the Cheshire-wide ‘Share the Road’ campaign to promote safer use of highways for everyone.”

A full copy of the report an viewed HERE