ROADS across Warwickshire could become much safer to the tune of £600,000.
Warwickshire Police has agreed to invest the bumper sum of cash into making the roads safer by tackling speeding drivers.
Moves include spending cash on the latest technology, delivering impactful road safety campaigns and increasing the size of the Road Safety Unit by 35 additional people.
New technology focused on road safety includes a public access system that will enable the public to view their speeding offence, accept liability or nominate the driver responsible. This will be further supported by a new telephony system which will improve access to the department and the overall efficiency of the process.
Mobile enforcement capability will also be increased with the purchase of three new speed enforcement vans fitted out with the latest mobile camera technology – enabling officers to make roads safer across Warwickshire and identify perpetrators.
Part of the police force’s future demand comes as a result of HS2 because as well as managing speed enforcement and red light offences on the county’s roads and motorways, the WRSU also ensures speed compliance at roadwork sites.
The Warwickshire Community Speed Watch and Operation Snap schemes will also benefit from additional capacity to support these as they continue to grow.
The WRSU improvements form part of our broader Empower organisational change model. Through this model, the force is making a number of improvements to increase resources focused on crime prevention and protecting people from harm, and to ensure it can manage demand in a sustainable way.
These changes include the introduction of geographical command centres, new investigation teams for the resolution of local issues and investigation of high-risk crime like domestic abuse, rape and serious sexual offences, improved intelligence, improved offender management and greater focus on the prevention of crime.
Police and Crime Commissioner and Chair of Warwickshire Road Safety Partnership Philip Seccombe said: “Warwickshire Road Safety Partnership does not accept that people continue to die on our roads every year. As a partnership we have set the ambitious target of halving the number of people killed or seriously injured on our roads by 2030. Ensuring drivers travel at safe speeds in Warwickshire is key to this but a safe system isn’t all about enforcement and education.
“Partners are working together to look at all aspects of road safety to make roads safer and we have set up a number of working groups to look at safe road design, post collision response, safe speeds, safe road users and safe vehicle design.
“As well as enforcement, the Speed Working Group is looking at road design and management, setting appropriate speed limits, encouraging and advocating vehicle based speed limiting and raising awareness through education and communications that we all play a role in road safety by driving within the speed limit and at an appropriate speed for the road conditions.
“I will be monitoring the progress of these improvements closely to ensure this momentum continues and we do everything we can to make our roads as safe as possible in Warwickshire.”
