The Vale Council is a road safety leader
The
Vale of Glamorgan already has the highest ratio of 20mph zones to
schools than any other county in Wales, and the Vale Council is set
to add even more.
There are currently seventeen 20mph zones, protecting 21 schools
– nearly half of the county's schools – and thanks to new funding
that number should continue to increase.
The new funding, from sources including the Safe Routes to
School initiative, will help provide another four zones,
safeguarding pupils at five schools.
The very first 20mph zone in the Vale of Glamorgan was provided
with money from the original Road Safety Grant in 2000 and since
then the Council has installed at least one zone each year.
Vale Council cabinet member for planning and transportation,
Cllr Chris Williams, said: "Children are most likely to be injured
in their first year at high school, so the council is trying
particularly hard to ensure as safe an environment as possible
outside every one of our comprehensive schools.
"The preferred option is to install a 20 mph zone and, where
this is not possible, other remedial measures such as zebra,
pelican, puffin and even toucan crossings have been installed
either directly outside schools, or at higher risk areas along the
routes to schools.
"I am very pleased with the progress to date, as by the end of
this year the majority of our senior schools will have the benefits
of a 20 mph zone and nearly every senior school will also have had
additional safety features constructed.”
The main advantage of a 20mph zone is that it reduces both the
number of collisions and casualties as well as reducing the
severity of any accidents that do occur by reducing speeds. A study
of 250 20mph zones in the UK as a whole has found that:
• average speeds have fallen by 9mph
• the annual number of total collisions has fallen by 60%
• the number of collisions involving children has fallen by
67%
• collisions involving cyclists have fallen by 29%
Local authorities are now legally entitled to set speed limits
to 20mph on individual roads or within whole areas, or "zones", in
residential areas, town centres, outside schools and on roads used
by cyclists, pedestrians and horse riders.
Residents generally support the zones and feel that they have
been
successful in both reducing speeds and making their communities
safer and more pleasant places to live.
Speed has particular implications for the health and well being
of people in built-up areas. In addition to direct injuries that
may be sustained at the time of a speed-related collision, there
are often longer-term physical and psychological effects.
05/12/2007