Agenda item

Briefing Note of the Head of Traffic & Network Management

The Scrutiny Board considered a report of the Head of Traffic and Network Management which provided an update on the impact of the Average Speed Enforcement (ASE) projects in Coventry. The information covered the initial schemes on London Road and Ansty Road that have been operational for over 3 years and the proposed ASE schemes.

The City Council received many concerns from residents and elected members across the city about inappropriate vehicular speed; this included a significant number of petitions requesting road safety measures. As the highway authority, the city council is responsible for setting speed limits on our local roads. West Midlands Police (WMP) are responsible for enforcing speed limits, and we collaborate to optimise speed limit compliance.

In line with our regional partners, the city council is committed to reducing the number of people killed or seriously injured (KSIs) on our road network. Over the last 3-year period (22/07/2020 to 21/07/2023), a total of 1231 personal injury collisions occurred on Coventry’s roads and this resulted in 1577 casualties. In-depth analysis revealed that a significant proportion pf KSIs were attributed to drivers travelling at excessive speeds, careless and aggressive driving.

In addition to average speed enforcement, the council also work with West Midlands Police with traditional speed enforcement techniques such as Mobile Camera Enforcement and Community Speedwatch.

The ASE cameras detect vehicles through Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) and calculate their average speed by measuring the time taken to travel between defined points, a known distance apart. ASE  encourages drivers to travel at a constant speed and this consequently reduces the negative environmental effects associated with vehicles accelerating and braking excessively.

The data showed that in the three-year period prior to the first ASE schemes being introduced in 2019, there was a total of 249 people injured on the roads that currently have ASE schemes in operation. Since the introduction of ASE on those roads, there had been a reduction of over 50% in personal injury to a total of 116. 

A review of the first two projects London Road (Toll Bar to Allard Way) and Ansty Road (Dane Road to Hinckley Road) has highlighted a significant reduction in personal injury collisions, including KSIs.

Since the London Road ASE project became operational in January 2019, to date there has been 9 personal injury collisions recorded since the go-live date. Further analysis revealed that the collisions resulted in two serious and seven slights and the two serious were no speed related.

The Ansty Road project became operational in January 2019 and to date there has been eight personal injury collisions recorded since the ASE camera go live date. Data showed that these were not speed related.

The Board noted that there are a number of ASE schemes where the ASE infrastructure has been installed and the scheme is due to “go-live” shortly. These included Allard Way – Kenilworth Road, Allesley Old Road and Holyhead Road. The ASE infrastructure is yet to be installed at Hearsall Common. 

Members asked questions, made comments and sought assurances on a number of issues including:

-  Explanation of what ‘camera activation’ means in practice

-  Tickets and fines and whether the fines come to the council

-  Reasons for delay with the new schemes waiting to go live

-  Effectiveness of each scheme

-  Impact of Covid on data

-  Explanation of data for Longford Road

-  Prioritising new schemes

The Board noted that traffic management officers could only access personal collision data, they did not have access to incidents relating to anti-social behaviour, drink driving incidents etc, hence the reason why they had not been referred to in the briefing note.

RESOLVED that the Board:

1.  Notes the information contained in the briefing note on the impact of schemes and were pleased that the current Average Speed Enforcement schemes are working.

2.  Supports the implementation of forthcoming Average Speed Enforcement schemes as detailed in the briefing note.

3.  Requests that the 3 year accident data on the schemes waiting to be implemented be circulated to the Board for information.