Warwickshire Police is investing over £600k to enhance road safety and make Warwickshire’s roads safer for everyone who uses them.

The investment endorsed by the Police and Crime Commissioner will be used to improve the effectiveness of the Road Safety Unit (WRSU) in tackling speeding drivers by ensuring we have the latest technology and processes to drive behaviour change, deliver impactful road safety campaigns and improve our service to the members of the public.

We can’t do all this without people or without improved technology. To ensure we can continue to drive improvements in road safety, we have increased the size of the department with 35 additional people.

We are also taking huge strides in technology – implementing wholescale, state-of-the-art new IT equipment and systems to underpin and improve our service to the public.

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 us to make roads safer across Warwickshire and identify perpetrators.

Part of our future demand comes as a result of HS2 because as well as managing speed enforcement and red light offences on our county’s roads and motorways, the WRSU also ensures speed compliance at roadwork sites and due to HS2, this demand is expected to increase over the next five years while the project is underway.

The effective and popular 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 we 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.

Chief Constable Debbie Tedds said

“The improvements will help ensure Warwickshire Police continues to be fit for the future and delivers on our enduring vision to protect people from harm.  We know the harm and devastation that collisions cause to families and that’s why a proactive, preventative approach is the best response we can give and this is at the core of the Warwickshire Road Safety Partnership strategy of which we play a key part.

“That’s why educating speeding drivers is vital in seeking to change behaviour to make our roads safer. This has a direct effect on road safety because we know that those who go on a training course are less likely to reoffend in the next 6 months after the course.  However, points and fines still play a part in reducing speeding and extreme or repeat speeders may find themselves going straight to court.”

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.”

For more information about the Safe System approach in Warwickshire please visit Our Strategy – Warwickshire Road Safety Partnership (warksroadsafety.org)