Road crashes cost Britain a staggering 1.5% of GDP. Car occupants account for some 70% of road deaths. Nearly two-thirds are killed outside urban areas with deaths concentrated on Britain’s forgotten A road network. This year’s report provides the most comprehensive route by route analysis yet of the safety of Britain’s roads, with over 2,700 individual sections covering the entire motorway and A road network outside urban centres. This 45,000km network is just one-tenth of Britain’s road length but accounts for over half of all deaths. Key findings: * 12% of the network has unacceptably high risk; *60% of the A road network and 25% of motorways fail to rate as safe; * Single carriageways are 6 times riskier than motorways, with 1 in 5 rated in the highest risk category; * Risk on high risk sections is more than 15 times higher than the safest roads; * One third of all fatal and serious collisions are at junctions; * 1 in 4 fatal and serious collisions involves a motorcyclist. This latest EuroRAP analysis shows Britain’s ‘most improved roads’ and what successful authorities have done to cut collisions markedly. The report also lists Britain’s ‘persistently high risk’ roads which continue to need urgent action alongside a special analysis of the roads where motorcyclists are at high risk of death and injury. The analysis in this report confirms that this network should be the focus of road safety strategy for the next decade with action on safe road design and other measures to create safe villages, safe overtaking, safe roadsides and safe junctions. (Author/publisher)
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