Road Casualties 2022

Post by **peter_winney** » Mon Jan 01, 2024 10:07 pm

The peak of road casualties in Britain was 1965 when 398,000 people were recorded as injured on the roads. The equivalent figure in 2022 was 135,480 with greatly increased vehicles and vehicle miles. ATDC was founded in 1965 but there is no causal link between that and the subsequent decline in road casualties.

The first road death in Britain was Bridget Driscoll a pedestrian run down by a car in the grounds of Crystal Palace who died on 17 Aug 1896. It was alleged that the car was driven “furiously” but evidence showed it could not exceed 4 ½ mph. The urban speed limit at the time was 14 mph.

The first driver to die in a road accident in Britain was in Grove Road Harrow on 25th Feb 1899 – a feat commemorated by a plaque unveiled 70 years later https://www.londonremembers.com/memoria ... d-accident

Casualties climbed with the growth of traffic. The introduction of the Highway Code in 1931 does not seem to have had a noticeable effect. By 1934 annual deaths on the road reached 7343, not far short of the 1964 total of 7820. I have not quoted any wartime figures as these were influenced by the blackout and other features peculiar to that time. The 2022 figure was 1711 deaths.

In the official report figures for 2022 are compared with 2019, the last comparable pre-covid year.
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistic ... eport-2022

By gender 76% of fatalities were male. By vehicle occupancy 44% were in cars, 20% on motorbikes. By age group 463 were 30-49, 392 over 70. These do not seem to have been collated against mileage, tho’ I may have missed that. By road type 59% of fatalities were on rural roads, 35% urban, and 6% motorways. In terms of vehicle miles by road motorways carry 21%, rural roads 44% and urban roads 35%. These are some of the figures used to show that motorways are the safest roads, but in these statistics no record is shown of how many deaths on motorways occurred on those where all-lane running operates at 70mph.

Unfortunately the stats do show the dangers of the roads most favoured by Austin drivers – rural roads. These are the ones where you see those useless and unsightly signs threatening “High-Crash Risk Area”. Might be more helpful to spend the money for the signs on something useful like crawler lanes up hills and protective islands for right turns. Or maybe just fill a few potholes.

In comparison with other countries England, Scotland & Wales come out quite well. On basis of road casualties per million population Britain is joint 5th with Japan with figures of 26 per million. Only Norway, Sweden and Iceland are better. Oddly Northern Ireland is accounted for separately and comes lower down the table at 29 just above Eire at 31. Despite its law-abiding citizens and road network cascaded by function the Netherlands has 42 casualties per million only slightly ahead of France 48 per million. The USA is 127 casualties per million population. What these stats don’t show is the No. of vehicle miles. Likely that USA has far more vehicles and vehicle miles than we have.

In 2022 e-scooter casualties are mentioned. Contrary to what you might think from news reports most of the casualties are scooter riders & not pedestrians struck by them.

Avon & Somerset Constabulary and Staffordshire Police are noted for the relative unreliability of their statistics due to misrecorded or unrecorded data.