Friday, the 1st of August, marks the first anniversary of Birmingham City Council’s declaration of a Road Safety Emergency. The Council’s strategy to tackle this emergency has so far focused on the rollout of LTNs and traffic reduction programmes. These projects have been pushed through despite opposition from businesses and residents in some cases, and without proper monitoring of KPIs or quality management processes in place to assess the real impact of these schemes.
Birmingham Local Conservatives have announced plans to scrap the existing Kings Heath LTN due to a lack of support from local residents and businesses, and concerns around pollution being concentrated on those residential roads around the LTN.
Cllr Timothy Huxtable (Con, Hall Green South), Shadow Cabinet Member for Environment and Transport, said:
We all recognise the seriousness and urgency of Birmingham’s road safety emergency – but that makes it all the more important to follow an evidence-based policy.
The Labour-led Council has pushed ahead with schemes like the Kings Heath LTN without proper monitoring, despite strong local opposition. The result? Traffic pushed off a traditional high street and funnelled onto quiet residential roads – bringing congestion and pollution to people’s doorsteps.
One year on from the declaration of a road safety emergency, the Council has made no specific progress on tackling dangerous drivers.
He continued:
The current approach punishes law-abiding motorists while failing to deal with the real danger on our roads – reckless, uninsured and illegal drivers. Birmingham has some of the highest rates of uninsured driving in the country – with 8 of the 15 locations with the highest number of uninsured driving incidents falling in the West Midlands – yet Labour’s policies focus on the wrong issues rather than targeting the real culprits.
The Council should be working with the Police to catch and prosecute those who drive illegally, dangerously or without insurance. These are the people who cause accidents – with insured drivers in particular being five times more likely to be involved in a road accident – not ordinary drivers going about their lives. If we’re serious about safety, we need to go after the real offenders.
