I asked a question to Full Council on 20mph and traffic safety outside schools – here’s the answer.

Question 3 submitted by Councillor T Pickstone
Could the Leader report on how many Schools in the Borough are sited on roads with a 20mph speed restriction, and how many are not? Could he also inform Council how many casualties have resulted from accidents outside schools in the last five years?

Answer:
There are currently 16 schools sited on roads with a 20mph speed restriction including 12 Primary, 3 Secondary and 1 other school.
The remaining 75 schools are all located on roads with a 30mph speed limit. These include 54 Primary, 13 Secondary and 8 other schools.
In the last 5 calendar years (2003 to 2007 inclusive) there have been 105 collisions recorded in the vicinity of entrances to schools in the borough. These have resulted in 144 casualties in total including 1 fatality, 14 serious and 129 slight.

The majority of these collisions occurred outside those schools which are located on busy Class A and B roads. Only a few have happened at school opening times and can be associated with school activities.

Collisions involving school pupils were recorded outside 11 of the 91 schools in the borough.

The number of school pupils injured in collisions outside school premises is 14 with 4 of these being classed as serious injuries. One of the pupil casualties was a car passenger and the other 13 were pedestrians. Two casualties were aged 8; the remainder were aged 11 or older. Not all of the collisions involved pupils attending the schools at the same location, since children of secondary age have been involved in collisions outside primary schools.
I can also inform the Member that the Economy, Environment and Transport Scrutiny Commission’s Highways Sub-Group is, as part of its 2008/09 Work Programme, examining the possible introduction of a 20mph speed limit in residential areas. Many of the Borough’s schools are included within such areas.