Warwickshire County Council: Councillors question rejection of road safety signs under new policy

County councillors have expressed concern at all requests for new vehicle-activated road safety signs in Warwickshire being rejected under new criteria.Warwickshire County Council implemented a new policy for vehicle activated signs (VAS) in September 2022, setting an evidence-based criteria for new signs or maintaining ones that no longer worked in a bid to manage costs.Existing signs could be taken on and maintained by the community but any requests for new ones would have to pass each of the four criteria put in place.None of the 18 requests that have come forward since have got past the first stage – the personal injury collision (PIC) score.A slight personal injury scores one with a serious of fatal injury scoring three. To pass the threshold for a new sign, the rating within 200 metres of the location must be five or greater over the previous three years.Of the 18 applications, all bar one had a score of zero with the other having a score of one, meaning that none of the requests got as far as considering the other factors which are whether 15 per cent or more vehicles break the speed limit in that location, whether the volume of traffic exceeds 3,000 movements per day or environmental concerns.The matter was discussed by the county’s communities overview & scrutiny committee this week with stand-in chair Councillor Jonathan Chilvers (Green, Leamington Brunswick) noting the 100 per cent rejection rate.“Quite often the first one is the one that rules it out, the personal injury collisions are so low as you can see from the paper, so subsequent steps are not carried out,” he said.Jon Rollinson, the county’s lead commissioner for strategy and place, defended the policy.“I think it is quite important to note, given the basis of why we wanted to bring this in in the first place, something like one in five or six of the previously-deployed sites had no personal injury collisions in the previous decade,” he said.“That is not a sensible use of our resources, we should target our resources more effectively towards road safety.”Noting the weighting element in relation to PICs, Mr Rollinson added: “You would only need potentially two serious collisions to be over the bar to meet that aspect of the criteria, so I think there is some safety built into that approach.”He later confirmed when asked that the score related to recorded incidents of personal injury without factoring in overall collisions.Councillor Tim Sinclair (Con, Stratford North), an observer rather than a committee member who was granted discretion to speak, added: “The concern we had last time was that the bar was so high, no new sign would ever be added.“At the moment, out of 18, no new sign has been added. As a suggestion, perhaps the committee may wish to monitor in an ongoing way whether a new sign is ever added because that bar, in reality, may be too high.”Mr Rollinson replied: “I think that is an entirely valid comment and I will certainly take that away.“It is not something that is set in stone, this policy will potentially evolve, we continue monitoring it as we do with lots of our policies.“Times and conditions change, we may need to tweak it in the future, I think it is fit for purpose as it stands in that it is doing what it was designed to do when we all sat down and agreed it previously."That doesn’t mean to say we will not take it away and look into it, potentially lowering that bar if that is appropriate at that time, subject to appropriate discussions with relevant officers in road safety, street lighting, considering all of the financial maintenance burdens that might increase as a result. I wouldn’t rule that out.”

Cllr Chilvers continued: “I certainly share that concern about the bar potentially being too high.“I am aware that from a resident’s point of view, those other collisions, the damage ones that don’t come to you, all the near misses and hooting, that anecdotal stuff that does not get captured at all.“In some ways, PICs are quite a crude measure.”His last point was followed on by Councillor Daren Pemberton (Con, Bidford & Welford).“Personal injury collisions is a rubbish benchmark,” he said.“It is not what the insurance industry uses. If we are ever going to head towards destination zero, which is where Sweden is heading, it is collisions.“I have about 37 airbags in my car, the injury frequency is dropping, pedestrians is the only injury frequency that is rising, and severity is rising because of our love of SUVs.“At some point we want to move beyond personal injury collisions, I know it is the national standard.“The concern from the committee is ensuring that we are continuing to be appropriate in our deployment and that as members, we can address concerns that might be raised by residents that the bar is set artificially high for financial reasons.”The panel decided that the data should be reviewed in a year to decide whether the matter should be addressed in full by the panel again.