Targeting Excess Speed on our Roads

Throughout February, North Yorkshire Police’s Traffic Officers will be targeting excess speed on our roads.

Excessive Speeding is one of the strands of the Fatal 5 Campaign. The campaign aims to highlight and tackle the five most common causes of road deaths.

Twenty-four-hour enforcement activity will take place across the county, with an aim of catching those who drive at excess speed and put other road users in danger.

Between 1 January and 31 December 2021, there were 85,610 speed violations captured by the Safety Camera Vans and Safety Camera Bike across the county.

Of those, more than 72,000 were offered Speed Awareness Courses and more than 9,000 were handed a Fixed Penalty Notice. More than 100 drivers were unable to be offered an Out of Court Disposal due to their excessive speed being over the threshold.

In addition to the Safety Camera Van and Bike figures, Traffic Officers issued more than 460 Traffic Offence reports for speeding offences in 2021.

The Safety Camera Van and Bike spend time at many different locations across the county including the motorway, rural roads, and village streets. Known locations with the highest speeds include:

• A1 Boroughbridge (Northbound and Southbound)
• B1427 Queen Margaret’s Road, Scarborough
• B6268 Masham Road, Bedale
• Tadcaster Road, York
• A19 at Knayton
• B6265 Grassington Road, Skipton

Traffic Sergeant Pete Stringer said:

“These figures show just how much of an issue speeding is here for us in North Yorkshire and this is not a huge surprise as we have a vast road network across the county including hundreds of miles of rural roads.

“There are so many dangers associated with excessive speeding, not least because it’s a major cause of fatal road traffic collisions.

 “Driving too fast for the road you are on prevents you from foreseeing dangerous hazards such as blind bends, stationary vehicles, and pedestrians or animals on the road.

“By slowing down and making sure you drive to the conditions of the road, you have more time to react to other drivers and hazards. On top of that, if you are involved in a collision, the slower the impact speed, the higher chance of survival.

“Our teams will be out across the county at all times of day and night. We will be out in marked and unmarked cars and bikes, and we will respond to public information to target high risk offenders, making sure they face consequences for their reckless actions.”