High risk roads urgently need an additional £200M to be spent on them to reduce the numbers of deaths and serious injuries suffered, according to an influential safety organisation.

 

The Road Safety Foundation said yesterday it had identified 550 sections of local authority A roads which it calls ‘unacceptably high risk’. This represents more than 6000km of highway.

 

It welcomed last year’s Government allocation of £175M into a Safer Roads Fund to tackle 50 of the most dangerous roads in England, but said a further cash injection is needed to help drive down the number of road deaths.

 

Responding to the call for more money, a Department for Transport spokesman said it is always looking at ways of make roads safer. In addition to the £175M being spent through the Safer Roads Fund, it said: “We are giving record levels of capital funding to local authorities; more than £7.1Bn up to 2021 to improve local roads and repair potholes. It is vital councils spend this money to keep roads in good condition.”

 

According to the Road Safety Foundation the highest risk road in Great Britain is once again the A537 between Macclesfield and Buxton through the Peak District, known as the Cat and Fiddle.

 

The most improved road is the A4151 in Gloucestershire from Nailbridge to the A48, which has seen over £200,000 spent in recent years to revise road markings, introduce marker posts and signs and install a pedestrian crossing and 20MPH zone in the town of Cinderford. 

 

The group has also launched an interactive road crash index in association with insurer Ageas UK which shows the level of road safety improvement or decline in each county between 2010 and 2015.