Road Safety and Traffic Reduction webinar
FIT held the latest in its new series of webinars on 16th May, on the topic of road safety and traffic reduction.
Every day on average a child is killed or seriously injured, 4 people are killed and there are over 350 collisions on Britain’s roads. Road danger is also the biggest barrier to getting more people cycling, as well as preventing more children walking and cycling to school independently. Despite the tragic human costs of this and the costs to society, road safety is the cinderella of transport policy. Making our roads safer is key to getting more people walking, wheeling and cycling. This webinar focused on how to make our roads (and pavements) safer for everyone and the benefits in terms of quality of life. It also considered emerging safety issues with the increasing use of e-bikes and e-scooters and how we reduce conflicts through training, better design and regulation.
In 2023, FIT’s funding focus is on traffic reduction, with a particular emphasis on road-user charging. Trustees are looking for bold, provocative and entertaining campaigns that change minds and challenge the status quo. The Alastair Hanton Memorial Fund has also been created for projects relating to road safety and aviation.
Speakers:
Margaret Winchcomb, Deputy Executive Director, The Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety (PACTS)
pacts.org.uk
Margaret is a Chartered Civil Engineer with passion for transport, focussed on people. Since joining PACTS in 2021 Margaret has led their Research and Policy work. Her work includes research into the safety of private e-scooters informing recommendations for future legislation. This project won a Prince Michael International Road Safety Award in 2022. She has also been involved in the production of PACTS new strategy and ran the last PACTS conference ‘Equality and transport safety’. Margaret is an active member of her local cycling campaign group and is a member of Women in Transport.
Rod King, 20’s Plenty for Us, Founder and Campaign Director, 20’s Plenty for Us
20splenty.org
Rod King set up 20’s Plenty for Us in 2007 in order to assist communities wanting lower speed limits. With a focus on setting 20mph limits for most urban/village roads across a complete local authority, it now has over 700 local campaigns in UK, Ireland, USA, Canada and Australia. 20’s Plenty for Us is a not-for-profit organisation with a small core team, but thousands of local volunteers. Rod is recognised for his UK and international work and has spoken at transport, active travel, road safety and public health conferences around the world. In June 2013 Rod was awarded an MBE for Services to Road Safety, he received the Global Light of Hope Award from the Irish Road Victims Association in 2017 and provides his time on a pro bono basis.
Panellists:
Amy Aeron-Thomas, Action Vision Zero, Roads Policing Campaign Coordinator, Action Vision Zero
actionvisionzero.org
Amy Aeron-Thomas has worked for Action Vision Zero since 2019. She coordinates their Roads Policing and wider Traffic Justice related work, which is focused on reducing road danger. She previously worked at RoadPeace (2000-2019) where she led on Advocacy and Justice, with campaigns on collision investigation, traffic law enforcement and victims rights. She also wrote their guides for victims, including on road death investigation, inquests and sentencing. She came to RoadPeace through her work at TRL in the international division, with a DFID funded study on community participation in traffic law enforcement. She has worked in over 15 countries, including developing national road safety plans, and researching under-reporting of road casualties, and costing of road crashes. Amy is the Justice Advisor for the International Road Victims Partnership where her reports include Road Death Investigation, Hit and Run, and Victims Rights. Amy has Masters Degrees in Transportation Engineering, Planning and Public Administration, from the University of Virginia.
Christian Douglas, Cofounder/ volunteer for Unique Talent CIC and Rollsafe
rollsafe.co.uk
Christian has a career spanning 14 years across a range of sectors, but his passion has always been working with young people who have faced adversity. Christian is the director of 2 other companies, one supports young people at risk of gangs/knife crime in London and the other is a supported housing company for young people leaving care. Christian has become a gang prevention specialist, diverting hundreds of young people away from gangs and knife crime. Christian has held various roles during his career, including residential support work, case management, prison rehabilitation, care work and project management. He has worked for some of the leading support charities across the UK including, St Giles Trust, YMCA, Mencap & Catch 22. Christian has a degree in Business Management and is currently completing his Master’s in Social Work studies with the University of Leeds.
Rollsafe is the UK’s first nationwide electric scooter training, designed to help everyone learn to ride their e-scooters safely.
Chair:
John Stewart, FIT Trustee
John is a transport specialist and long-time campaigner. He chairs the UK Noise Association and the Campaign for Better Transport. In 2020, he stood down as the Coordinator of HACAN (representing communities impacted by Heathrow) after 20 years. He is a Director of Good Journey, an Associate of Transport for Quality of Life and Coordinator of Lambeth Public Transport Group. Previously, he chaired the Slower Speeds Initiative, RoadPeace, ALARM and ALARM UK (which brought together communities opposed to road building schemes). At a European level he is vice chair of UECNA (which gives communities a voice on aviation) and is a member of the EU’s Noise Expert Group. He is the author of Poor Show (1998), a study of the impact of traffic on low-income communities; Location, Location, Location (2006), assessing the impact of wind farm noise; and the lead author of Why Noise Matters (Earthscan, 2011).