NO children were killed on Kirklees roads in 2010, according to figures just released by Kirklees Council.
This is in line with a national trend which has seen a year on year reduction in the number of deaths and serious injuries on Britain’s roads.
Figures from Calderdale and Kirklees councils indicate that local roads are also becoming safer for both pedestrians and drivers. In Kirklees a total of 137 people were killed or seriously injured on local roads last year, compared with 160 for the previous year, a drop of 15%. One encouraging statistic for road safety campaigners is that no children were killed on Kirklees roads last year, whereas one lost their life in 2009.
The number of children seriously injured also fell from 23 in 2009 to 17 last year.
In Calderdale the improvements in road safety have been even more dramatic with the numbers killed on the roads falling from nine to three and serious road injuries dropping from 111 to 78 over the two years. There were 612 slight injuries on Calderdale’s roads in 2010, a reduction of 26%.
These latest figures were welcomed by the road safety charity Brake. Spokesperson Joel Hickman said: “Thankfully there has been a positive national trend in recent years. However, we would argue that every single road death is one too many.
“It is still the biggest killer of young people and our child pedestrian rate is worse than 10 other EU countries. Much more needs to be done”
