The dramatic drop in road casualties across Dumfries and Galloway during the pandemic has been revealed.
It was fully expected that road accident numbers would decrease in the region in 2020 as the roads were particularly quiet due to lockdown measures.
However, the stats compared to just four years earlier are glaring.
A road safety report due to be tabled at Dumfries and Galloway Council’s communities committee next Thursday reads: “From 2016 to 2020, there has been a 60 percent reduction in all reportable road traffic collisions.”
In 2016, the region recorded a total of 385 road traffic collisions, which included 14 fatal incidents, 57 serious, and 314 involving slight injuries.
In 2020, the total had dropped to 155, with five fatal accidents recorded for the whole year, 44 serious cases, and 106 with slight injuries.
However, with lockdown restrictions gradually being eased in 2021, the number of road accidents began to climb again in the region.
The number of fatal accidents doubled to 10, while the number of serious accidents rose by more than 70 percent to 76.
The road safety report due to be tabled at next week’s communities committee shares how Dumfries and Galloway Road Safety Partnership and the council are actively working to improve road safety for the public.
The report also highlights how Scotland’s new Road Safety Framework sets out a vision for Scotland to have the best performance in road safety in the world by 2030.
The ambitious project, labelled ‘Vision Zero’, aims to ensure there are no serious injuries or deaths on Scotland’s roads by 2050.
Statistics show that in 2019 the total number of casualties fell to its lowest since annual records began back in 1950.
Every year, statistics for reported road casualties in Scotland are published by the National Statistics Office, on behalf of Transport Scotland.
