Progress in Road Safety Measures
| Author | H. Alker Tripp |
| Published date | 01 October 1938 |
| Date | 01 October 1938 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X3801100405 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Progress in Road Safety Measures"
A REVIEW
By H.
ALKER
TRIPP,
C.B.E.
Assistant Commissioner of Police,
New
Scotland Yard
MANY people assume that the problem of road casualties
is of recent origin,
but
that is not the case. Road casualties
were occurring long before motor-cars were introduced, and
have always in the main been due to vehicle speed. First it
was the speed of horse-drawn traffic that caused these casual-
ties, then of cycle traffic also, and
latterly-and
far more
extensively than ever
before-of
motor traffic. These casualties
are occasioned sometimes to people on the vehicles concerned,
but
also-and
much more often
nowadays-to
other people
who are on the road; and the higher the speed and the heavier
the vehicle, the greater the damage to other people will always
be.
The
great majority of casualties at the present time are
occasioned by motor traffic, and the aggregate danger to the
public broadly corresponds with the aggregate number of motor
vehicles.
The
more of these fast vehicles there are on the roads,
the greater the amount of injury that will be caused.
As will be seen from the table on page 429, the number of
casualties rose for many years as the number of registered
vehicles increased.
The
figures shown date from 19°9, as that was the first
complete year for which full informationwas collected.
In
1914,
the year ofthe outbreak ofthe Great War, there were over three
times as many cars as in 1909, and twice as many accidents
causing casualties.
The
conditions during the years of the
Great War were so abnormal that the figures relating to them
are not really significant, and no useful deductions can be
• A
paper
read at the
Twenty-first
Anniversary National Safety Congress
.f
the
National"
Safety
First"
Association on 25th
May,
1938.
428
PROGRESS
IN
ROAD
SAFETY
MEASURES
429
drawn.
The
first complete year of peace, viz.
1919,
may be
taken as the starting point of the period now under review.
Since
1919,
motor-car registrations have increased ninefold,
and there has been a fourfold increase in accidents causing
casualties.
Year
19°9
19
10
1911
1912
1913
1914
1915
1916
1917
1918
1919
1920
1921
1922
1923
1924
1925
1926
1927
1928
1929
193°
1931
1932
1933
1934
1935
1936
1937
GREAT
BRITAIN
Motor
Vehicles
122,2°3
143,877
192,877
245,235
305,662
388,860
4°
6,821
427,974
341,122
229,428
33°,518
65
0,14
8
873,7°0
979,000
1,141,400
1,335,600
1,547,000
1,729,5°5
1,899,87
6
2,052,539
2,195,712
2,287,326
2,213,722
2,239,567
2,297,326
2,416,9°8
2,581,027
2,768,606
2,938,485
Accidents involving
casualties
27,161*
30,191*
34,128*
37,4°5*
43,252*
59,846
61,3°6
52,658
44,054
36,685
49,75°
56,438
62,621
7°,197
83,101
98,215
115,473
124,287
133,943
147,5
82
15I
,801
156,793
181,077
184,006
191,782
2°4,710
195,892
198,978
196,368
•
Excluding
accidents
attributed
to
pedal
cyclists.
In dealing with the steps taken by regulation to stem the
growing tide of casualties, it may be convenient to review the
matter under three headings:
(I) Regulation by Law
(2) Regulation by Precept
(3) Regulation by Police Action
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