Police push to tackle motorcycle and scooter fatalities in London
‘Operation Winchester’ aims to reduce deaths by deploying more police to stop riders
TRANSPORT for London (TfL) has today launched a new phase of its Operation Winchester initiative, which aims to reduce the amount of accidents involving motorcycles and scooters by deploying more police to target riders in the Capital.
TfL says it’s working with the Metropolitan Police and the Transport Policing Command to put more officers at what it calls ‘motorcycle hotspot junctions’ - locations where collisions are most likely to occur, in boroughs where statistically motorcyclists are at greatest risk of injury.
Methods employed will include clamping down on speeding, careless riding and red light running, as well as other antisocial behaviour. Alongside stepping up enforcement of traffic laws on motorcyclists, the police will also be giving road safety advice to all road users and providing leaflets about BikeSafe-London skills days.
Leon Daniels, TfL's Managing Director of Surface Transport, said: `We are fully committed to making London's roads safer for all, and with this focus on motorcycle and scooter safety, bringing down the number of collisions involving this vulnerable road user group. The three Es - enforcement, education and engineering - are central to this. On-street education and enforcement, substantial investment in improving rider skills and guidance to help engineers design roads so that they are safer for riders, all form part of a concerted effort to improve road safety in the Capital.'
This latest enforcement phase of the wider plan to make London’s street safer to motorcycles and scooters sits alongside a few other initiatives and resources aimed at improving skills. They include securing funding for MCIA-accredited training centres in every part of London and a one-to-one pilot training scheme in Croydon for commuters, which could be rolled out to other parts on London if successful.
During two previous phases of the same operation, the police stopped 5,389 riders, handed out 742 traffic offence reports, 1,335 verbal warnings, seized 96 motorcycle and made 10 arrests.
In 2015, motorcycle and scooter fatalities in London rose to 36, from 27 the year before. Provisional data indicates that there were 514 serious injuries to motorcyclist and scooter riders in the twelve months ending September 2015, compared with 507 in 2014.
