Warwickshire Road Safety Education is helping to spread road safety messages to the county’s primary schools as part of a new campaign focussing on child safety around heavy goods vehicles (HGVs)
This week will see the launch of a brand-new set of resources focussing on the key message ‘to remember the code and step back from the road’.
The Warwickshire County Council campaign aims to raise awareness of the dangers of HGVs and reminds pedestrians to take extra care, follow the road safety code and step back from the kerb if they see an HGV approaching.
The available resources include a large bright banner for school railings, supporting posters and a digital animation that schools can share via school information screens, websites and social media platforms to help spread the message.
Warwickshire Road Safety Education Team is committed to delivering key, age-appropriate and timely road safety messages and embedding good road safety practices from a young age. With the increased numbers of HGVs travelling on Warwickshire's roads, raising awareness of safe practices around lorries is timely.
Cllr Wallace Redford, Warwickshire County Council’s Portfolio Holder for Transport and Highways, said: “The road safety message is a very important one for school-age children. This latest campaign demonstrates our proactive approach to ensuring that our communities have better awareness of their surroundings and keep themselves safe when out and about.
“It’s great that we have been able to secure HS2 Road Safety Funding for such an important scheme to help to keep our young people safe as we encourage them to take advantage of more safe and active travel opportunities for short journeys.
“I would encourage all the schools in the vicinity of HS2 lorry routes to join this campaign and raise awareness of the dangers of HGVs which are increasing in numbers as the construction of the railway becomes more intensive in Warwickshire.”
This campaign, funded by the HS2 Road Safety Fund, has initially been offered to Warwickshire primary schools identified as being in proximity of the High-Speed Rail 2 (HS2) route and forms part of the wider Road Safety Education and Safe and Active Travel awards programme.
Two of the schools who have joined the campaign are Burton Green Primary and All Saints Primary at Leek Wootton.
Warwickshire County Council secured an additional £8 million Government funding to deal with road safety issues around HS2-affected highways. The Department of Transport’s £30 million HS2 Road Safety Fund is to be shared across all 13 eligible local authorities.
The digital animation can be accessed free of charge by all Warwickshire primary schools by contacting Warwickshire Road Safety Education Team at roadsafetyeducation@warwickshire.gov.uk