The London Road Safety Council recently held three information sessions to help educate its members on emerging road safety topics.
The sessions took place on consecutive weeks throughout February and covered:
- School Streets and air quality
- E-scooter hire
- Cycle and e-scooter enforcement in London
All three sessions are now available for LRSC members to access via the members’ area of the website – while any non members can contact James Parker, the LRSC’s executive officer, via email, for more information.
The first session, which took place on 2 February, was delivered by Olly Samways, head of sales and marketing at Westcotec.
Olly talked about School Streets – which typically involve closing roads around schools to motorised traffic at peak times. They aim to reduce traffic congestion and pollution, as well as making it safer for children to walk or cycle to school.
He outlined how Westcotec are helping with the delivery of School Streets, including through signage which is able to issue automated penalty charge notices (PCNs) and monitor air quality.
The second session discussed e-scooter hire – and was delivered by Johnny Munro, public policy manager (UK) at Bolt, an e-scooter provider.
Johnny provided an overview of the ongoing UK trials, before looking at the plans for e-scooters in London.
He outlined the technicalities of running a rental e-scooter scheme, including: geofencing, parking locations, maintenance and safety issues, sanctions and insurance.
The final of the three sessions was facilitated by Sgt Steve Wilson from the Met Police’s Cycle Safety Team.
Sgt Wilson discussed both cycle and e-scooter enforcement, outlining dates for future Close Pass operations taking place in the coming weeks and months (details of these are available in the members’ area).
He also talked about the Met’s use of virtual reality technology in initiatives such as Exchanging Places and to tackle issues including car dooring.
The LRSC is keen to run more of these sessions in the future. Any suggestions for topics to be covered should be sent to James Parker via email.
22 February 2021