Find how dangerous the roads near your schools are with new postcode search map

AXA Car insurance has launched an interactive road safety map, showing how safe the roads around your local schools are, according to a new Local Road Safety Index developed with the not-for-profit group Road Safety Analysis.

Using a postcode search, local residents can see the number of incidents within a 500 metre radius of schools, broken down into collisions involving cyclists, children and pedestrians.

In the London area alone, there were a total of 69,950 collisions on non-motorway roads between 2008 and 2010 - and perhaps because of the urban density of the capital, 86 per cent (59,900) occurred within 500 metres of a school.

The past three years (2011-13) have seen an increase in this number, with a total of 71,119 collisions, 61,024 of which have occurred within 500 metres of a school.

Cycling incidents within 500 metres of schools has risen by 26 per cent between 2011 and 2013 (12,262), compared to 2008-10 (9,733). Meanwhile, pedestrian collisions have marginally increased in the capital from 15,347 (2008-10) to 15,476 (2011-13).

It is worth noting however that the number of journeys made by bike in London has been steadily increasing, from 0.29 million per day in 2000, to 0.57 million per day in 2012.

According to Transport for London, the Mayor has set a target to deliver a 400 per cent increase (from 2001) in the number of cycle journeys and a 5 per cent mode share for cycling by 2026, equivalent to around 1.5 million cycle journeys every day in London.

Cycle journeys grew by 79 per cent between 2001 and 2011, having remained broadly unchanged between 1993 and 2001.

The interactive map has been created by analysing a total of 506,160 collisions, relating to the immediate areas surrounding Britain’s 29,107 schools.

James Barclay of AXA Car Insurance said: “We firmly believe that by releasing data in a visual and useful way through the Local Road Safety Map, users will have a real understanding of the risk associated with their local roads. This information will be vital in the continuing campaign to reduce the numbers of road incidents in all areas.”

Richard Owen, director of Road Safety Analysis, commented: “Compiling data and information is one thing, but putting meaning behind it and helping to develop ways in which more lives can be saved is something very powerful.

“We believe that today’s launch and the data behind it builds on AXA’s initial work within road safety and we hope to see a further reduction in traffic casualties as a result.”

The project also aims to crowdfund local safety measures, by Crowdfunder campaigning via the AXA page. Parents, teachers, local road safety officers, schools, local campaigners, local authorities or businesses can organise things like printing costs following a school road safety drawing competition, funding a lollipop person or right up to the funding of a pedestrian crossing.

Coaches from the Crowdfunder Academy will offer crowdfunding advice to reach their funding target, and AXA Car Insurance has committed an initial £10,000 to ‘match-fund’ the projects once they have reached their Crowdfunder targets.