Lancashire Sees Increase in Teen Traffic Accidents Since 2020

Hey, I read something interesting. Child-related crashes in the county totaled 844 in 2024. 18-year-olds were involved in 201 of those. These numbers increased a lot since 2020. Back then, there were only 126 incidents.

Younger drivers are part of this problem too. The number of accidents rose each year. In 2020, 78 crashes involved 17-year-olds; by 2024, the count reached 143. It’s a really alarming trend.

Sadly, a 17-year-old, Demi-Leigh Davies, died in a crash. It happened on the M65 in October. Three others in the car got badly hurt as well. It’s such a tragedy.

The government tried to help with road safety. They gave almost £6 million to Lancashire through the Safer Roads Fund aimed to improve rural roads. But the crashes still went up.

The money went to two main roads. The A6 got £4,450,000 for improvements and connects Preston and the M6. The A583 had £1,497,180 spent on it, and it goes to Blackpool.

A road safety charity shared some stats too. IAM RoadSmart found many endorsements given out, and 1,128 of these were for dangerous driving attributable to drivers ages 17 to 25.

Young drivers hold only a small part of licenses, but they got a lot of the endorsements. They only have seven percent of licenses, but received 38 percent of the endorsements.

New drivers often crash soon after passing. About a fifth crash within a year. Sadly, nearly 5,000 people were seriously hurt or killed in 2022, involving young drivers.

Lancashire County Council is trying something new: “DriveFit.” It will be in schools soon, and they will use theater to show the risk of road accidents. Maybe this will help.