A new road safety campaign reminding drivers to slow down near schools will be rolled out to coincide with the start of the school year on 7th February.
Superintendent Dave Cliff, New Zealand Police National Road Policing Manager says in the last five years over 1200 child pedestrians have been killed or injured during school terms.
"The key risk times are weekdays between 7.30am and 9am and 3pm to 4.30pm when children are dropped off and collected from school," said Superintendent Cliff. "The most vulnerable age group is aged between 11 and 15 years and makes up 44 percent of all child casualties aged between 5 and 18 years."
Driving at 50 km/h, you travel nearly 20 metres while reacting and moving your foot to the brake pedal. If a child was 20 metres from the car, you would still be travelling close to 50 km/h when you hit the child.
A healthy adult struck at 50 km/h has about a 40% chance of being killed - for a child, the odds are much worse.
"We will be reminding people to slow down when driving near schools, especially during the high risk times as we will be rigorously enforcing speed limits within 250 meters on each side of school boundaries."
"Drivers who exceed the speed limit by more than 5 kmh will be issued with infringement notices and we will also encourage Local Authorities to focus on parking offences around schools."
The campaign will be launched by the Minister of Police, Annette King at Miramar Central Central School, Wellington on 7th February when the majority of primary and a number of secondary schools return for the year.
ENDS
For further information : www.police.govt.nz
or
Lesley Wallis
Communications Manager - Road Policing
04 4707111
027 2209752