Community Speed Watch – Private

Community Speed Watch: August Report

by
27 August, 2025


The Community Speed Watch (CSW) team continue to be active throughout the village with the sole objective of reminding drivers to be more conscious of their speed. During July the CSW team held a Speed Monitoring event 5 times with 6 more ‘events’ scheduled during August. Almost 400 vehicles have been reported to the Police for excessive speeding during Speed Monitoring events held so far this year. Many are repeat offenders!

Even more serious is the overall number of speeding vehicles recorded by the static speed cameras. Located at either end of the village the cameras record vehicle speed 24/7 and the data collected from the cameras show around half of all vehicles entering and leaving the village exceed 30mph.

Drivers need to slow down!

As was shared last month, more permanent Traffic Calming measures to address the ongoing risk of another serious road traffic accident was one of three key topics presented at the Brailes village meeting on the 13th of July. Details of our proposed Road Safety Improvement Plan including a ‘School Safety Zone’ and locations of other permanent traffic calming measures were discussed and received unanimous support from members of the public that attended. Details of our plan can be found on the Brailes Village website. 

Obviously the ‘School Safety Zone’ is at the heart of our village plan and so we will continue to engage with the staff, parents and children at the school to ensure we do everything possible to make it as safe as possible for all concerned.  Apart from our plan for school flashing signs and a raised zebra crossing to forcibly reduce traffic speed, there are other things we could do in the meantime. This includes the possibility of inviting a Police Road Safety Officer to attend the school to help make the children more aware of the dangers crossing the road. 

We could also potentially reduce the inherent risks of vehicle parking on the road near the school at drop-off and collection times. As a reminder, drivers are encouraged to use the Village Hall car park as the default place to park and more safely deliver and collect their children from the school. It must be noted however, there will be occasion when the Village Hall is being hired at these times and therefore may not be freely available. On these occasions parents will need to resort to parking safely somewhere else until we find a better solution.

As you may have seen in last months’ Feldon News report, the children themselves have made it very clear they want us to reduce traffic speed and provide them with a safer place to cross the road.

These were just some of their ideas:


Road Safety Improvement Plan – update

Discussions have already taken place with Warwickshire County Council regarding our village Road Safety Improvement Plan and whilst there are several challenges we face to comply with DfT Highways regulations, including consultation with all ‘Blue Light Service’ vehicles, we will continue to do all that is necessary to follow this through to improve road safety in the village as quickly as possible. 

The good news is that we have received recent confirmation that in principle, our application for a Government grant that will contribute up to 50% of the cost of such road safety measures has been approved. For our part of the costs, we are preparing a fund-raising programme that will include a proposition to be presented to local businesses that allows them to contribute towards the balance of costs and be associated with our School Safety Zone plan. We will continue to update our progress in future editions of Feldon News.

If you wish to support our road safety endeavours in any way please feel free to get us touch with us by emailing the CSW team via  br****************@*****ok.com. 

Community Speed Watch: Brailes Road Safety Improvement Plan

by
1 August, 2025

Speeding was one of three key topics presented at the Brailes village meeting on the 13th July. Details of our proposed ‘School Safety Zone’ and locations of other permanent traffic calming measures were discussed and received unanimous support from members of the public that attended. Our intention now is to progress the plan to the next phase. We will keep you updated on our progress.

Given all the evidential data that has been collected for nearly 3 years now, speeding remains an ongoing serious issue. On average:

– 50,000 vehicles drive through Brailes every Month

– 24,000 exceed 30mph

– 7,000 exceed 35mph, that’s 233 every day !

– A high % of speeding occurs between 7-9am and 4-6pm

Speeds of over 50mph are regularly recorded during the day, the highest in June was 65mph in Lower Brailes and 57mph in Upper Brailes.


The School has played a very important part in our Road Safety Improvement Plan so far. The children have got involved and told us what they think we need to do to make the roads safer for everyone to cross. We’ve had lots of suggestions so a big thank you to all the children and of course to Mrs Childs and her team for their enthusiastic support. 
Here are just some of their ideas:

The parents were also invited to give us their views. Some really good and practical feedback was received. The overwhelming response for a designated ‘zebra’ crossing and means of physically slowing traffic speed is included in the plan.

However, the inherent dangers of parking on the main road by the school at drop-off and pick-up times was also raised as an issue, especially when children have to exit a vehicle in the middle of the road. Part of the plan therefore is to provide a safer place for parents to park and for the children to have a safer route to school.

In the meantime the Community Speed Watch (CSW) team will continue to be seen throughout the village to try to make drivers more aware of their speed so if you want to help and can spare an hour or so a month why not join the team. You can do this by emailing the CSW team via  br****************@*****ok.com.

Community Speed Watch: July Report

by
27 July, 2025

Police now supporting the need to reduce speeding in Brailes

Police have been attending the village recently as a result of the continuing number of speeders recorded by the static cameras.

You may have also noticed the twin pairs of wires across the road just past the George recently, which are also monitoring vehicle speed there.


It is clear to anyone who cares about road safety and the consequential risks caused by unnecessary speeding, that more permanent traffic calming measures need to be put in place. 

Vulnerable road users are at a particular risk from higher traffic speeds. The risk of a pedestrian being killed if hit by a car increases from 10% at 30mph to 70% at 50 mph. 

Given all the evidential data that has been collected for nearly 3 years now, improving Road Safety is a key priority. The area around the Primary School is especially critical and plans have been drawn up to help make this safer for children and parents to be able to walk to school and cross the road.  

Details of our proposed School Safety Zone along with other permanent traffic calming measures for the village where excess speeding is a serious problem will be shared at the public meeting planned to be held on July 13th in the Village Hall when your input will be most welcome.

In the meantime the Community Speed Watch team continue to try to ‘educate’ speeding drivers to slow down so if you can spare an hour or so a month and would like to join the CSW team please let us know by email to: br****************@*****ok.com.

Community Speed Watch: June Report

by
27 June, 2025

Playing a crucial role to help keep our village safer for all road users

In case you wondered why a Community Speed Watch (CSW) team has appeared throughout Brailes regularly for the last 12 months the answer is simple – it’s because  a number of motorists persist in failing to acknowledge the speed limit in a built-up area risking not only theirs’ but other peoples’ lives too.

According to the Department for Transport a safe road system is one that has an appropriate speed limit given the surroundings. This should be guided by the knowledge of the human body’s tolerance to external forces. DfT studies show that reductions in average speed result in substantial casualty reduction in the event of an accident. Vulnerable road users are at a particular risk from higher traffic speeds. The risk of a pedestrian being killed if hit by a car increases from 10% at 30mph to 70% at 50 mph.

Data relating to all vehicles that travel through Brailes is recorded by the two static cameras at either end of the village twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. The data shows that on average 48,000 vehicles travel through Brailes every month. 6500 of these are speeding which is more than 210 vehicles every single day. In the month of April alone, 110 vehicles were recorded exceeding 50 mph!

As the camera data shows, the vast majority of motorists do drive within the speed limit. However, it’s the drivers who ignore all the warnings and persistently exceed the speed limit who pose the greatest risk to life that the CSW team are trying to help make more aware of their speed and the potential consequences.

In recent weeks a couple of motorists have stopped and asked the CSW team what they are trying to achieve and why they operate where they do. So again it’s worth making clear the only reason CSW teams operate is because speeding continues.

The CSW team are unpaid village residents who volunteer their time freely in the hope of making these errant drivers be more conscious of their speed and adhere to the speed limit for the safety of everyone. Each volunteer is approved by Warwickshire Police and there are strict operational guidelines that are followed; including the number of volunteers that are required for each speed monitoring event, which is between 3 – 5. Each of the locations used has also been specifically determined by the Police with Google Map photographs showing exactly where the team must operate. As a result of this the Police can track the speeding data and take the necessary action; including visiting persistent speeders wherever in the Country they may live. The CSW team derive no pleasure out of monitoring vehicle speeds; the hope is that by being seen frequently, motorists become more conscious of their speed and drive accordingly.

The area around the Primary School in the village is the most worrying and action has been taken to look at all options to make this safer for children and parents to be able to walk to school and cross the road. More details of our proposed School Safety Zone along with other permanent traffic calming measures for the village will be announced very soon.

In the meantime the CSW team are doing a great job and would like to recruit more volunteers. If you can spare an hour or so a month and would like to join the CSW team or have any views on the speeding situation, please let us know by email to: br****************@*****ok.com. Your support and feedback would be most welcome.