Understanding and measuring the contribution of Community Speed Watch

9 May 2024

Community Speed Watch (CSW) is an approach to tackling speed in local communities where volunteers, supported by their local police force, monitor vehicular speed and report offending vehicles

Staffordshire University provided an evaluation of the effectiveness of Community Speed Watch (CSW) throughout Gloucestershire to help engage with drivers and communities around the issue of speed.

The project used a mixed methods approach combining focus groups and interviews with survey and CSW activity speed data to explore the use and effectiveness of CSW and CSW+ in reducing speeds, empowering communities and influencing perceptions of legitimacy and safety.

The majority of participants considered CSW to have a positive impact on their community, agreed that CSW plays an important role in tackling speed, makes them feel safer in their community and would like more CSW activity to take place. A strong majority claimed that the presence of CSW/CSW+ makes them drive slower but there was less support for letters, with almost half of participants agreeing that warning letters are too lenient.