The worst location for red light-jumping in Birmingham revealed
The worst location for red light-jumping in Birmingham revealed
Plus: enjoy a pairing of Gremlins and wine tonight
Good morning readers — welcome to Tuesday’s Dispatch.
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Road safety continues to be a major concern in our city and today’s Brum in Brief leads on results from a survey of red light jumping by campaign group Better Streets for Birmingham. Be sure to click through to their site as they’ve presented the results in a very easy-to-read way. plus you can look at the map to see if where the most dangerous spots are.
On that same note, this footage shared by Walking and Cycling Commissioner Adam Tranter is a terrifying incident in which a mother and her baby nearly get crushed by a car that flips onto a pavement in Solihull. Thankfully they weren’t injured and police are investigating the matter.
Brum in Brief
🚦Better Streets for Birmingham (BSfB) has published alarming new data on cars jumping red lights in the city. The worst location was the A45 Redhill Road junction, where a 12-year-old child was killed by a driver in June. BSfB found one driver jumped a red light here every minute. 50 surveys of 21 junctions were completed and you can see the complete findings here on the BSfB website.
🚨 A person has died following a fire on Soho Hill in Handsworth where three-quarters of the building was damaged in the blaze, the BBC reports. Four people were rescued from the building and did not require treatment by paramedics. It’s the second time the property has caught fire in the last four weeks.
🏗️ Birmingham City Council has agreed to reconsider its decision to demolish the Ringway Centre after campaigners launched a legal challenge citing heritage and environmental concerns. Barrister Estelle Dehon, working on behalf of the Save Smallbrook consortium, wrote to Director of Planning Ian MacLeod to argue that officers had misled the planning committee by claiming Historic England had “no concerns” about the proposals, and regarding the carbon impact of the demolition.
📆 The BBC has delayed the opening of its new, Digbeth HQ by a year, and The Tea Factory site will now open in 2027. BBC Nations director Rhodri Talfan Davies said “additional planning work” had been required after a squeeze on the licence fee.
✍️ The BBC and Create Central are set to launch a writing scheme to give industry opportunities to 12 aspiring scriptwriters in Birmingham and the Black Country in 2024. Kit de Waal, author of My Name is Leon and Create Central member, says "I'm absolutely thrilled that our collaboration with the BBC, as part of our wider partnership with them in the West Midlands, is paving the way for incredible opportunities for local talent.
📽️ There are only a handful of seats left to watch 1980’s classic Gremlins while tasting expertly selected wines in the comfort of The Crescent Theatre tonight, courtesy of The Wine Events Company. Tickets cost £27 and the film starts at 7pm.
📸 Budding photographers can meet like-minded souls and get some tips from a practising professional at this free weekly meetup in the Jewellery Quarter. Every Wednesday at 11am.
Jumping red lights happens wherever there are red lights, not just at the junctions that BSfB surveyed.
I travel up and down Yardley Wood Road every day to and from work, and even as a bus passenger there are some near heart-stopping experiences I have observed in the last few years.
From my own observations, while I agree that the Wake Green Road junction is bad for red-light jumping, it is not as dangerous now the timings appear to have changed and there seems to be a slightly longer pause between one set turning red and the other changing to green. However I'd say the junction of Taunton Road and Stoney Lane is probably worse, a young e-scooter rider was seriously hurt there earlier this year. I lose count of the number of times the lights turn to green, and there are still vehicles flowing out of Taunton Road turning left and right into oncoming traffic. There was one 'near-miss' that still sticks in my mind from a few weeks ago; I was on a bus heading towards Sparkbrook, the lights changed to green and as the bus started accelerating forwards, a car came racing across right in front out of Durham Road and onto Taunton Road. If the bus hadn't been stationary at the red light, and was approaching that junction at speed, that would have been a very bad crash!
I don't drive and I've never owned a car, but I am not 'anti-car' by any means, I do recognise that it is a minority of motorists who drive like idiots, and we must be mindful of actions and proposals that end up hindering those who do drive responsibly.
OK, the reporting on red light jumping is interesting. But the reference to the Solihull car flip incident being 'terrifying' and linking that immediately the need to take action is exactly what would happen in the tabloids that we choose this journalism over.
Specifically, on the incident, whilst yes it is scary, there is no information yet on what caused it. It could be speeding and/or poor driving, but there are plenty of reasons for that to happen that certainly wouldnt fall into the 'dangerous driving' pot - for example the driver having had to swerve off camera when someone pulled out in front of them, or the driver having a medical episode. The outcome is the same, but the cause completely different and in that case would not align with the wider story about road safety.
Perhaps you might amend the wording unless or until the police give any information on the actual cause.