1. Main Points

1. Main Points

1.1 There were a total of 9,391 road casualties reported in 2017 this is 1,514 or 14% fewer than 2016 and the lowest number of casualties since records began in 1950. Of which there were:

• 146 fatalities: 45 (or 24%) less than 2016
• 1,580 seriously injured: 119 (or 7%) less than 2016
• 7,665 slightly injured: 1,350 (or 15%) fewer than 2016 [Table 2].

1.2 By mode, in 2017 there were:

• 5,685 car user casualties (1,014, 15% less than 2016); including 65 fatalities (41 less than 2016)
• 1,350 pedestrian casualties (317, 19% less than 2016); including 38 fatalities (6 more than 2016)
• 618 motorcycle casualties (92, 13% less than 2016); including 29 fatalities (1 less than 2016)
• 729 pedal cycle casualties (8% less than 2016); including 5 fatalities (3 less than 2016)
• 355 bus and coach user casualties (53, 18% more than 2016) [Table 3].

These figures take no account of changes in modal choice so changes could be because more or fewer people are travelling by a particular mode.

1.3 In 2017 there were 899 child casualties reported, 100 (10%) less than in 2016. This included 2 fatalities, 10 less than last year [Table 4]. Conclusions on trend cannot be made from a single year's data as the numbers are small and fluctuate from year to year. Trends using a three year average are included in table 7.

1.4 In 2017 male fatalities fell by 37, 28% (to 97). Female fatalities fell by 8, 14% (to 49). Fifteen per cent (1,384) of all casualties were aged 16–22, a fall of 14% on 2016, of which 785 were male and 599 were female. Casualties aged under 5 remained the same at 139 between 2016 and 2017 [Table 12].

1.5 Scotland's road safety framework to 2020 contains 5 national targets for casualty reductions by 2020 – four of these targets are updated within this publication:

• 146 people were killed in 2017, a reduction of 50% since the baseline (2020 target: 40% reduction) [Table 5]
• 1,580 people were seriously injured in 2017, a reduction of 39% since the baseline (2020 target: 55% reduction) [Table 6]
• On average, there were 6 children killed each year between 2015 and 2017: a reduction of 61% since the baseline (2020 target: 50% reduction) [Table 7]
• There were 152 children seriously injured in 2017: a reduction of 53% since the baseline (2020 target: 65% reduction) [Table 8]