One of Britain’s most welcome achievements is the remarkable reduction in the road accident rate.

When I was born in 1942, about 10,000 people were killed each year on the roads even though traffic levels were a small fraction of today’s totals.

Admittedly there was a war going on and many casualties occurred at night during the black-out but even in 1966 the road death toll was almost 8,000.

It has steadily fallen since then and is now about 2,000 – about half the rate in France which has a similar population and far below the toll in America of about 33,000.

Indeed the number of deaths in Britain is less than that in just one Indian city – Delhi Why has the death rate dropped so steadily in this country? One reason is improvements in traffic management which are often most effective.

A good example is Denton Corner on the A259 near Newhaven which used to be a death trap junction. Then East Sussex County Council installed a roundabout with crossings and the number of accidents immediately fell sharply.

Another is improvements in the quality of cars and other vehicles with better brakes and features such as airbags.

Safety belts have undoubtedly saved many lives, although they can encourage reckless motoring, and the driving test is tougher than it used to be.

Introducing the breathalyser in the 1960s was a major factor in improving road safety. It now seems amazing that so many people before that drove cars when they were drunk.

Reducing the road death toll has come at a cost to our children. No longer are they allowed to play on the streets.

Most of them are shepherded by adults on their way to junior school and I know some at secondary school who have never walked there alone.

Some pundits think road casualties cannot fall much further with the amount of traffic on the roads but I disagree.

There is one measure that must be taken and that is to cut speed. It is the main factor in thousands of crashes each year.

Many lives could be saved by reducing the speed limit on motorways and major roads to 55mph which also happens to be the optimum speed for fuel economy.

Yet amazingly there is a lobby to increase the current motorway upper limit from 70 to 80mph.

Even more effective are moves to reduce the speed limits on residential roads in towns and cities from 30mph to 20mph.

Portsmouth was the first major city to start such a scheme in 2009. Casualties have dropped by 47% since then.

There have been similar drops in other pioneering places such as York, Warrington and parts of London.

Now there are moves, which I wholeheartedly support, to introduce such a scheme in Brighton and Hove.

It will cut casualties. If pedestrians are hit by cars travelling at 35mph, they have a 50 per cent chance of surviving the impact. At 20mph, the survival rate rises to 97%.

Zones will also reclaim the streets for children. When cars are driven slowly and with more consideration, it is safer for youngsters walking to school.

It might even be possible for children to play once more in quiet streets although the presence of parked cars will often make this difficult.

These 20mph zones also help make motoring smoother and less jerky. The amount of driving time added to each journey is minimal. The zones will not apply to main roads.

There is an active campaign in Brighton and elsewhere for these zones to be put into place. New legislation has made signing simpler.

As for policing such large areas the hope, already realised in other cities, is that the zones will mostly be self enforcing.

The death toll may be much lower than it was but I find it still unacceptable. Few families do not know someone who has been killed or badly injured on the roads.

During the Northern Ireland troubles, more people were killed in car crashes than by the bombs from terrorists.

Road accidents are the single biggest cause of death for young men and they are the group most likely to go too fast.

I can understand the need for speed but the place for it is Brands Hatch rather than some side street in Hove.

When cars are being driven down quiet roads, campaigners are right to insist that Twenty’s Plenty.

Do you agree with Adam?