Unitary authority · England

Road risk in Shropshire

Shropshire ranks 131 of 192 British highway authorities on our road risk score. Here is what the official record shows, and how it compares.

Below averageRisk score 41.9/100ONS code E06000051

Police recorded 337 injury collisions in Shropshire in 2025, hurting 479 people, of whom 121 were killed or seriously injured and 17 were killed. Set against the traffic its roads actually carry, that is 68.4 killed or seriously injured per billion vehicle miles, 15% below the median ranked authority (80.5).

Collisions: 337 in 2025
People hurt: 479 casualties
Killed or seriously injured: 121
Killed: 17
KSI per billion vehicle miles: 68.4 (median 80.5)
KSI, three-year average: 123.3 a year
Severity-adjusted KSI, 2025: 149 (recorded: 121)
Severity-adjusted KSI, three-year average: 151 a year (recorded: 123.3)
KSI per 100,000 residents: 36.3 — rank 90
Population: 333,162
Risk score: 41.9/100 — rank 131 of 192

Compiled by Stephen Hall, Data lead, Swift Assist. Source: DfT STATS19 and DfT road traffic estimates (2025), OGL v3. Updated 2026-10-08.

Direction of travel

Five years of collisions in Shropshire

Across 2021–2025, recorded collisions were down 5.6%, with 2022 the worst year of the period at 416 collisions.

Collisions per year in Shropshire

2025: 337 (down 13.4% on the year before) · peak 416 in 2022 · -5.6% across the period

Axis clipped to the data range to show year-on-year movement.

Two ways of measuring

Shropshire looks less dangerous per mile driven than per resident

Divide casualties by the people who live here and Shropshire ranks 90. Divide by the miles actually driven on its roads and it ranks 131 — a difference of 41 places.

That gap runs the other way: relative to the traffic its roads carry, Shropshire does less harm than its casualty count per resident implies. Places with heavy local travel and few through routes tend to look worse per head than the volume of driving warrants. Neither number is the true one. Which you should use depends on whether you are asking how safe it is to live somewhere or how safe it is to drive there.

Vehicle crime · year ending June 2026

Vehicle crime in Shropshire

1.48

offences per 1,000 residents

493

offences recorded, 12 months

264

of 287 areas, worst first

Shropshire recorded 1.48 vehicle offences per 1,000 residents, below the England and Wales rate of 5.04.

Rate calculated from 493 offences and a population of 332,500 (ONS mid-2024), both taken from the same ONS release. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: Office for National Statistics, Crime in England and Wales: Police Force Area data tables, year ending June 2026; police recorded crime collected by the Home Office.

Who is being hurt

Pedestrians, cyclists and riders in Shropshire

These are the road users with the least protection when something goes wrong, and they carry a disproportionate share of the serious injuries. Across 337 collisions in Shropshire, the three groups appear 133 times between them — an involvement rate of 39.5%.

Road user	Collisions	Share of all collisions
Pedestrians	42	12.5%
Cyclists	45	13.4%
Motorcyclists	46	13.6%

A single collision can involve more than one of these groups and is then counted in each row, so the rows do not add up to a share of the total.

Darkness, weather and the time of year

When collisions happen in Shropshire

DfT records the light level and road surface at every collision, but publishes neither below national level. These are Shropshire’s own shares over 1,074 collisions, with the national figure beside each one for comparison.

Share of collisions	Shropshire	National	How it reads
In darknessAny collision where the officer recorded darkness, lit or unlit.	26.9%	28.7%	close to the national figure
In darkness, no street lightingThe rural lighting picture rather than the urban speeding one.	15.3%	6.3%	more than double the national figure
On a wet road surfaceWet, damp or standing water at the scene.	28.3%	24.5%	above the national figure
On snow or iceRare everywhere, and concentrated in a handful of authorities.	2.5%	1.4%	well above the national figure

On the darkness share, Shropshire ranks 123 of 192 authorities, counting from the highest.

The winter effect. Collisions in Shropshire run 6.9% lower from November to January than from May to July — against 4.5% lower nationally. That is 270 collisions against 290.

What this does not tell you

A share is not a rate. A high darkness share means darkness accounts for more of Shropshire’s collisions — not that its roads are more dangerous overall. Read it alongside the casualties-per-mile-driven figure above.
Condition is recorded, not tested. The officer records the surface and light level at the scene. It is an observation, not a measurement, and it is not a finding that the condition caused the collision.
Exposure is not controlled for. Fewer people travel at 3am than at 3pm, so a collision in darkness is drawn from a smaller pool of journeys. Without hourly traffic counts, these shares describe when collisions happen rather than how risky an hour is.

Every authority compared on the same measures: winter road risk across Britain.

Benchmark

Shropshire against similar authorities

A national rank compares Shropshire with places that may be nothing like it. This is the comparison a council actually uses: its statistical nearest neighbours — the authorities ONS identifies as most similar on population, economy and demography, restricted to the same tier, so counties are compared with counties. Within this group Shropshire is 5 of 7 on casualties per mile driven, against a group median of 77.7.

Authority	KSI / bn miles	Score	National rank
Carmarthenshire	123.9	63.2	42
Denbighshire	96.2	52.2	90
Dorset	92.2	55	74
Herefordshire, County of	77.7	44.2	127
Shropshire (this page)	68.4	41.9	131
Somerset	67.7	34.1	161
North Somerset	59.8	47.1	118

Peer group: ONS statistical nearest neighbours, Open Government Licence v3. ONS notes the grouping is a snapshot that is not comparable with earlier editions, and is not a judgement about any authority’s performance. The road figures against it are ours.

National position

Shropshire against its closest comparators

Shropshire sits 131 of 192 nationally, and 108 of 148 within England. These are the authorities nearest to it in the table.

#	Authority	Score	KSI / bn miles
129	Kent	43.8	89.6
130	Salford	42.2	67.5
131	Shropshire (this page)	41.9	68.4
132	Hampshire	41.2	62.7
133	North Northamptonshire	41.1	58

See all 192 authorities →

Common questions

Road risk in Shropshire, answered

How dangerous are the roads in Shropshire?

In the latest official DfT figures, 337 road collisions in Shropshire injured or killed 479 people, 121 of them killed or seriously injured. Measured against the traffic its roads actually carry, that is 68.4 people killed or seriously injured per billion vehicle miles, against a median of 80.5 across the ranked authorities — placing Shropshire 131 of 192 authorities on our combined score, where 1 is the highest risk. The score weighs that rate alongside who is being hurt, the five-year trend and how often a serious collision proves fatal, so the rank is not the rate alone.

Are road casualties in Shropshire rising or falling?

Across 2021–2025, recorded collisions in Shropshire were down 5.6%, with 2022 the worst year of the period at 416 collisions. Year-to-year movement in a single authority is noisy, so the five-year direction carries more than any single year's change.

Who is being hurt on Shropshire's roads?

In Shropshire there were 42 collisions involving pedestrians, 45 involving cyclists and 46 involving motorcyclists, out of 337 in total. Added together that is an involvement rate of 39.5%, though a collision involving two of those groups is counted in both figures, so it is a comparable index rather than a clean share.

Who is responsible for road safety in Shropshire?

Shropshire is a unitary authority, and is the highway authority for its own roads. That means it sets local speed limits, designs junctions and crossings, and decides safety scheme spending. Motorways and most trunk roads are managed separately by National Highways in England, Transport Scotland, or the Welsh Government, so the worst road in an area is often not the council's to change. Enforcement sits with the local police force.

Where does this data come from?

DfT STATS19, the record police complete at the scene of every injury collision, published annually under the Open Government Licence, combined with DfT's own road traffic estimates for the mileage denominator. Collision, casualty and KSI counts on this page are for 2025; only the trend compares 2021–2025. STATS19 counts collisions police attended and recorded, so collisions never reported do not appear, and under-reporting is known to be worst for cyclists and for slight injuries.

What this means for you

What actually changes the odds in Shropshire

Data is only useful if it changes what you do. These three are picked from Shropshire’s own figures above, each with the number that prompted it. Every guide explains how the thing works before it suggests buying anything, and most cost less than a third of a typical insurance excess.

Alarmed disc lock

£20–£50

Motorcyclists are in 14% of Shropshire's collisions, and bikes are also lifted rather than ridden away. An alarmed disc lock covers the theft half for about £30.

How it works →

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