Volunteers are taking to the streets to help tackle speeding in a Fife village.
Motorists exceeding the speed limit in Coaltown of Balgonie can now expect to be clocked by a team of community members determined to put the brakes on dangerous drivers.
Trained by local police, they will take to the main road through the village following expressions of concern from residents about dangerous driving.
The move has been welcomed by local councillor Ross Vettraino, who says that speeding in the community has been a long-term problem.
“Speeding in Coaltown of Balgonie fills my caseload and people are obviously very concerned about it,” he said.
“Fife Council has already done what it can by putting in speed humps and signs up.
“What will happen is that the vehicle details are reported to the police and they will write to the owner of the vehicle telling them that an offence has been committed.
“The community speedwatch is not done with the intention of having people prosecuted. It is done with the intention of making the motoring community aware that speeding is illegal.”
The community speedwatch initiative has already proven to be hugely successful elsewhere in the area, having been run in nearby Thornton and Kinglassie.
Local community officer PC Jim Harvey has helped to train volunteers involved in the scheme and has said that motorists in Thornton in particular have begun to change their attitudes towards speeding in the village.
With the project now up and running in Coaltown of Balgonie, he said he hopes that more motorists will learn that speeding has a potentially huge impact on communities.
He said: “As part of Police Scotland’s continued engagement with communities and following concerns raised by local residents at the last enhanced community engagement meeting, a further community speedwatch training day was organised.
“Police Scotland is committed to keepingpeople safe on our roads and drivers need to realise that speeding impacts on the entire community, particularly around schools and areas with a large concentration of children.
“This is another example of the local community and the police working together to enhance the safety of the community at large.”
PC Harvey has successfully introduced the scheme to Thornton after receiving numerous concerns from residents about speeding near the local primary school.
By teaming up with volunteers, dozens of motorists have been detected breaking the speed limit, allowing police to issue warnings to the worst offenders.
As well as Thornton, the scheme has already been piloted in nearby Kinglassie, which councillor Bill Brown says has already had a notable impact on driver behaviour.
Hoping that the initiative will have a similar impact in Coaltown of Balgonie, the Glenrothes West and Kinglassie representative said: “It’s brilliant.
“It has helped to change attitudes in Kinglassie as the vast majority of traffic now passes at 20mph, where before it was going through at 30mph.
“In Thornton I think the average speed has been reduced from 38mph to 24mph. That is a massive difference and is especially helpful for children and elderly people crossing roads. “We don’t have sufficient numbers of volunteers yet but we are building them up. However, the ones that we have just now have said that they will work wherever they are required.”