Traffic safety is an important issue
Unfortunately, children and senior citizens are repeatedly involved in accidents on our roads every year. Between January and September 2016, 77 children and 346 senior citizens were involved in road accidents across the district. Of these, 14 children were seriously injured and 57 were slightly injured. Among senior citizens, 35 were seriously injured and 83 were slightly injured.
In the same period in 2015, 83 children and 318 senior citizens were involved in road accidents. 14 children were seriously injured and 60 were slightly injured. 19 senior citizens also suffered serious injuries and 84 minor injuries.
In order to reduce the number of children and senior citizens involved in road traffic accidents, the traffic educators at Heinsberg police developed this unique cooperation idea:
Young and old should "experience road traffic" together and work together to improve road safety
Traffic education for children is an important part of influencing the road safety and traffic ethics of a maturing person. Cooperation between kindergartens and schools with police road safety advisors has therefore become standard practice for all children in the district.
Also, in almost every town where there are schools, there are now facilities for senior citizens. Boredom and the feeling of no longer being needed are a major concern for many older citizens. They are grateful for tasks that break up their daily routine. Many senior citizens are also still very mobile on the roads and are therefore also a target group for the police's road safety work.
Why not increase road safety together and liven up everyday life?
Bringing these two target groups together was the basic idea behind this unique campaign. With the support of the St. Gereon Brachelen retirement and nursing home, the road safety advisors were able to train several senior citizens as road safety assistants. These are elderly citizens and dedicated caregivers at the facility who still actively participate in traffic activities.
In future, additional training sessions between young and old will be offered two days a month on the grounds of the elementary school, which has been specially prepared as a traffic park by the city of Hückelhoven. The events will continue independently between the kindergartens, the schools and the senior citizens' facility and will be supervised by the police if necessary.
Learning from each other into old age
"Stop at the stop stone, so there's no banging!" and exercises that counteract the danger of distraction will continue to be part of the program, as will the training of motor skills when cycling and the acquisition of a "bicycle driving license". The senior citizens are actively involved in this and their knowledge is updated at the same time.
The senior citizens' offer to check the road safety of the bicycles together with the children and parents and to show the children how to carry out minor repairs themselves is gratefully received. With the support of the city of Hückelhoven, a "bicycle workshop" will be set up in which parents, children and senior citizens will work together to ensure safe bicycles in future.
These joint afternoons will certainly not only enrich the everyday lives of the children and senior citizens involved in future, but also increase road safety.