Traditionally, Easter sees the start of summer biking season and South Yorkshire Police are expecting the roads to be very busy over the Bank Holiday weekend.

Injuries to motorcyclists are far out of proportion to their presence on our roads: Motorbikes are just 1% of total road traffic, but account for around 20% of all Great Britain's road user deaths.

In South Yorkshire alone, between 2005 and 2008 there were 515 crashes involving bikers that resulted in death or serious injury.

Over the Bank Holiday weekend the force will be running a biker awareness campaign with extra patrols on a number of routes including the A57 Manchester Road from Crookes (Sheffield) to the county boundary near Ladybower Reservoir and the A19 from Toll Bar to the county boundary near Askern – two routes which are favoured by riders that have been the scenes of death and serious injury to bikers in previous years.

Traffic cars will also patrolling and South Yorkshire’s helicopter will be in the air performing speed checks.

Andy Male, Chief Inspector for roads policing in South Yorkshire said,

“Police patrols over this period will be checking on all motorists, not just the bikers. We know that there are a number of single vehicle collisions where rider error is the cause, but we must remember the other side where the rider is not at fault, another road user doesn’t see them and performs a manoeuvre that results in a crash.

“The overall aim of this Casualty Reduction Partnership campaign is to make South Yorkshire roads safer for all road users. I want people in South Yorkshire to have an enjoyable Bank Holiday weekend and would be extremely happy if there were no biker collisions at all”.

For further details please of the biker awareness campaign visit the website www.safetycamera.org/biker