A-road through Petworth named Britain's most dangerous highway Single carriageway from Petworth to Chichester named most dangerous Half of all fatal crashes in the UK happen on the roads surveyed Number of people seriously injured or killed has increased 16.6% Report offers safety recommendations and road improvement suggestions By Ray Massey for the Daily Mail A popular 12-mile stretch of country A-road running through one of the most picturesque parts of Britain has been named the nation's "most persistently dangerous" highway. It is one of a number of "beautiful but deadly" roads - many running through or near national parks and areas of outstanding beauty - where the toll of deaths and serious injuries are "unacceptably high," says a major new road safety report. The single-carriage A285 from Petworth through the South Downs to the coastal town of Chichester runs north to south through West Sussex linking the A27 with the A272. The single carriageway from Petworth to South Downs named the UK's most 'persistently dangerous' road The road in West Sussex linking the A27 with the A272 is particularly popular for those en route to Goodwood 10 Most 'Persistently Dangerous' Roads in Britain A285 - 12 miles - Petworth to Chichester, West Sussex A27 to A272 A809 - 10 miles - Glasgow to the A811 A937 - 8 miles - Montrose to the A90 (Laurencekirk) A18 - 10 miles - Laceby to Ludborough near Grimsby A6 - 6 miles - M6 junction 33 to Lancaster A61 - 6 miles - Wakefield and the M1 junction 44 A36 - 4 miles - A3090 to Totton in Hampshire A589 - 5 miles - Full route around Lancaster A643 - 7 miles - Brighouse to Morely in Yorkshire 10 A4300 - 4 miles - Full route through Kettering Source: Road Safety Foundation It is particularly popular with families and holidaymakers heading to the seaside and with visitors en route to events at Goodwood including horse-racing at "Glorious Goodwood" the Goodwood Festival of Speed and the Goodwood Revival. But the number of people killed or seriously injured (KSI) - the official measure of major road casualties - has risen there from 18 in the 2007-9 period to 21 in the period 2010-12 - an increase of 16.6 per cent. The report by the Road Safety Foundation notes how many routes through National Parks - as this one does - show a particularly high degree of risk. It says 64 people are killed or seriously injured on Britain's roads every day with six out of ten fatal crashes occur on rural roads. The report concludes: "The UK's persistently highest-risk road is a stretch of less than 12 miles in West Sussex. The A285 between Chichester and Petworth runs north to south linking the A27 with the A272 and runs through the South Downs. It tops the list of high-risk and medium-high risk roads which have shown little or no change over time or significant increases in the number of crashes. The route has "a significant number of bends," it notes: "It has seen a 16 per cent increase in the number of fatal and serious crashes over time - at junctions, running off the road and even head-on collisions." A 10-mile stretch of the A809 between Glasgow and the A811 is the next most "persistently high risk" road followed by an eight-mile stretch of the A937 between Montrose and the A90 (Laurencekirk), and 10-mile run of the A18 between Laceby and Ludborough near Grimsby where in April last year five people were killed in a head-on smash between a cat and a lorry. The Road Safety Foundation says the number of people killed on the road has risen in the period of 2010-2012 Britain's Highest Risk Roads (By Region) North West: A537 - 7 miles - Macclesfied to Buxton South East: A285 - 12 miles - A27 (Chichester) to Petworth Scotland: A809 - 10 miles - Glasgow to A811 Wales: A44 - 24 miles - Llangurin to Aberystwith East of England: A1302 - 3 miles - A14 to A134 (Bury St Edmunds) Yorkshire & Humber: A61 - 6 miles - Wakefield to M1 J44 East Midlands: A4300 - 4 miles - Full route through Kettering South West: A4151 - 5 miles - A43136 (Nailford) to A48 West Midlands: A422 - 7 miles - A429 to A46 (Stratford on Avon) North East: A67 - 10 miles - Darlington to A19 It is followed by a six-mile stretch of the A6 between the M6 junction 33 to Lancaster, a 5-mile stretch of the A61 between Wakefield and the M1 junction 44, four miles of the A36 between the A3090 and Totton in Hampshire, five miles of the A589 around Lancaster, seven miles of the A643 between Brighouse and Morely in Yorkshire, and four miles of the A4300 through Kettering. The report called "How Safe are You on Britain's Roads?" sponsored by Ageas is to be published today (MON) at a briefing in the House of Lords and notes: "Once again, the top route is a route that goes through a national park. The safety measures taken so far are not enough to tackle the route. It requires a more far reaching intervention along the 12-mile length of the route which make junctions and roadsides safer in particular. The most improved road is the A404 (Amersham) between High Wycombe and Great Missenden in Buckingham shire where a major speed limit review in the county "resulted in the route being targetted with a speed limit reduction from 40mph to 30mph through two short sections of one-mile and half-a-mile through Amersham." Vehicle activated signs, road resurfacing and junction improvements, new reflective bollards, better street lighting, and renewed cats-eyes, all contributed, said the report. The report also highlights how low cost safety improvements carried out by highway authorities and council to coincide with routine maintenance have helped reduce fatal and serious crashes by 80 per cent on 15 of the previously most dangerous stretches of UK roads. This has seen deaths and serious injuries fall from 237 to 52 in the three years after action was taken. It says: "The economic value of just these few low cost improvements is estimated at a staggering £0.4billion." Across all regions and highways, single carriageways were by far the most dangerous road type for drivers. Pictured: A6 road through the Borrowdale Valley in Cumbria It points out how improvements including speed reductions on one notorious and "infamous" accident black spot - the so-called "Cat and Fiddle" route on the A537 - had seen it fall from being the most dangerous to "28th in the list of "most improved" routes. Half of the cost of all fatal crashes on the British road network occurs on the 10 per cent of roads surveyed and mapped in the Foundation's report, it says. Britain suffers annual serious injury costs alone of £0.3 billion on motorways, £0.6 billion on national trunk roads and £2 billion on local authority "A" roads. It says the safety of roads has not kept pace with safety improvements in cars: "We should not be driving five-star cars on one- and two-star roads. It is time to set a national goal that our "A" roads should achieve a minimum three-star safety rating with four- and five-star ratings for our busiest trunk roads and motorways." The East Midlands has been revealed as the highest risk region in Britain for the first time Regional breakdowns show that the risk and cost of death and serious injury on the major roads of the worst performing East Midlands is two thirds higher than the best-performing West Midlands. It notes: "This difference is larger than between many countries." By contrast, the West Midlands and Scotland are the two regions improving most quickly. The report says: "The differing risk in each regions is mainly due to the amount of travel there is on safe roads and how much on risky roads. The motorways in the South East have been shown to have the highest risk of all motorways in Britain However, for single carriageways, the highest risk of accident exists in the North West "Even an average single carriageway "A" road is seven times riskier than a motorway. Some roads represent more than 20 times the risk of others. James Bradford, engineering manager for the Road Safety Foundation said: "The busier the road, the more frequently any flaw in layout leads to death and serious injury." Road Safety Foundation chairman, Lord Whitty said: "We can no longer accept sudden, violent road death as such a significant cause of premature loss of life. The UK government must design, plan and legislate to put safety on roads on the same footing as safety in the air, sea or on rail. The dossier complements a second report also published today (MON) by the Road Safety Foundation called "Making Road Safety Pay" which makes recommendations for the Government to adopt in a bid to achieve "zero road deaths" within a decade. These include: a zero Insurance Premium tax (IPT) rate for insured vehicles fitted with a telematics unit for drivers under the age of 25; low speed Autonomous Emergency Braking (AEB) mandatory as standard on all new cars; and minimum inbuilt 4-star safety rating levels for the busiest national roads and minimum 3-stars for all other national roads by 2025.