POLICE in Bolton remain committed in the fight to crack down on speeding.

Last year Greater Manchester Police (GMP) declared Bolton was its biggest area of concern in the region for road safety.

And the force said patrols would be stepped up in the town.

In October 2020, Chief Inspector Matt Bailey-Smith of GMP’s Safer Transport Team, said: “Currently, Bolton is our highest area of ‘threat’ and is therefore subject to increasing deployments to look at issues of speed, anti-social use of vehicles and intelligence.

“We recognise that many people drive carefully and stick to speed limits and we would like to thank them for doing so.”

Following a number of serious collisions in the borough last year, police in Bolton launched Operation Portman, focused on making the roads safer.

The month-long operation was launched on December 3, 2020 and resulted in 564 motorists being reported.

Another two drivers were stopped on suspicion of a mobile phone while driving, three were arrested after being accused of drink-driving offences and five were allegedly driving without due care or attention.

And an arrest was made in which a driver was accused of being behind the wheel of a vehicle when they were disqualified.

Sergeant Phil Brown, tactical lead for Operation Portman, said: "During 2020, we saw an unacceptable level of death and serious injuries on Bolton's roads.

"The effect on families and loved ones involved is simply unimaginable.

"Portman achieved it's aims and our targeted operation saw a significant drop in death and serious injury on Bolton roads."

In order to keep on top of road safety in the borough, action has been taken by police.

Sgt Brown added: "The neighbourhood teams at Bolton remain committed to continuing the good work started under Operation Portman.

"To that end, we have up-skilled officers in traffic enforcement and education, trained officers in the use of the TruSpeed laser devices and the borough now have two of these devices available for use.

"This means that road safety activities will continue to form part of our daily business for Bolton's neighbourhood teams.

"In addition, we will continue to work with our partners both within GMP but also at other agencies such as Bolton Council, the DVLA and others to improve standards on our roads.

"We believe this work is vitally important as just one death on our roads is too many."