SPEED Groups as a Tool for Reducing Aggression and Risky Behaviour in Road Traffic: A Criminological, Psychological and Organisational Analysis

Abstract

This article examines the activities of the Police SPEED teams as an element of the system for reducing road aggression, serious speeding offences and other high-risk behaviour. The analysis draws on Polish and international literature in transport psychology, criminology and road traffic law enforcement, documents of the Polish National Police Headquarters and the National Road Safety Council, as well as regulations governing traffic control and measuring instruments. Publicly available materials make it possible to reconstruct the teams’ tasks and the scale of detected offences. The absence of a continuous data series prevents changes in national crash rates from being attributed to SPEED. The functional rationale for unmarked patrols lies in their ability to observe driver behaviour before intervention and to increase the perceived probability that an offence will be detected. The value of this approach depends on the appropriate selection of locations and the reliability of the evidence collected. The way performance is assessed also matters. The number of fines reflects team activity; assessing the impact on safety requires separate measurements of speed and driver behaviour combined with crash analysis.