There were 163 crashes in Uttlesford in 2018, figures released by the Department for Transport have revealed.

This is a decrease compared to 2017, when there were 181 crashes in the district.

Police attended 108 slight, 60 serious and four fatal road traffic collisions (RTCs) in 2018, the data, released last month, shows.

The force were called to two fatal collisions on the M11, both between Birchanger and Great Hallingbury, on October 31 and April 27 respectively. Another fatal crash happened on August 13 between Quendon and Stansted Mountfitchet, on Cambridge Road, while the final fatal of the year occured on December 19, between Thaxted and Great Easton on Dunmow Road.

On Dunmow Road, between Dunmow and Great Canfield, there were three serious crashes, whilst another took place further south, near High Roding.

Along the B1053, between Saffron Walden and Sewards End, there were three serious crashes.

In Essex, the number of fatal RTCs increased from 45 in 2017 to 48, but overall the number of crashes fell, from 3,235 to 3,163, with the number of serious collisions decreasing by 1, to 805.

A spokesperson for Safer Essex Roads Partnership said: "The partnership's purpose is to reduce death and serious injury on Essex roads to zero, an ambitious vision and one which we cannot tackle alone: each road user plays a part.

"By 2020 we aim to have fewer than 830 killed or seriously injured collisions (KSI) per year in Essex. This is an interim target towards our vision of zero people killed or seriously injured on our roads, as one life ended or changed in a road traffic collision, is one too many.

"The data tells us we are heading in the right direction but there is still work to be done. We promote road safety through a number of activities, interventions, programmes and products which involve a combination of education, engagement, engineering and enforcement. We will interact directly with more than 270,000 Essex road users each year.

"In order to achieve our target we review the previous year's collision data to evaluate what we have achieved and understand whether we are targeting the right road user groups in the right way at the right time.

"Road safety is everyone's responsibility and we urge every road user to consider how they play a part. We'd encourage everyone to take a look at our easy-to-use interactive data tool https://saferessexroads.org/collision-data/ which shows maps, trends and other data for the last 5 years.

"We also encourage members of the public to follow our social media channels (@saferessexroads) to see what we're doing to drive down collisions and casualties."