Hot-rodders and speed merchants on the Danish roads might want to ease off the throttle this week as the police have launched nationwide speed controls.

The police controls, which will last until Sunday, have been established in co-ordination with the Council for Traffic Safety and that organisation’s ‘Sænk farten – en lille smule betyder en hel del’ (‘Reduce the speed – less is more’) campaign.

“Despite the number of serious traffic accidents continuing to fall in Denmark, there are still too many drivers who speed and thus expose themselves and others to danger,” said Erik Terp Jensen, the head of the state police’s national traffic centre.

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EU campaign
According to the police, there is a direct correlation between speed and traffic casualties. The issue is particularly prevalent in rural areas, where over 60 percent of drivers drive above the speed limit. As a result, these are the areas where most accidents occur.

Nearly half of all traffic fatalities in 2014 involved a vehicle driving over the speed limit.

The police control is part of a joint EU initiative that is organised by the European traffic police network TISPOL and partially financed by the EU Commission.