Location Overview – Northampton is a market town in the East Midlands, on the River Nene, it is 60 miles to the northwest of London and 50 miles to the southeast of Birmingham and is the county town of Northamptonshire, one of the largest towns in England. The town is 30 miles south-southeast of Leicester, 16 miles north-northwest of Milton Keynes, 43 miles west of Cambridge, 37 miles northeast of Oxford and the same distance southwest of Peterborough. Many smaller suburbs make up Northampton, including Billing, Collingtree, Great Houghton, Duston, Hardingstone, Hunsbury Meadow, Upton, West Hunsbury, and Wootton & East Hunsbury. You will also find the adjoining villages of Boughton, Cogenhoe, Ecton, Grange Park, Harpole, Little Houghton, Moulton, Overstone and Rothersthorpe. We have been delivering advanced driver training in the Northampton area since 2011.

During a session, we typically look at the following:

* Understanding observational elements of driving (seeing) and building these into your driving plan
* How to become a more skilful driver
* Manoeuvres and driving in restricted areas
* Undoing years of ingrained bad habits
* The system of car control – IPSGA
* Driving in busy urban environments
* Car control (looking at gears, steering, and use of signals etc)
* Learning how to anticipate the actions of other road users better
* Learn how you and other drivers think when behind the wheel
* Coping with bad weather
* Understand your own limitations and at-risk factors – most of which you won’t be aware of
* Developing an improved attitude towards motoring
* Coping and defusing with road rage
* Learning why skids can happen and how to control them
* Learning to see and not just look when driving

Once the training is complete, a PDF report will be sent to you with several things assessed, such as confidence, forward planning, attitude, vehicle control, etc. This report is beneficial as it’s completely bespoke to the driver and provides valuable tips and insights for future safer driving. Each report is thoroughly verified and documented – proof you’ve had driver training with a DVSA-registered professional.

Key learning points of our driver training:

* Demonstrate your intention to become a safer, improved driver
* Deal with and address issues which may have been holding you back
* Work on any issues which could be impacting your level of skill and safety
* Become a much improved, more skilful motorist

Training is a little different for commercial clients – the end client, the person who has the on-road training, is often not the person who decides to do the training. While we help the driver to improve, from a commercial perspective, your business will benefit from the following:

* Demonstrating your businesses Duty of Care
* Lower fuel costs
* Providing the opportunity for an employee to develop
* Showing you care
* Potentially lower your fleet insurance costs

Northampton is served by junctions 15, 15a and 16 of the M1 motorway connecting the town to London in the south and Leeds to the north. The A45 and A43 link Northampton with other major towns in Northamptonshire and can be accessed by a ring road. The A14 is close to the north of Northampton, providing links to East Anglia and a secondary route to the areas of the Midlands, which are situated to the north of the town. These are ideal routes to take further driver training. We have delivered training for both private and corporate clients, and the tutors are all handpicked and registered with the DVSA. We will come to you and take you or your drivers out in your own vehicles.

Whether you are a private client or a business customer, we can build a course based on your specific needs and requirements anywhere in the UK.

Our courses do vary in structure, although we have many courses based on duration:

3.5hr session

7hr session (which can be split for two drivers if needed)

2 x 3.5hr sessions

3 x 3.5hr sessions – We also have longer courses if needed.

The 7hr session, as mentioned above, can be split between two drivers, which is time and cost-efficient. One driver will be trained in the morning, usually 9.00 to 12:30, and then the second in the afternoon, usually 13:00 to 16:30. We can be flexible with start times and can start earlier than 9 am if needed. Each driver has 3.5hr on-road training.

Longer Duration Courses:

Our bespoke 3, 4 and 5 x 3.5hr sessions are suited to those with specific driving issues. These issues include driving anxiety, motorway confidence, a fear of driving in new areas, post-RTC confidence or those that have not driven in a long time.

These longer courses are booked mainly by private individuals, although they are also open to our business customers.

Those that commit to these longer-duration courses see change happen over the weeks as they build confidence and address the specific issues they may be facing.

Talk with us:

While we cover as many things as possible on this page, we understand you may still have questions. If you wish to discuss anything, please call or email us. A member of our team will only be too pleased to help you. We can help both private individuals and business clients.

If you’re looking at a quote for a large number of drivers, we will be able to provide such, along with how we can best approach the training based on your business needs. Training large numbers requires a little extra planning, but we have many years of experience in managing extensive, often complex driver training sessions, which involve multiple start locations and hectic diaries.

Road Safety Risks and Information – Northampton

Northampton is set on the eastern edge of the M1 in Northamptonshire. Several fast A roads, such as the A45, A4500, A5132, and A5076, serve the town centre and surrounding residential areas.

From junction 15 of the M1 Northampton Road, A508 links the A45 into Northampton and the Nene Valley Way. This is a large and challenging junction with numerous accidents notes, some severe. Most accidents are found on the slip roads and the roundabout, suggesting that positioning for lane exiting may be to blame. When driving across busy large intersections such as these, it is vital that you are always aware of the lane you should be in for exiting to avoid such collisions. Further along at junction 15a, statistics are very similar with accidents occurring on the slip roads. When joining or exiting fast motorway systems, the correct speed must be applied, as this can cause problems that can lead to pile-ups involving many vehicles at once. Junction 15a links the A43 to the A5123 to Upton Way and Danes Camp Way, which both carry a high amount of traffic throughout the town, and accidents are seen at nearly every roundabout and traffic light system along the way, especially the Hunsbury Hill Roundabout. Junction 16 of the M1 links the A45 to the A500, Weedon Road, which travels into the town centre; it is a fast dual carriageway for much of the route until it reaches the Gambrel Road Roundabout, when it runs through a highly residential area. This route is shared with bus routes, and more pedestrians and cyclists are found along this road. The collisions that happen along this route are severe even though the speeds are quite low. This would suggest that pedestrians and cyclists are involved in many of these collisions.

The A500 circles the south of Northampton town centre, forming a ring road with the A5132 and York Road, and numerous collisions are seen along the route; these are more likely in rush hours and can lead to congestion with road closures and redirections at times. If you are unfamiliar with driving through Northampton, it can be very challenging as even though it is a relatively small town, the road network is quite challenging. The A508, Horse Market Street, runs through the centre of the town from north to south and meets Gold Street, running east to west. There is a traffic light system here, and numerous accidents have been noted, some very severe.

Please contact us if you have any specific roads you travel on in the Northampton area and are keen to discover what parts are at higher risk of collisions. We offer a free-of-charge service to anyone who is interested, where our team of experts will conduct a thorough analysis of the road conditions, traffic patterns, and accident history of your chosen route and provide you with a detailed report highlighting potential risk areas and recommended safety measures.