VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – A bump in speed limits along several BC highways isn’t the biggest factor when it comes to collisions.

Over half of all crashes were the result of distracted driving, adverse weather and drivers who don’t slow down to accommodate conditions.

Thirty-three sections of highway were studied, comparing crash statistics between November 2014 and Oct 2015 with the previous three years.

Minister of Transportation Todd Stone says in 12 of those with higher speed limits, the number of crashes dropped. But in seven others, there were actually more crashes.

“If we believe that the right speeds have been set on segments of highway, we will keep those speeds and we will continue to focus on engineering and infrastructure improvements and other policy and regulatory changes to generally make our roads safer.”

Of the areas looked at, crash rates dropped or decreased in 19 sections while two jumped out as problematic.

“In two of those segments, we believe that no amount of rumble strips or reengineering of the highway in those segments is likely or at least cost effectively going to enable us to maximize the mitigation of risk”

Highway 1 from Hope to Cache Creek will return to 90 km/h and Highway 5A from Princeton to Merritt will return to 80 km.

There was a 30 percent drop in serious collision rates over the last decade, while single year numbers find an almost 10 percent jump across the entire highway system.

Click here to see government release on the report.

NEWS 1130’s Shannon Brennan joined Amanda Wawryk and Jim Bennie on air to talk about the report. You can hear the interview below.