Interesting speed limit issue

[embee]

Where I live in Kenilworth there are some council notices up proposing some speed limit changes. That's not unusual.

One of them is to extend a 30 limit a couple of hundred metres. The road is the border between housing and country, and cars do generally tend to exceed 30 a bit but I can't actually recall any significant accident (or any come to that) in 25yrs. The existing road probably needs to be 30 in practice but realistically 40 wouldn't be unreasonable in real life, which is what a lot of people do.

Interesting thing is that there has been one objection so far to the extension of the 30 limit, and that is from..............the Police.

Their argument, which I think is entirely pragmatic and sensible, is that it will just make more people ignore the existing limit due to what will be seen as just another "silly" limit reduction.

The local paper reports that the Council will ignore the Police's view. The campaigners are using the old "accident waiting to happen" argument. Hmmmm.

I wish they'd concentrate on the things that really need doing (spending my council tax on bottled water for the Council meetings for example :smt067 ).

[lx_online]

Interesting - where did you find their objection?

[Lozzo]

Strange reaction from the police, but a worthy one all the same. I suppose they know more about this thing than anyone else, after all, they've seen almost every single carriageway NSL in Warwickshire be reduced from 60 to 50mph in the past few years with absolutely no positive effect whatsoever on casualty figures.

My eldest daughter lives in Barford near the M40 and says driving or riding in Warks is a bloody nightmare since the 50 limits started springing up everywhere

[Amadeus]

My eldest daughter lives in Barford near the M40 and says driving or riding in Warks is a bloody nightmare since the 50 limits started springing up everywhere

That's a little dramatic isn't it? ;)

[-Ralph-]

Warks is a bloody nightmare since the 50 limits started springing up everywhere

I ignore them all. Kind of proves that the police have a very valid point doesn't it?

Both my parents are over 60 years of age and very rarely break a speed limit elsewhere, but both are habitual speeders as soon as they enter Warwickshire, whilst muttering "ridiculous" Victor Meldrew style at every speed limit sign they pass. They stick to the limits as they used to know them, "it's been 60mph as long as I can remember, I'm not going to start doing 50 now!", so even if one gets changed for a valid reason that they are not aware of, they'll ignore it as being another "ridiculous" limit change.

If you can't get the most law abiding demographic to obey the law, then that tells you there's something wrong with it.

[Lozzo]

Ah, but eldest daughter has a few points racked up over the last 13 years* so has to be on her guard - her licence is her job.

*I don't think her licence has been clean since she was 18

[Bibio]

we have the same up the coast of fife. huge sections of 40's in the countryside. only explanation i can think of is there will be housing developments going in at sometime in the future so they are getting people used to the limits now.

[-Ralph-]

Ah, but eldest daughter has a few points racked up over the last 13 years* so has to be on her guard - her licence is her job.

*I don't think her licence has been clean since she was 18

Guess I'd be the same in that position, but that said I'm really not sure that the police are actually enforcing those limits. Dunno about scameras. Reckon if she stuck to 60mph she'd be fine.

[embee]

Interesting - where did you find their objection?

Just what it says in the local rag. OK, not necessarily gospel truth, but they aren't usually wrong on these sort of things, public domain stuff I guess.

TBH I don't think the Warwks police spend all that much time on enforcement of all the 50 limits, I suspect they consider they've got better things to do.

[yorkie_chris]

That's a reasonable reaction from the coppers, "an unjust law is no law at all". Like round here where they have solid white lines in perfectly safe overtaking locations, these idiots simply devalue the law in places where it is reasonable to obey it.

[454697819]

thats the same reasons the highways agency gave when I asked them to consider moving the 30mph 200m out of the village, they said that if people see no need for the restriction they wont stick to it... I consider this BS and await the day I get side swiped out the junction from my house...

[timwilky]

Local authorities do this sort of thing to justify their safety camera partnership scamera vans. They can then justifiably claim that people are ignoring the limits and therefore we need to catch/prosecute or offer courses on our awareness course to make us more money. Or am I a simple cynic who has been caught out by an NSL being reduced to 30 with a scamera at the bottom of the hill only visible once you go round the blind bend and the only serious accident being attributed to an unsafe load and not speed.

[Captain Nemo]

its quite normal for Police authorities to object to changes in speed limits one of the reasons for this is it has to be enforcable, if the police dont see the limit as being reasonably self enforcing they may object as the public will generally expect the Police to enforce the new limit and they just dont have the resources.

quite often villages and parish coucillors shout to local authorities for "accident waiting to happen" roads to have reduced speed limits, without actually realising that to get those reductions physical constraints have to be applie to the highway, for example, gateways, increased lining and signing, even speed control. they seem to think that by just banging a sign up that driver behaviour changes instantly....................

quite often they then go a bit quiet when they realise the perfectly straight and safe road outside their newly converted barn conversion will have to have speed humps and street lighting and ribbed markings all over the place.

[Red Herring]

thats the same reasons the highways agency gave when I asked them to consider moving the 30mph 200m out of the village, they said that if people see no need for the restriction they wont stick to it... I consider this BS and await the day I get side swiped out the junction from my house...


Maybe I've read this wrong. You seem to be suggesting that if you pull out of your house in front of someone doing 60mph it is somehow their fault, but if they are only doing 30 then it's not? It may be that the view from your entrance is restricted in which case may I ask what steps you have taken to make it safer? Have you put a sign up warning approaching motorists of the entrance, have you considered a mirror to afford a better view?

I think if we start expecting a 30 limit outside every house/entrance then pretty soon the rest of the Uk will look like Warwickshire.

[missyburd]

There's a road here that was a 50 then national speed limit for years. For the last few months it seems to be causing some confusion as to what should be the limit. It's gone to being a 30 then national speed limit, to being a 30 and a 40, and now it's a straight 40 all the way through. I've yet to see any scamera vans or anything on there, but there have been a handful of accidents in the last few years which I assume is responsible for the decisions but I do wish they'd make there bloody minds up.