No to 20mph speed limits everywhere (From Your Local Guardian)
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No to 20mph speed limits everywhere
7:23am Tuesday 10th April 2012 in Kingston
I do not accept that 20mph limits are proven to reduce casualties by dramatic amounts. The same claims are made for speed cameras, traffic calming measures and speed limit reductions as well as road engineering improvements, probationary driver schemes and passive safety enhancements. And yet, the overall road casualty figures have not significantly improved since 1993. Figures claiming great improvements for certain measures must be viewed in the context of the overall figures, and when this is done they simply do not add up. There are several obvious factors which do not appear to have been taken into account: There are large fluctuations in fatality statistics at a county level which do not fit in to standard statistical distributions. This is because accidents are complex events with multiple causes.
Many 20mph limits have been implemented in specific locations in response to resident pressure for action following a blip in accidents. It is therefore inevitable that the measures will "succeed" — that success was built in at the start by effectively choosing a few locations with a bad "before" period. This is why local "success" from "safety" measures rarely translate into overall improvements.
20mph outside school, yes.
On housing estates yes.
Not on every residential road!
Lastly why is the road safety issue of cyclists without lights at night ignored by all? The Council should be addressing this highly dangerous issue.
Based on information supplied by Tony Trinkwon.
Comments(3)
New Malden Man
says...
11:42am Thu 12 Apr 12
Rather than cyclists with no lights, I would say the following more serious issues should be dealt with first.
Drivers on mobile phones.
Drivers playing with Sat navs, car radios etc.
Drivers incapable of using their indicators.
Drivers ignoring red lights and one way streets.
Uncle Bulgaria
says...
11:20pm Fri 13 Apr 12
Drivers parking on double yellow lines
Drivers jumping red lights by stopping in advanced stop boxes dedicated to cyclists
Drivers failing to stop at zebra crossings
Drivers stopping on a crossing in heavy traffic (contravening the highway code)
Drivers unable to turn right by The Alexandra pub and instead smashing into the bollard and writing off their car then blaming the bollard
Uncle Bulgaria says...
10:38pm Wed 11 Apr 12
What is the point of changing the speed limit if nobody checks whether people are adhering to it?