30kmh – making streets liveable

[reohn2]

.........In my case, the road was for all practical purposes empty. It was daylight, visibility was good, weather was fine. The locale was agricultural, with no likely location for pedestrians to appear. By maintaining a very high level of concentration I could anticipate and thus observe in good time any likely hazard to a sufficient degree as to be sufficiently safe to drive at the speed I did...........

Badgers,Foxes,Hares,sheep,Cattle,Horses, even a low flying Buzzard,all have immaculate road sense

You my friend are exactly the type of person who needs to be restrained by speed limits and the law!

Quite! but if someone's highly trained nothing can possibly go wrong.............can it?

[reohn2]

So, whenever you are driving down a normal urban road where there are pedestrians on the pavement, in normal light traffic flow conditions, do you slow down to 20 mph, or 15 mph in case a pedestrian decides to do something stupid, causing a collision it would be impossible for you to avoid?

Yes.
Don't you?

Apart from the danger, it's impolite and rude to go past peds at 30mph. Treat them with respect and kindness. Treat them in a manner you would like to be treated.

spot on!

[belgiangoth]

I grew up in Belgium. For the first 18 years of my life speed limits were not enforced on motorways and people drove at 200-220 kph.
Then, in the space of two years they started enforcing speed limits.

We can back this motion and ten hope that the law gets enforced, or we can not back this motion and then not have a moral highground/case in law to assault PCCs/councillors/MPs/motorists with.

[xerxes]

30 miles per hour is plenty slow enough, providing motorists stick to it. The problem with a 20mph/30kph limit is that it has motorists creeping along in low gears, wasting fuel and creating even more pollution - as if cars weren't inefficient enough already !

What is needed is not lower speed limits, but stricter enforcement of existing limits together with more severe penalties. If for instance a single speeding offence carried an instant ban, it would soon change driving habits. Speeding seems to have a 'laddish' culture associated with it - even supposedly responsible organisations such as the AA campaign against speeding regulations (e.g. their campaign to ensure all speed cameras are clearly marked). This needs to change.

At one time, drink driving was regarded in a similar gung-ho fashion. Since the introduction of the breathalyser, opinions have gradually changed, and now drink drivers are generally regarded as pariahs, not much higher in the social order than child molesters and rapists. We need to encourage a similar attitude towards those who break the speed limit.

[belgiangoth]

30 mph in a school zone is too fast, same for a busy park area - especially since both will have cars parked into the road on both sides, meaning room for only one car and drivers' view of small children crossing obscured.

[gentlegreen]

I'll often cycle faster than I would drive on a given road because my killing potential is much less and I am much more aware of my surroundings.
I get claustrophobic just thinking about driving - it amazes me how people so easily get into doing it every day.

[gordy]

If I was in charge, I'd ban brake lights on all motor vehicles.

At a stroke, IMHO, that would make life much more pleasant for the communities currently blighted and held to ransom by motor traffic and drivers.

[Mark1978]

Agreed that we don't really need lower limits. Just strict enforcement of existing ones.

Someone above seemed to advocate chicanes and road narrowing etc. Which is good for pedestrians, but for cyclists there's little worse!

[Mick F]

If I was in charge, I'd ban brake lights on all motor vehicles.

This idea has some merit.
If vehicle didn't have them, people would keep further back - wouldn't they?
This would then make them slower?

On a humorous note, if they did away with air bags and replaced them with spikes, if you have an accident, you get stabbed!

[patricktaylor]

If I was in charge, I'd ban brake lights on all motor vehicles.

This idea has some merit.
If vehicle didn't have them, people would keep further back - wouldn't they?
This would then make them slower? ...

Not necessarily slower, just further back. Getting up to the same speed but with bigger gaps - lines of cars take up more space, queues are slower to get moving, slower to stop, more delays. Or something... but not generally slower (that's just my guess).

[reohn2]

C'mon chaps let's be real switching of brake lights is daft in the extreme,how a people behind going to know when the traffic has stopped,especially when texting?

20mph speed are very appropriate in some places,town centres,housing estates,etc.Also some national speed limits are plainly ridiculous on most rural country lanes,etc.

The problem is the expectation that nothing should ever impede the almighty motor vehicle,by a growing element of drivers and more so with a lack law enforcement fortified by the fact that,even in the slimmest chances of ever being caught the penalty will be no more than a slap on the wrist .
The elephant in the room is speed,the second one is responsibility.

[Edwards]

Around here most residential roads need a 30kph/20mph speed limits, the biggest bonus is that it would only need one car to travel at the desired speed and the rest of the antisocial, selfish, life ruining things would be stuck behind them.
The roads are not wide enough to allow for overtaking. If they need to get their fix and travel faster than they are really able, then they can use the 40mph Dual Carriageways that go around this housing estates.

There will always be some fools that thinks that they are "Too Good" for speed limits. But as people get used to slower vehicle passing their house maybe they will start throwing things at the cars going to fast for the safety of the people living there.
The residents should decide the speed not the driver.

[gordy]

The residents should decide the speed not the driver.

Absolutely. I've never understood why speed discussions and decisions have anything to do with motorists at all - the community should decide what they are prepared to accept.

[thirdcrank]

One problem is that it's often the residents who drive fastest, perhaps through a combination of familiarity with local roads and an assumption that they somehow own the street.

I live in a cul-de-sac off another cu-de-sac and I see this all the time.

I think it's often the case that when there's enforcement following residents' representations, that it's the locals who get caught. (That's probably partly caused by the locals in an area tending to be the most numerous, not just the effect I'm suggesting.)

I can't see any other basis for setting speed limits than technical ones: eg poor sightlines, residential area, are things which should dictate low speeds; motorway conditions enable faster traffic.

[reohn2]

^^^ Spot on!