Safe Speed Forums

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1516214,00.html

Speed humps face axe in plan to ease traffic flow

By Ben Webster, Transport Correspondent

ALL road humps would be ripped out under a Conservative plan to make traffic flow more smoothly.

The Tories will today claim that humps cost more lives than they save because they delay the emergency services and cause pollution because drivers repeatedly have to slow down and speed up, reducing fuel efficiency and raising emissions.

Many residents have also complained about the noise from cars accelerating away from humps. Councils have investigated claims that the vibration caused by bouncing over humps may result in structural damage to properties.

A Conservative amendment to the Road Safety Bill, being debated in the Commons today, proposes that no new speed humps should be permitted on any public road. It adds: “Within two years of the commencement of this Act every highway authority shall ensure that all speed humps constructed for traffic-calming purposes shall be removed from all public roads within their area.”

Tim Yeo, the Shadow Transport Secretary, said: “Superficially, road humps may seem an attractive solution. But they probably do more harm than good.

“Both safety and environmental considerations are better served by cars travelling at a steady 20mph rather than constantly speeding up and slowing down.”

Mr Yeo said he was regularly annoyed by having to negotiate humps when driving and believed the policy would win broad support among Britain’s 30 million motorists.

But he admitted that the Conservatives had conducted no research on the costs of digging up humps, adding later: “We are minded to remove humps, subject to the cost of doing so.”

The London Ambulance Service has claimed that humps cause up to 500 deaths a year because its crews are delayed in reaching cardiac arrest victims.

Road safety groups said the benefits of faster response times would be far outweighed by the extra casualties resulting from drivers speeding on hump-free streets. Deaths and serious injuries in road crashes fell by 57 per cent after the introduction of 20mph zones enforced by humps.

The Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety said: “This Conservative policy runs counter to all the research, which shows that humps reduce speed and save lives. We find this strange because humps were introduced in the early 1980s when the Conservatives were in power.”

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents said any local authority which removed humps might be sued by the families of people killed by speeding vehicles.

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Certainly gets my vote!

I think the research showing that humps save lives is much the same as that showing that speed cameras save lives - they only do so by moving the accidents elsewhere.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

That'll annoy the local council as they have just put in a load

Problem is, a lot of Conservative councils on the ground don't practice what the national party preach about humps, cameras and speed limits

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

So, that'll be, "Sorry, cost too much to remove - you'll just have to live with them" then.

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Will

Well, even a moratorium on installing new ones would be a huge step forward from the current situation.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

I really hope they do dig up those pieces of shit. There are even speed bumps along the road leading to Kingston-upon-Thames hospital!!

I reckon they could even make money on digging them up -- I'd pay a fiver for a few minutes at the helm of the JCB

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Will

Oh no..."speed kills" will be livid. It will half his property value.......

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Speed camera policy Kills

Actually I remember reading an estate agent report stating that speed humps lower propery values due to noise.

I also think the so called benefit was a misquote too. I read a report saying that accidents reduced in 70% of installations. Which is not the same thing as in 30% of installations accidents increased!

I'd also like to know what happens to traffic volumes after calming 'the real reason why people want them'.

This is rubbish and they know it.



It's not just the noise, it's the impression which it gives people visiting the area. If you see loads of humps you immediately think the locals must be a bunch of nutters behind the wheel if they need all those obstacles to remind them to slow down in a residential street.

I still think the damage to cars caused by speed bumps is a problem. Some cars will suffer more than others, (my Alfa has suspension bushes made out of margerine) but now that I have to negotiate speed bumps daily, my wheel alignment needs tweaking every time I get new tyres. I've never had this level of problem before. And I don't do anything near the 30 limit they enforce BTW.

RoSPA seem to be saying that the families of RTC victims could sue authorities for taking speed humps away, but the families of heart attack victims who died because the humps delayed the ambulance cannot sue the authorities for putting the humps in.

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Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler - Einstein

I wonder how much truth there is in this and, more importantly, how well it would scale to our land?

http://www.its.leeds.ac.uk/projects/pri ... alming.htm

ln my experience the opposite is true - humps cause acdelerate/decelerate - extra pollution. Humps create pinch points - more potential collision risk.