Safe Speed Forums

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Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

This is true, you would have to be insane to ever do more than 20 in many of Portsmouth's roads, so it's hardly surprising that the DfT concluded that "20mph zones had hardly any effect on drivers" . The problem here is that these 20 limits have also been applied to roads which are wide and have no parked cars, within non-pedestrianised, non-residential areas, so are those limits being ignored?

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

Councillor Lynne Stagg (Lib Dem)
Cabinet Member for Traffic and Transportation
Councillor for Baffins until May 2011
71 Highgate Road
Copnor, Portsmouth, PO3 5AS

email Cllr.Lynne.Stagg@portsmouthcc.gov.uk
Tel: 023 9278 0245 (home)
Mb: 07958 795386 (mobile)

Dear Councillor Stagg

I expect you are aware of a recent report, “The Nimrod Review”, An independent review into the broader issues surrounding the loss of the RAF Nimrod MR2 Aircraft XV230 in Afghanistan in 2006, by Charles Haddon-Cave, QC, available at;
http://www.official-documents.gov.uk/do ... 5/1025.pdf
In this 14 men were needlessly killed when leaking fuel came into contact with hot pipes, which then resulted in a fire that lead to the destruction of the plane and its occupants.

You may ask what this has got to do with you and the blanket 20mph limit you have imposed in Portsmouth, but Charles Haddon-Cave, QC, the distinguished author, draws a particularly strong comparison between the safety culture related to this aircraft crash and that related to road accidents in urban areas, which is as much “A Failure of Leadership, Culture and Priorities”.

As a result of this review, the government has had to admit it got its priorities wrong and it is a great pity they, and you, don’t now admit the same with respect to road safety policies.

In Chapter 27 – “New Safety Culture”, Charles Haddon-Cave refers to Hans Monderman, a Dutch road traffic engineer and innovator, with the quotation, “The greater the number of prescriptions, the more people’s sense of personal responsibility dwindles” (Hans Monderman).

In section 27.31 of his report, Charles Haddon-Cave, QC states, “It is worthwhile having regard to the work of Hans Monderman, the Dutch road engineer and innovator, who pioneered the concept of ‘naked streets’ or ‘shared space’. He realised that by removing a plethora of prescriptive road signs in urban streets you would encourage drivers and pedestrians alike to think more about safe conduct and reduce accident rates accordingly. He has been proved right”. Yet you, in comparison, seem to think you know better and believe that the more limits you prescribe, with the additional 20mph speed limit signs, the safer it will be.

Put more simply, “If you treat people (drivers) like idiots, they will behave like idiots”. The more you prescribe what they should do, the more they can just do what you tell them and the less they will need take responsibility for their own actions. A driver could, quite legitimately, say, “sorry I hit the child, but it was not my responsibility to anticipate them running in front of my vehicle, since I was complying with the required 20mph speed limit you imposed”. Or put another way, “I was following the rules and orders, so it not my responsibility”, as did MPs with their expenses. So in the end we now have the “tick box” culture, which just requires fulfilling the checklist and then everything is ok.

I notice in your previous communications you mentioned how many children you have nearly collided with, despite strictly observing the speed limits, yet in more than 40 years of driving I recall only one particular incident where this nearly happened to me, when a teenage boy on a cycle unexpectedly pulled out in front of me without looking. While there have been many other situations where similar incidents could have happened, it was otherwise possible to anticipate the event and avoid the incident. Even in the case mentioned, my anticipation meant a collision was avoided. Very few drivers I know have as many near misses as you appear to have, so might I propose you look more at the way you drive, rather than the speed you drive, and you should then have a lot less near misses with children. Then encourage others to do the same, rather than trying to force them to drive everywhere at just 20mph.

May I recommend the excellent book, “Mind Driving: New Skills for Staying Alive on the Road”, by Stephen Haley.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1873371160
now available for just £9.50, or less, inc P&P.

Why not issue a copy of this book to every school in your area and encourage them to pass on the lessons learned to the children they teach. This would be much better than wasting many £100,000 of ratepayer’s money on your worthless blanket 20mph speed enforcement programme. This is just wasting the lives of thousands of drivers, who are of no danger to anyone, as they are needlessly delayed by your ill-considered scheme.

Regards

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

Similar thing happened up my way summer 08, a road which was previously 50kph was reduced to 30kph because there was a school on the road. Never has there been an incident but just because there is a school I accepted it (still don't agree with it). The limit was brought in the week after the school holidays STARTED. Cops up policing the new speed limit at 7pm, during the holidays, in perfect conditions.

I understood that there are currently NO certified speed detection devices which can be used below 30mph and its evidence used in a court of law. So how are the police fineing people for breaking the 20mph speed limit unless of course there were exceeding 30mph? Perhaps the people in Portsmouth have a case if fined for a speed betwen 23 -30mph.

But I stand to be corrected on the cerified speed detection device.

I thought the 20mph limit on Tower Bridge was enforced somehow. Anyone confirm this?

I believe that 20 limit is (or at least was) monitored using SPECS cameras: Google Street View

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

Here

This is not SPECS3 but prior technology.
For SPECS3 see here http://www.speedcheck.co.uk/specs3.htm
and
here http://www.speedcheck.co.uk/images/SCS_ ... ochure.pdf

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Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

No, it does not.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

Don't forget, Malcolm, these people aren't road safety experts, (or experts on much else, I would guess), how would you expect them to know what an "average speed camera" does, or even how to calculate an average speed.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

So that being said, would she be happy to stand in front of my car on a test track whilst I drive at her at 20mph? I doubt, because as we all know, she would certainly be killed instantly, if not in terrible pain.

Again another "road safety expert" in the making!!!! Where do these people get their qualifications/experience/knowhow from???

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

This is what I posted on the subject on BBC HYS:

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Only when ideology, prejudice and dogma are set aside does the truth emerge - Kepler

She obviously hasn't understood the Ashton Mackay graph that clearly shows that people die from neigh all speeds - in that graph from approx 12mph to 82 mph ... 30 was 'just' the half way marker - 50% of people having fatal accidents above and below 30mph.
It just baffles me that they cannot understand that a Police car patrolling would prevent ALL trucks / lorries with wrong weight limits from going over the bridge at all !
A weigh section of road would easily alert a VAS type visual aid to show that vehicle was too heavy, and that plus Police presence would likely prevent all lorries from entering the bridge with a visual warning. Instead we have had many lorries cross the bridge and obtain tickets. So people feel aggrieved, instead of receiving a clear warning from cops as to the real problem and prevent access.
A height restriction of course would have stopped large lorries and some smaller ones too of course, but apart from that it would otherwise have worked without anyone receiving tickets, and without even taking up a single policeman ! And would have told people and helped them learn and a chance to behave correctly.

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Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

(What is the BBC's HYS?)
When in attention is one of the primary causes of accidents, frustration being the second, and considering that forcing people to try to drive (sometimes) deliberately slowly which causes frustration and greatly increases inattention, seems exceptionally 'wrong' to put it mildly.
The enforcement (asked in an above post) will be by SPECS3, so we end up with 'zone's' with entry/exit cameras (like the average SPECS one's - only worse). So people will use all sorts of possible tactics to stay within the limits, from driving too slow after short too fast sections, others will have sat nav's guiding them but others won't so all will end up driving behind the slowest car. Some will stop deliberately so parking will become an ever greater issue. Roads around the area will become more popular and prices of properties will vary in an out of the 'ring'. The delivery drivers will have issues with number of deliveries as they cannot deliver to as many drops, so prices will go up.
Then there are all the driving problems from mental fatigue and turning drivers into zombies that pay less attention and are distracted very easily. Having to keep checking the speedo to ensure that you are within the necessary numeric value can be dangerous when one may have to check when conditions are less than safe.
Any need to drive quickly to a hospital will add to an already stressful experience. If you accidentally entered the area too and met one of the inner cameras you maybe too late by the time you see the next camera and then brake hard having realise your mistake.
Then those that live in the area maybe lulled into a very false sense of safety. Children may start to think that they can play on the streets !
I foresee it as a very dangerous area for road safety.

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Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

Sales of paintball guns will rise.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

Ooo, perish the thought!

It's "Have Your Say". Here's the link: http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread. ... 1212124657

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Only when ideology, prejudice and dogma are set aside does the truth emerge - Kepler