I can't help thinking that seems a little fast. Some might say dangerous
Speed Limit Reduction in Wales from next week
- Thread starter Big Andy
- Start date
Anecdotal I know, but we have loads of 20 mph roads in and around where I live. I'd estimate about 5% of people obey the limit and where there is a camera will slow down for it and then speed up afterwards.
I think most people find it hugely frustrating driving at 20 and when someone comes up behind another car correctly obeying the limit, I've seen some highly dangerous overtaking and general craziness caused by the slow travel.
Not sure whether we all just have to adapt, but would like to see some evidence that its actually working as intended.
I think most people find it hugely frustrating driving at 20 and when someone comes up behind another car correctly obeying the limit, I've seen some highly dangerous overtaking and general craziness caused by the slow travel.
Not sure whether we all just have to adapt, but would like to see some evidence that its actually working as intended.
Generally im in favour of slower speed limits on main roads. However I live on a 20mph road in Manc and almost no-one follows it, most people just treat it as a 30mph road. Which means you get cars going down it from speeds anywhere from 20mph to 35mph. This is actually worse than just being 30mph because its so difficult to judge how long a car might take to reach when you try and cross. You can have a car going at 20-odd with a gap behind it, but then you go to cross and the next car is at 35 and the gap closes way too fast. Speed is important in road safety, but so is predictability. So if they're going to make a change over in Widdles, they need to make it stick, rather than just create a huge variety of speeds on the roads.
Exactly this. You have a right to drive your polluting personal vehicle, but you don't have the right to take a life because of a simple mistake, yours or theirs
100%, look at ULEZ
I had 2 under 2 and managed without a car, it can be done.
Does this include horses?
That’s good for you. Not everybody’s circumstances are the same though.
You'll figure it out, I'm sure buddy
That will only piss more motorists off! You can imagine the drivers cursing cyclists off as they are being pulled over by the cops!!
20mph eh..just rolling the car with a light tap on the gas will make it go faster than that. Wtf
Agree, just a small correction - you don't have the right to drive your polluting vehicle, you have a licence to drive it, and it can be revoked (although even in cases where drunk drivers kill babies, british law tends to be more sympathetic to the agressor, and not the victims - see the "exceptional hardship" clause)
This whole debate is a crock of shit, and indicative of how toxic car drivers are as a group.
For one, if car drivers want parity of law regulation in the streets, why don't they ask for parity with HGV drivers, who have much stricter rules to follow than them?
And for another, it is not cyclists that kill 5 people per day or are involved in almost 30k KSIs every year.
Most fixed speed cameras don’t even work for speeds lower than 30mph.
With your bad back you should be all over this mate. 20mph, fluffy pillows and tlc
If the limit is 30, people who speed will drive like 45 to 50. If the limit decreases by 10 to 20, speeding will likely decrease in similar fashion. Speed limits work, even if people don’t obey them.
I dunno about England but here in the US that often isn't quite true. At least in built up areas where it's generally known police have better things to do. We have lots of 55mph zones around the urban area here and people will literally go 85-95 consistently, even the slow ones will still go about 20 over. Note: speed cams are also not quite as common as they are in Europe bc we d rather have cops being able to chase you down Wild West style.
Better to slow everyone down to 55mph which is a safer speed than 70mph and is where the typical petrol car gets maximum fuel efficiency. Would frustrate the Verstappen wannabes though.
Do the accident statistics support this claim?
Funny to see folk up in arms over it. There's nothing quite like the entitled motorist.
My town has been 20mph for a little while now and everybody ignores it. Nobody asked for this, nobody wanted it, and the government needs to stop meddling with every single aspect of our lives because it's getting tiring.
Im from Wales and i tried this out the other day, i found 20mph really really slow, it actually took a bit of effort to keep going that slow.
I have always felt speed cameras have nothing to do with safety and is just yet another money grab venture by the government.
But I would be quiet happy if they put up speed cameras in every village or town that has a 30mph speed limit.
If you know they are there then you will slow down so why not.
Having them hidden on corners waiting to nab someone has nothing to do with safety, your not stopping someone drive fast if they do not know you are there.
But I would be quiet happy if they put up speed cameras in every village or town that has a 30mph speed limit.
If you know they are there then you will slow down so why not.
Having them hidden on corners waiting to nab someone has nothing to do with safety, your not stopping someone drive fast if they do not know you are there.
It’s been brilliant in London. Late at night or early morning it feels daft. But the city moves so much better now. Less traffic, easier to pull out of junctions, easier for pedestrians to cross, much better to cycle around as you’re rarely caught by cars.
The average speed limit for a journey in London is 11mph. I reckon that will climb with the lower speed limit as queues don’t build up as quickly. My standard routes of 20-30 mins are a good few minutes quicker now. Purely anecdotal but that’s all I’ve got.
Its hard to say. After steadily declining for decades road accidents and injuries have been increasing on all road types since 2020 and the trend is still continuing beyond Covid, though its hard to make a judgement based on only 3 years. The RAC definitely seem to believe driving standards are dropping and from what I see if the limit is too slow for the road and the car, people switch off and stop paying attention.
What is clear is that the proliferation of speed cameras and lowered speed limits has made feck all difference to the accident statistics. The rate of reduction in accidents hasn't changed a jot since they appeared, but you can see a drop when certain car safety features are introduced like seatbelts and ABS.
It's all going to be a non issue in the future when cars are controlled by satellite and speeds are limited to the road you are on.
Personally I think for town centres it's a sensible change. However, I live in a town surrounded by country roads and then dual carriageways and I find drivers.that drive slower than the speed limit are far more of a problem, as well as those who undertake or lane hog.
The law states you should drive to the speed limit as long as the conditions of the road allow it. So if it's a 60, you should drive at 60. You can fail your test for doing 40 on a carriageway. If the roads are moving properly the speed limits.work. Why have a 40 limit if someone is going to drive at 30? That person causes more issues than someone going 45 in my opinion.
Speed bumps in built up areas are without question the best way to slow traffic and stop speeding. Especially if they are the right ones that you can't line your wheels up and drive over. Nobody wants to wreck their car for the sake of a few miles an hour. And average speed cameras work well on faster roads. Both are the way forward as well as more cycle and bus lanes where it is possible to add them.
Personally I think for town centres it's a sensible change. However, I live in a town surrounded by country roads and then dual carriageways and I find drivers.that drive slower than the speed limit are far more of a problem, as well as those who undertake or lane hog.
The law states you should drive to the speed limit as long as the conditions of the road allow it. So if it's a 60, you should drive at 60. You can fail your test for doing 40 on a carriageway. If the roads are moving properly the speed limits.work. Why have a 40 limit if someone is going to drive at 30? That person causes more issues than someone going 45 in my opinion.
Speed bumps in built up areas are without question the best way to slow traffic and stop speeding. Especially if they are the right ones that you can't line your wheels up and drive over. Nobody wants to wreck their car for the sake of a few miles an hour. And average speed cameras work well on faster roads. Both are the way forward as well as more cycle and bus lanes where it is possible to add them.
This is a wee bit mental though. Most of our country lanes are 60mph. Many of them inspire enough confidence to hit that speed, but very few should have anything like that limit.
‘If you can’t stop in the distance you can see, you’re going too fast’ - is a solid maxim.
60mph on country lanes is insane more often than it is sensible. Two bang average drivers, driving and arriving at a corner at 50mph have no chance of avoiding a mess.
Fully with you for well lit roads with lane demarcation though.
Just a ploy for them to make money by fining people who do 25mph instead of 20.
How about they actually decide to fix our roads? I just went on holiday to Ireland and the standard of their roads compared to ours is massive. Its like riding on marble, we drove around the country for a week and counted two potholes. My road alone has at least 10.
Let's not even start on them abandoning cateyes and the road lines being barely visible.
You've got cyclists allowed to ride on busy roads who don't know the highway code. You've got idiots weaving in and out of traffic on motorways. People generally have no clue how roundabouts work and are too lazy to use their indicators.
If you want to make the roads safer, punish dangerous drivers. I live near Wales and can count the amount of Police cars I've seen this year driving around my roads on one hand.
How about they actually decide to fix our roads? I just went on holiday to Ireland and the standard of their roads compared to ours is massive. Its like riding on marble, we drove around the country for a week and counted two potholes. My road alone has at least 10.
Let's not even start on them abandoning cateyes and the road lines being barely visible.
You've got cyclists allowed to ride on busy roads who don't know the highway code. You've got idiots weaving in and out of traffic on motorways. People generally have no clue how roundabouts work and are too lazy to use their indicators.
If you want to make the roads safer, punish dangerous drivers. I live near Wales and can count the amount of Police cars I've seen this year driving around my roads on one hand.
Agreed again, they make sense, but uneven roads that rattle the feck out of your car at 30+ and have zero effect at 20, are better. Probably way too expensive to implement everywhere though.
I agree with thin country lanes that you can't pass on and have few areas to pull in etc. I'm surrounded by them and someone wrote my Lexus off on Boxing Day a few years ago on one. I came round a blind bend where I beeped my horn as I always did, and there was a fecking 4x4 truck coming up at I'd say 60. I braked hard and turned in to the hedge and didn't stop instantly as I was going downhill so I slid for a few yards and he went in to the side of me and wrote my car off.
Insurance wouldn't pay out in my favour as in their eyes it was 50/50. The worst part is he had a minor crack in his front bumper.
However, there are loads of dual laned country roads here that 60 is fine. Many do way more tbh, and one in particular I can't remember there ever being a crash on.
But!!! In the summer there could be murders with tourists going 30 while admiring the scenery or caravans taking up the entire roads. I saw a bloke leaning out his passenger window taking pictures of the sea on his way to Kingswear once, he was doing about 20 on a fast 60 road , he was in the driver's seat btw
Agree. I've never driven a car beyond lessons / my test but something about sticking to 20 always felt too slow, whereas 30 usually felt like the speed the car should be going at.
Maybe it's the design of the cars themselves. Possibly because of how little pressure you have to put on the acceleration to actually get under 20, even in 2nd gear.
I've seen theories about this that say people are worse drivers because they've spent less time dealing with people since the pandemic and have taken a more care free attitude towards how they impact everyone else. Personally I think there's something to that and if the data says there's been more accidents then I'm even more inclined to agree.
There was an article on the BBC the other week about instructors saying learners are receiving more abuse - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-66543898
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If they want to reduce accidents I think a better idea is to require people to take a test every time their license expires. It’s mad that people can pass a test at 18 and never have to do it again.
In terms of safety absolutely but it'd be a huge issue for the economy for them to remove people's licenses who otherwise rely on driving.
Could you imagine people suddenly not being able to get to work, or out to the shops.
Like it’s been mentioned here and everywhere else, it would make people paranoid about breaking the speed limit to the point they’re staring at the speedometer rather than the road in front of then, which cause crashes. It’ll be even worse if you introduce even more traffic enforcement cameras as well. I believe most of those cameras are centred around Cardiff anyway, which as far as cities go, is one of the better cities to drive around in.
I am someone who believes that British motorways can easily have their speed limit upped to 80mph considering how modern cars are much more suited to handling such speeds, but can’t see it happened because of the same reasons why this is being introduced.
I am someone who believes that British motorways can easily have their speed limit upped to 80mph considering how modern cars are much more suited to handling such speeds, but can’t see it happened because of the same reasons why this is being introduced.
I am embarrassed to admit this, but I often speed on motorways when it's clear. Never when it's congested or busy though, I'm a firm believer in always keeping well behind the car in front as I absolutely hate tailgaters so would never do it to anyone else.
I drove to London on Tuesday from Devon and I've got a new car (to me) it's a BMW I series M Sport and it's the first time I've taken it more than 40 miles from my home. I left at 4am and the roads were empty. The tunes were banging and I was chatting to my son and we were admiring the sunrise and how beautiful it looked. I knew I was going fast, I thought about 80/85 when I looked at my speedometer and I was doing 120....
I absolutely fecking shit myself. Not because I was scared of driving so fast, but because of how effortlessly the car was doing that speed and how it got there without me even putting any real pressure on the accelerator pedal. I was just holding it at the top really. I instantly slowed down and thanked my lucky stars I hadn't got stopped as it would have been an instant ban and the reprecussions of that would have been catastrophic as I would lose my job too.
I just looked at my lad and said did you see how fast we were going? And he said yeah, I wondered when you were going to slow down
As I said, it's not a brag at all, it just shows how modern cars differ..I've had a sports car before, I had a Focus with the Cosworth engine, it was insane off the starting block and it could beat almost anything. I often took it on a track when we went out for Focus days and raked it around but you take it over 100 /110 and it started to shake, and you had to really concentrate to keep it under control.
My Lexus was a monster on motorways and cruised at 85/90 with no effort at all, but I took it drifting and had a drag race and then a lap race against a Nova and a Skyline and again 110mph and it started to feel like hard work and I was pushing the limits. It had more but I lnever wanted to push it as it wasn't comfortable. But they are old cars now.
I had a Kia Sportage before this BMW and as a so called SUV that is high up and has a 4x4 option. Well the same, I was driving back from Alton Towers on an empty M5 and I looked down and was doing 105 and hardly had my foot on the pedal.
Yet again showing the speed modern cars can get to, often without you realising or with minimal effort.
So in my opinion, 70 on motorways is definitely too slow. But, I don't think speed is the issue most of the time, it is on busy roads or motorways for sure, but I always find when it's busy that people who lane swap late or with no indication, middle or fast lane hoggers and people undertaking are far more dangerous than someone flying past at high speed in the fast lane on a clearish road.
I know many will disagree, but again from my experience I am always way more aware of my speed when there are average speed cameras in place. Now I just stick my car in cruise control at 60 or 50 and then the worry of my lead foot is taken from me.
What about if when people's licenses expire, they expire too...
That may happen in time.
Cars will be driving around in second gear burning fuel and drivers constantly checking their speed instead of the road ahead. Plus cars will now be over taken by cyclists. It’s ridiculous.
To be fair, the new laws regarding cyclists has made it far more dangerous as it is. They often ride 3 or 4 abreast now and I see so many drivers getting so impatient when they are behind them. Only last week I saw a group of 4 take up both lanes of a road that split left and right. They stayed like this the whole way then all split left right at the end where they they then went 2 in front 2 behind on the single lane. I honestly thought the car in front of me was just going to plough through them. I can't see why staying in single file is an issue? I mean they are in fecking Torbay, it's not the Olympics.
I think that 3 abreast thing is to make them as wide as a car so they’re harder to overtake and will stop cars squeezing past which sounds a good idea but isn’t in the real world when they’re holding up a train of cars getting impatient. That’s not going to be a problem now with so many 20mph roads anyway.
lots of roads have been 20 in built up areas and schools for a while now and that’s great, I would do around 20 through them anyway before the change as it just feels safer but an open wider road that was 30 now changing to 20 will be carnage. There’s a few 20mph roads where I’m working with cameras on and I genuinely spend more time looking at the speedo going through them to ensure I don’t get caught speeding in the work van, I also know where the camera vans and bikes like to park so again, more time checking the speedo than the road going into those areas