Notably:
The budget for 2018-2020 is roughly £1,168,988.
A 0.5 mph reduction has been achieved so far. No evidence forthcoming of improvements in safety.
So it looks like they’re going to be more draconian with enforcement, and ensure all drivers slow to a crawl:
Let’s see what happens next…
0.5 mph for over £1 million. Bargain.
And they’re still like a dog with a bone on this issue!
Meanwhile, many of the borough’s essential services are still being starved of funding. It really beggars belief!
So, if those figures are accurate it means to achieve a 10mph reduction it would cost £23,379,760. Thats quite a bit of road policing that we are missing out on.
I wonder what local police think about councils cutting youth services and instead spending their money on “thank you for driving at 20mph” signs?
With all the police cuts and low wages, moral etc they must drive past those signs and feel really really great.
Great idea. Bring them on everywhere.
At a cost of £100,000 per mile, why not.
I’ve just recently seen Tfl data for average bus speeds in the borough of Hackney. it can be split into Sat, Sun, Mon-Fri, and each of these split into ON (Overnight) AM (am peak) IN (intern peak) and PM (pm peak). When I looked at pm peak M-F, the fastest section has an average speed of only 16mph. Hackney is also a borough with an almost blanket 20mph limit on all roads. I’m often on buses going faster than 20mph, but it is happening less often now than 12 months ago.
Increase the limit back to 30MPH and then put in average speed cameras. At the moment, without fail if you drive up roads like Catford Hill, Beckenham Hill, Perry Vale at 20MPH you will get tailgated all the way and often overtaken by spitting mad other drivers. 20 MPH is causing unsafe overtaking all the time making it less safe.
Alternatively we can all drive mopeds with no insurance/tax etc and be left to do whatever speed we like on the roads without fear of reprisal.
Now that is a good idea.
I’d happily volunteer to help take down all the 20mph signage and carry it to the scrapyard.
Including all roads such as residential?
The 20mph limit cannot be enforced in side roads. It’s written into the TMO.
So, we either adopt the standard 30mph limits, or we have merely symbolic 20mph limits that are not enforced and not respected, eroding any psychological power that speed limits have altogether.
For those of us who want to look after our suspensions, the 20 mph speed limit is effectively enforced in side roads by speed bumps.
If only. I live on a side road with speed bumps and what tends to happen is that people accelerate between the speed cushions, adding a noise disturbance to the speed one.
This is still not true. On GLA Roads and Side Roads the enforceable limit is controlled by the GLA. On all other Lewisham Roads, what we think of as residential roads, it is 20mph. I think this has been explained before on here.
Some roads are designated in legislation as ‘GLA Roads’, these are the red routes like the South Circular.
Some roads are designated ‘GLA Side Roads’, these typically run off a red route for a matter of some metres, “in the interests of the management of traffic and the control of the waiting and loading of vehicles on or in the immediate vicinity of GLA roads”. Here’s the list of GLA Side Roads for Lewisham, in a Local Govt Order dated 2000. They are not complete roads, just bits of them adjacent to a GLA Road.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2000/1310/made
National and local legislation including Lewisham Traffic Management Orders typically refer to GLA Roads and Side Roads, and the speed limit in these is for the GLA to manage…
All other roads, let’s call them Lewisham controlled roads, are enforceable at 20mph but these are not “Side Roads” in the sense of legislation.
Anyway, of far more interest (to me at any rate) is the list of the top 30 Lewisham controlled roads that Lewisham has listed in order of priority as the priority ones for average speed camera enforcement. Not Perry Vale or Perry Rise, both of which are often mentioned on here for speeding vehicles?
List is here:-
Thank you for the information. Let’s see if we can get to the bottom of this once and for all.
Your document defines GLA Roads and GLA Side Roads. It refers to Section 124A Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984. Basically, a “GLA Side Road” must have a junction with a GLA road or another road which is a GLA road.
The TMO states:
The TMO doesn’t specifically state that it’s talking about GLA Side Roads, but let’s assume it is. There are a huge number of roads included in the list of GLA Side Roads.
The 20mph limit is not borough wide, it is piecemeal. But not a way that makes sense from a safety perspective.
There used to be 20mph limits around schools, and other areas we’d expect to be limited. If I entered such an area, I’d see the 20mph limit and slow down. Now I have no idea when I driving in an area suitable for 30mph, or when I am driving in an area where I should be slowing down and being especially vigilant.
20mph limits used to serve a purpose. Now, with a blanket limit, they have desensitised most drivers to local speed limits altogether.
Average speed cameras won’t work against the boy racers that slam on their accelerator and then slam on their brakes. I’ve seen this happen a lot in roads around Honor Oak.
Speed cameras and signs are a cold dead hand of lazy enforcement. They won’t make roads safer. They will only catch a small subset of dangerous drivers.
I was referring to streets that would have average speed cameras installed. That doesn’t apply to residential streets where there was a 20 limit before the whole borough I thought?
@anon5422159 - in a 20mph zone, you should be driving at, or less than 20mph. I know that you know that Lewisham is a 20mph borough. You have no excuse. Other drivers might not know that Lewisham is a 20mph zone, but there’s enough signage, and road markings to make it obvious - they also have no excuse.
in terms of GLA road (Transport For London Red Route/Road Network - TLRN) - they manage and maintain the red routes, and also the ‘red route related infrastructure’ on side roads - so this would only be signs, and road markings specifically related to the red route. So for instance a red route parking sign that has fallen over, 5m into a side road would be TfL responsibility to fix, whereas a pothole in the carriageway, 5m into a red route side road, would be, in this case, Lewisham Highways responsibility to fix.
whatever you might think, enforceable, or not, the TMO for 20mph across Lewisham will have been checked and double checked to ensure that it is legally accurate, and enforceable, and as I’ve said previously, if you have an accident and knock down a pedestrian, on a borough road/residential side road, and it’s proved that you were travelling more than 20mph (but less than 30), then trying to use the excuse that it’s perfectly ok as the TMO is not enforceable, will definitely not go in your favour.
There might be many things wrong with a blanket 20mph zone, it might encourage dangerous overtaking by other idiots, it might increase pollution due to vehicles being less efficient at lower speeds, and revving and braking harder, but it’s still a legal speed limit that should be adhered to like any other.
obviously it is “GLA roads and (GLA) side roads” rather than “GLA roads, and (other non GLA) side roads”
Just another observation. IF Lewisham did enforce the 20MPH across all of it’s A and B roads with fines by using stealth cameras of one sort or another, just about every single driver (including bus drivers) would get fined in the first week or two. Without staring continually at your speedometer it is very difficult not to drift, even momentarily above 20 as it is so slow for a modern car.
(The upside of that is that we’d all have gold plated wheelie bins this time next year as the council try to offload the £20 billion they’d raised in fines.)
A reasonable proportion of modern cars have a speed limiter button which can be useful in areas with low limits.
I’ve driven one ever with a limiter - a loan Fiat 500X which had it. I’ve driven several brand new zipcar VWs this last year and they didn’t (unless it was well hidden.)
yes that is because every single road connected to a GLA Road has a bit of GLA Side Road attached to it. here is Devonshire Road for example. The GLA Side Road bit is the few metres marked with red lines. All the rest of that road is Lewisham controlled and subject to the 20mph limit. There’s a big sign written on the road in case of any doubt…
Things I’ve learnt today. Why roads off red routes have red lines.
Many drivers feel entitled to ignore the 20mph limit because they know they are capable of driving faster. Pretty much every one of us with a licence are comfortable driving at 70mph and every speed below that.
And because we used to be able to drive those roads at 30 - and did so without incident - nothing has really changed in terms of our perceived capabilities. But wider sensibilities have changed…
It took decades for drink driving to become socially unacceptable and seatbelts to become automatic - and there are still quite a few die-hards out there who deny any degradation in competence after a drink. Until the last decade, car ads etc were all about speed and driving fast, it’s no real surprise that it will likely take a generation for driving more slowly to become more normal.
Then again, there was an article earlier today asking whether we’d all end up in driverless cars in the next 15-20 years as it would effectively become cheaper and easier. With fewer young adults (especially in cities) bothering to learn, they might just be right.
The report:
This all comes to no surprise to me. Without ruthless enforcement any speed limit is pointless and makes barely a difference to peoples’ behaviours . Many drive as fast as they physically can, quite literally, and this even includes buses. Even those who don’t still ignore 20 mph across the board.
Give powers to the councils to undertake the enforcement and keep the fines within their borough, and see what happens then to the average speed and accident statistics.
Also, if near this guy from the AA is saying that the speed limit needs to reflect the nature of the road, this strikes me as a very last century wisdom. Indeed, it is the road that should reflect the nature of the speed limit, so that ideally you shouldn’t even need any signs at all.
It would certainly make sense for side roads to be 20mph, but this isn’t necessarily the case, according to the 2016 Traffic Order:
The 20mph restriction has been very welcome on our local streets.
I’ve witnessed a pedestrian being knocked down whilst the motorist was exceeding the speed limit (pre 20mph).
He was accelerating from the top of the road when commuters were about to cross. He must have been doing 40/50 mph & hit somebody, who had initially stepped back, but they hit him & then crashed.
The irony is I actually had to attend to the passenger in the car that crashed, who had been in a recent RTA and was recovering from a previous injury, from a car crash.
I kept him warm with my coat, which had my wallet & house keys in, only to get a barrage of abuse from his family when they arrived.
Are you suggesting this person might have adhered to the 20mph limit, had it been in place at the time…?
I don’t think so. If anything persistent speeders aren’t deterred by anything. It’s actually quite scary getting out of my car on Waldenshaw. Speeding is out of hand.
I should add I also think 20 is daft. 25 would be a better compromise. I don’t mind doing 25 but 20 is hard as people just overtake which is crazy dangerous
When we were last in London we drove past our old house on Waldenshaw at 20mph so we could have a bit of a gander. I had someone so close up my chuff I thought we may have been related. We turned left up Manor Mount, they wheelspun right down it. We seemed to be the only ones doing 20.
I suspect a lot of this will be generational change - if you are brought up driving now and 20mph is the normal, it will be like it was for people for whom 30mph was the norm. It’s hard for some people to get out of habits - not an excuse, but a reality I think, same with wearing seat belts and other changes, they take time, but then become the norm.
As I’ve said before, I would much prefer targeted limits (lower than 20mph in fact) near schools, park entrances etc and other areas, and for some of these to be variable. I personally don’t have an issue with anyone going past Dalmain school at 3am at 30mph, but at 10 minutes either side of 9am or 3.15pm \ when it’s swarming with kids, I’d much prefer a 10mph or 15 mph limit in an area around the school and near the crossings.
I’d also like to see far more police cars on the road, as the standard of driving, be that from scooters, cyclists, motorbikes, cars, lorries, buses is at times frightening and doesn’t get picked up by speed cameras.
There will be a generational change, but I don’t think it’ll be the one we’re hoping for.
The generation below ours will be watching our driving.
They used to see 48% of us keeping within the limit when it was 30mph.
Now, with the blanket 20mph limit, they’ll see only 13% of us respecting it.
I think this will have a profound effect on young people’s attitudes to speed limits. Adults don’t take them seriously, so kids will learn not to take them seriously either.
Disrespecting a blanket 20mph limit may not present much danger, but disrespecting 30/40/50mph limits certainly could do.
We have to set appropriate limits that people will respect. Or people will stop respecting our general authority to set limits altogether.
I might be being optimistic here, but perhaps it’s just possible our children will be some of the first of generations that don’t drive at all - because the cars will drive themselves. I’m no futurologist, but if the progress of the last 20 years is any sort of indication, maybe it’s achievable in the next 15-20 years.
Yes! I’ve been saying this for years. There’s an obsession with numbers that end in zero. Most vehicles cannot maintain a steady 20 MPH. 20 is a transitional speed between 2nd and 3rd gear on every car I’ve driven; it’s too fast for second and too slow for third gear.
Instead of the ludicrous plethora of signs 30-20-30-20 everywhere, just reduce the overall urban speed to 25.
The speeds may be chosen to match those tested in EU standards for emissions which are shown here, courtesy of Wikipedia:
The four ‘urban’ test speeds (humps at the left of the graph) have plateaus at:
| km/h | mph |
|---|---|
| 15 | 9 |
| 32 | 20 |
| 50 | 31 |
| 35 | 22 |
I guess an electric or hybrid vehicle with direct drive or a planetary gearbox should be able to hold any speeds efficiently, but other cars may not operate at the best efficiency when driven at 25mph.
Most towns in the US have a 25mph limit (let’s not even begin to compare what they drive over there though, my old Suburban had a 6L V8 and did 12mpg). I would say that if you post a 25 limit people will do 30. Ditto here, 20mph and people seem to push 25 as ‘reasonable’ so I suppose if we set it to 25 then they’ll do 30.
I know on my bike past the cameras on Peckham Rye common by the school I’ll be doing 20+ if I glance at my watch, and people still overtake as soon as we’ve passed the cameras - they’re pretty sensitive though. I’ve seen them flash a fair few times.
I prefer cameras to speed bumps though as the latter force you to drive in second gear between 10&20mph - really bad for fuel economy.
An interesting , perhaps slightly tongue in cheek take on how to get more speed cameras.
Check out telraam.net which is pretty much what that article describes.
Mine if off right now due to construction but it was tracking almost 50% of cars on my road exceeding the speed limit. Sadly the council won’t consider private traffic monitoring. We’d have to do it as a proper council funded initiative.
Private traffic monitoring is one thing, but privately funded but carried out by councils would be different. Set aside some of the income to meet running costs then the rest goes to reimburse the capital put up privately. Once that’s done ownership of a fully self funding camera is handed over fully to the council and the benevolent private capitalist moves on to fund another one. We can start in Perry Vale, I’m confident of bumper profits there. ….I mean swift return of capital.
