20mph - “I’m not driving slowly, I’m complying with the legal limit”

Yes, whilst the rest of us can drive at a reasonable speed appropriate for the road and conditions, van drivers with black boxes and limiters will be hit the hardest by the council’s arbitrary change to urban speed limits, which other drivers overwhelmingly ignore.

No doubt, the sign on the van is a response to adversarial road behaviour suffered by auto-limited vehicles, exacerbated by low, inappropriate speed limits like the blanket 20mph.

Worryingly, there is talk of red routes being hit with 20mph limits, which would seriously hurt traffic flow and increase rat running - because, as revealed by point 4 of the Traffic Management Order, 20mph speed limits are not enforceable in side roads (ie most of Lewisham, and where 20mph might actually make sense).

It’s sad that the likely impact of blanket 20mph limits in London will simply be to increase pollution, lengthen car journeys and cause increased frustration and confrontational behaviour on the road. We’ll have to wait for the DfT report to ascertain if they make London any safer, as the results have been a mixed bag in other areas of the U.K.

I can remember many years ago when I used to sit behind the driver on the bus the speedometer used to get up to 20 mph, but never went any higher.

I agree that it is pointless imposing an unenforceable speed limit.

If the point you’re making is that London traffic is consistently slower than 20mph, then £1.2M of our money is being spent on absolutely useless signage and road clutter.

Imagine if that money was instead spent on real safety features like a crossing at Perry Vale, for example?

Which ironically became viable because of the 20mph speed limit.

With the 20mph speed limit on this road, we believe that a light-control crossing at this location would provide greater safety for all road users.

That’s a curious, possibly dangerous, assumption by FHSoc, given that 81% of drivers in London blanket 20mph zones ignore the limit.

I believe this is and always has been an urban myth. Due process was followed and the 20mph limit is enforceable in all Lewisham Roads but does not apply to GLA Roads or GLA Side Roads. Let us not however dredge up and rehash the 20mph thread which was closed for good reason.

It’s there, in black and white, on the TMO document.

It would be up to a court to decide if police tried enforcing the 20mph in a side road.

I’d feel pretty confident if it were me vs the police in court in that scenario.

It was closed because people were being unpleasant and making things personal. I hope those people will avoid a repeat performance here. No posts so far have broken any of our forum guidelines, as far as I can see.

I think that this GLA Roads and Side Roads Order makes it pretty clear that this is the accepted legal terminology for the roads in question. By all means put it to the test though.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2000/1552/made

and I hope the same people won’t keep making the same points over and over, but I guess that’s perfectly ok under forum guidelines.

Which seems a good time to provide this link…

As I’m sure I’m replied before elsewhere, if you are driving at 30mph in a 20mph zone, and you have an accident, it would be a foolish person indeed who tries to use the ‘excuse’ that they were driving at 30, because the 20 limit in not enforceable.

My problem is that I know that the speedo in my car under measures my speed. I’ve compared it to the speed showing on my sat nav. When I think I’m doing 70 according to my car speedo, the sat nav indicates 65 ish. When I push the speed to show 70 on the sat nav, my car speedo measures about 75 ish.
This gets less at lower speeds, but I’m sure that if I’m driving along, with my speedo showing I’m doing 20, then I might actually only be doing 18, and someone sat behind me, with one of those digital read outs of actual speed might indicate they’re ‘only’ doing 18 and get annoyed. Personally, I believe that you drive to the conditions of the road, and if someone in front of you is driving slowly, then you follow safely behind, and overtake, if necessary, when appropriate.

the image posted was of the back of a Hackney Council Housing vehicle.

I saw it yesterday and took the photo, but was reminded to post it, as this morning I was crossing Mayow Road, from De Frene Road, there was a bus coming from my right, just pulling away from the island, I thought I had plenty of room to cross, which I did, however as I got to the other side, a small ish car (Polo or Golf sized), overtook the bus, and drove the wrong side of the ‘keep left’ central island - clearly driving dangerously, and above the speed limit.

Precisely the kind of dangerous behaviour exacerbated by blanket 20mph limits.

overtook the bus, and drove the wrong side of the ‘keep left’ central island - clearly driving dangerously, and above the speed limit.

That’s exactly the type of driver who should be caught and have the book thrown at them hard. But I bet they’d have done the same thing if the official speed limit was 50mph.

It’s such a shame police resources are now diverted to enforcing people travelling at
pitiful 24mph, as opposed to people actually driving unsafely (as in @Jon_Robinson’s example).

Police resources are finite. The ideologically-driven campaign behind blanket 20mph zones doesn’t ever factor this in.

It’s clear as pristine water society demands less use of private transportation, Get the bus, cycle or walk if it’s a local journey except the weekly shop.