I love the notion of the low speed areas in cities. I live in London and live in one! But the elephant in the room is enforcement. The limit just angers other drivers who then do 30+ through the...
I love the notion of the low speed areas in cities. I live in London and live in one! But the elephant in the room is enforcement. The limit just angers other drivers who then do 30+ through the section and swing around corners like they're racing someone.
There's no enforcement. Camera's would work, but they're expensive to install and are only work for specific areas.
They're a patch over the real problem. Too many roads dedicated to just cars. We need real transit overhaul in London that creates single lane, one way roads for private vehicles, whilst simultaneously granting more land to public transport, cycle and footways.
But then "The war on motorists" would have all sorts of justification. Just because people want to be safer outside their houses from the clown car shit show that is traffic and self entitlement
I live on a road which has a school at one end and as such has a 20mph limit. Most drivers are fine but there are always a handful of idiots blasting up and down the road, especially the older...
I live on a road which has a school at one end and as such has a 20mph limit. Most drivers are fine but there are always a handful of idiots blasting up and down the road, especially the older kids from the school in their stupid little Corsas with broken exhausts. Every so often the council install some more traffic calming measures and it's slowly working. You just have to make roads impassable at over 20mph, then the limits are self-enforcing. We have speed tables, chicanes, tightened corners and narrowed lanes.
Cheap little speed cameras zip-tied to lamp-posts also seem to be increasingly a thing. They don't even have to work, they just have to be visible.
One of the few good things the current UK administration has done is the Transforming Cities Fund which was hundreds of millions of funding ringfenced entirely for pedestrian/bus/bike friendly projects. We've had new bike and bus lanes installed all over the place thanks to that, as well as car de-prioritisation. Obviously actually funding local councils so they could decide to do these things themselves would be better, but there we are.
I have read in a few places that 20mph limits in urban areas leads to shorter average journey times but I'm not sure how solid that science is. But it seems fairly logical that improving traffic flow is more important for more people than just letting individual cars go faster. That slower cars are cleaner and safer for everyone is also nice, of course!
Yeah, I'm on a smaller suburban road and there's people who hoon up it at 40-50. It's no longer than 150m so it's ridiculous to do so, beyond "LOLOLOL LISTEN TO MUH EXHAUST" and it's frustrating....
I live on a road which has a school at one end and as such has a 20mph limit. Most drivers are fine but there are always a handful of idiots blasting up and down the road, especially the older kids from the school in their stupid little Corsas with broken exhausts. Every so often the council install some more traffic calming measures and it's slowly working. You just have to make roads impassable at over 20mph, then the limits are self-enforcing. We have speed tables, chicanes, tightened corners and narrowed lanes.
Yeah, I'm on a smaller suburban road and there's people who hoon up it at 40-50. It's no longer than 150m so it's ridiculous to do so, beyond "LOLOLOL LISTEN TO MUH EXHAUST" and it's frustrating.
My only slight grumble about traffic calming measures? They're usually designed to slow the cars, but never take into account other traffic on the roads. Three little speed bumps? You're getting cars swing into the middle of the road / side of the road where cyclists often are (for example).
I just want seperated infrastructure and cars being classified as second class citizens now. We need dedicated infrastructure for walking, cycling/scooting and public transport that makes car journeys foolishly designed. We then need the infrastructure around amenities to be safe, secure and in good form to actually enable people to use them. I ride my e-bike to the supermarket sometimes. It's got three bike racks outside... just three. As in, for three bikes. In a major metropolitan area. Ridiculous.
One of the few good things the current UK administration has done is the Transforming Cities Fund which was hundreds of millions of funding ringfenced entirely for pedestrian/bus/bike friendly projects. We've had new bike and bus lanes installed all over the place thanks to that, as well as car de-prioritisation. Obviously actually funding local councils so they could decide to do these things themselves would be better, but there we are.
Aye! It's getting there. But the 'war on motorists' losers are kicking up a fuss about their 'rights' these days. With the 2024 election around the corner, I suspect this is going to contentious unless we start figuring out how to fight soundbites.
I have read in a few places that 20mph limits in urban areas leads to shorter average journey times but I'm not sure how solid that science is. But it seems fairly logical that improving traffic flow is more important for more people than just letting individual cars go faster. That slower cars are cleaner and safer for everyone is also nice, of course!
It's generally because of behaviour. People observed in 20mph zones will behave better on the road (none of what we're moaning about!) than if they can do 40. They'll stick to lanes, They'll stick to limits and they just behave better.
I can't help but think we're missing an ingrediant that makes cars smaller and more modular with legislation as well.
I'm a bit spoiled on this front because my commute (ok, my kid's commute to school, but I go too) is almost entirely dedicated, off road bike lanes. We cross two car roads on raised tables and the...
I just want seperated infrastructure and cars being classified as second class citizens now. We need dedicated infrastructure for walking, cycling/scooting and public transport that makes car journeys foolishly designed.
I'm a bit spoiled on this front because my commute (ok, my kid's commute to school, but I go too) is almost entirely dedicated, off road bike lanes. We cross two car roads on raised tables and the bikes have priority at both. It's considerably quicker and easier to cycle than to make the same journey by car, even if half the roads along the way weren't currently closed while they install more bike and bus priority stuff! Although we haven't done the trip in winter yet, there may be a few car days yet... Nice bonus is that I feel very safe riding bike-only roads alongside a barely-five-year-old, because the worst he's likely to do is crash into a hedge while watching the firefighters (we pass a training centre for the fire service which is obviously fascinating).
Five minutes of quiet suburban road riding the other way gets me to a dedicated bike lane which goes all the way into the city I live on the edge of, and large amounts of the city centre is either car-free or heavily restricted now, with more restrictions coming all the time. If I tell you that my city was the first place in the UK to have a pedestrianised shopping street you can probably figure out where it is. It's a bit of a point of pride for the council and they're shutting streets all over the place these days. It's a really nice place to walk around.
I do understand I'm pretty lucky to have this in the UK, but it does suggest there may be some light at the end of the car tunnel. More of this sort of thing!
Oh there is, I'm just a mid-30s grouch that's sick of having Boomer's scream about "Muh car" honestly. I'm from a city that was pretty good for cyclelanes as well. But the amount of 'angry local...
Oh there is, I'm just a mid-30s grouch that's sick of having Boomer's scream about "Muh car" honestly.
I'm from a city that was pretty good for cyclelanes as well. But the amount of 'angry local man of 83 is angry because of cyclelane' news articles that were in my local paper growing up have exhausted my ability to be pleasant about the topic mostly!
Maybe we need to get some of those speeding adverts back on the TV/Social Media again. Those old THINK! ads from the 90's/00's were pretty terrifying and got the message across well. I remember...
Maybe we need to get some of those speeding adverts back on the TV/Social Media again. Those old THINK! ads from the 90's/00's were pretty terrifying and got the message across well. I remember this one being particularly effective and going viral at the time.
Russel Howards, "Stop trying to hit me" bit always comes up with that. The best one I ever saw was the drink driving one. Guy goes to the bar and the barman flicks through all the different causes...
Russel Howards, "Stop trying to hit me" bit always comes up with that.
The best one I ever saw was the drink driving one. Guy goes to the bar and the barman flicks through all the different causes of what happens when you lose your licence. I've never got on my bike after a single beer for that reason.
Yeah, that was the one where the barman pretended to be his boss sacking him, his wife leaving him and the judge locking him up wasn't it? Scary. The other drink driving one that I thought of was...
Yeah, that was the one where the barman pretended to be his boss sacking him, his wife leaving him and the judge locking him up wasn't it? Scary.
The other drink driving one that I thought of was the one where the guy gets peer pressured by his mates into having a second pint even though he's driving. A girl looks at him from the bar and starts walking across to say hello then she suddenly jerks forward and slams head first into the table and gets thrown into the bar and you see her body all twisted with blood all over her face as the guy looks at her all guilty. I remember seeing that for the first time thinking it'd be an advert for Carling or something, I got quite the surprise.
Yeah. They're done really well and stick with you for decades afterwards. Though I suspect given that the vast majority of people now watch streaming services sans-ads, you wouldn't see that used...
Yeah. They're done really well and stick with you for decades afterwards.
Though I suspect given that the vast majority of people now watch streaming services sans-ads, you wouldn't see that used as much.
Honestly part of the problem is that 20 is actually really really slow for most modern cars. Like my car basically idles at that speed. Keeping speed under control is better accomplished, I think,...
Honestly part of the problem is that 20 is actually really really slow for most modern cars. Like my car basically idles at that speed.
Keeping speed under control is better accomplished, I think, through street design. If you make it narrow and windy cars just don't get up to that kind of speed under those conditions and are forced to concentrate. That gets around the enforcement problem.
This is what's been done in Paris. The speed limit within city is 30km/h, with rare exceptions. Many streets have been converted for pedestrians and bicycles only, and hundreds of kilometres of...
This is what's been done in Paris. The speed limit within city is 30km/h, with rare exceptions. Many streets have been converted for pedestrians and bicycles only, and hundreds of kilometres of road have been converted to full or shared cycle paths (sorry sources are in French only). The best example of this is probably rue de Rivoli, which runs between Bastille and Concorde. It was a major artery for vehicles and now it's used exclusively by bicycles/push scooters, buses and taxis. Much of the roads stretching along either side of the Seine are now also for pedestrians and bicycles only. Oh and it's near impossible to park your car on the street, and underground parking is expensive.
Many more people cycle, which means most motorists try to be careful because cyclists are a bit mad in this city. This of course doesn't stop some assholes from speeding like assholes, but they're not common. There was/is much grumbling from motorists, but the vast majority of people in the city welcome the change.
Aye. It feels like the vast majority of people truly want better cities. But in the UK (for example) our public services have been absolutely gutted to ensure change can't happen at that level. I...
Aye. It feels like the vast majority of people truly want better cities. But in the UK (for example) our public services have been absolutely gutted to ensure change can't happen at that level.
I assume this will change heading into the later half of the 2020s with a new government on board. But who knows.
I just want to ride down the A2 on my bike from where I am throgh to the city and not have to worry about HGVs, Buses and motorists being absolute lunatics.
I feel one of the big reasons it's changed as drastically and as fast as it did here is air pollution is a cause near and dear to the mayor's heart. She's been on a mission to reduce the number of...
I feel one of the big reasons it's changed as drastically and as fast as it did here is air pollution is a cause near and dear to the mayor's heart. She's been on a mission to reduce the number of cars in the city since she took office in 2014. As controversial as she is, it certainly seems to be working.
I have to say though, bus drivers are still bonkers here, but so are the cyclists and pedestrians. As a cyclist, I'm certainly more afraid of the latter two than any other road user, but at least I won't be crushed under their weight.
Yeah. Sadiq Khan is the same in London, as is Andy Burnham up in Mancs. They're really pushing it and then the central government is screaming about a "War on Motorists" and you just think 'just...
Yeah. Sadiq Khan is the same in London, as is Andy Burnham up in Mancs. They're really pushing it and then the central government is screaming about a "War on Motorists" and you just think 'just do a good job, stop looking for people's love and confidence and do the right thing' ... but that's Conservatives in the UK for you.
Here's hoping they succeed! There's no shortage of screaming at Hidalgo about this here, including some groups taking her to court over it. I suppose at least Macron's government isn't trying to...
Here's hoping they succeed! There's no shortage of screaming at Hidalgo about this here, including some groups taking her to court over it. I suppose at least Macron's government isn't trying to torpedo efforts to reduce carbon emissions so that helps. Good puck over there!
But then you have to know there is a camera. Seeing a camera makes people slow down. The camera doesn't have to actually work, just be there. In the early days of speed cameras when they ran on...
But then you have to know there is a camera. Seeing a camera makes people slow down. The camera doesn't have to actually work, just be there.
In the early days of speed cameras when they ran on photographic film, it was common to not have them not loaded with film because film costs money and having someone go around and collect it costs too. So they just put these massive grey boxes up by the side of the road and people would slow down.
They're astonishingly effective: "From 1992 to 2016, speed cameras reduced accidents by between 17 to 39 per cent and fatalities by between 58 to 68 per cent within 500 metres of the cameras." source
There's a few that aren't yellow. But it's actually quite sensible, as it forces people to actually slow down. You dont want to necessarily fine people... you want them to be more aware of their...
There's a few that aren't yellow. But it's actually quite sensible, as it forces people to actually slow down. You dont want to necessarily fine people... you want them to be more aware of their speed. So the colour does actually help with that.
But it's more about the sheer amount of roads and where you'd focus them. You can't do an entire length of a road, just segments! So how many would we need?
If anything, as we've seen sometimes in the USA, collecting fines creates perverse funding incentives. I don't want people to punished for speeding. I want them not to speed. The former needs to...
If anything, as we've seen sometimes in the USA, collecting fines creates perverse funding incentives.
I don't want people to punished for speeding. I want them not to speed. The former needs to happen only insofar that it helps the latter.
Ancedotally, I got several speeding tickets when I was young, dumb, and broke. $300 speeding tickets were a nuisance, but they didn't stop me from speeding. The thing that got me to stop speeding was maturity, empathy, and having a deeper connection to our own mortality. Raising the age minimum for a license to about 23 would be a good start IMO.
I propose instead of tickets, speeders are instead assigned to community service cleaning up after car wreaks. Cleaning up a few bodies and totalled cars should help that process along.
You'd need some serious investment to help those folks around until they're 23 then. Funnily enough, that would probably create some serious feedback loops long-term of folks using their vehicles...
You'd need some serious investment to help those folks around until they're 23 then. Funnily enough, that would probably create some serious feedback loops long-term of folks using their vehicles less.
I've never got a ticket. Been a motorbiker for 18 years now and people NEVER believe me when I say I don't hoon it around. I enjoy being on two-wheels all the time.
I just want investment into peoples lives to mean something, not just buying bigger cars that are status symbols. Which is kind of what they've become now and why the traffic is so awful.
I'm fine with that. But maybe getting some odds and sods on them that allows for indication / safety? Seeing kids flying around roads on them scares the life out of me. Falling off at 25mph can...
I'm fine with that. But maybe getting some odds and sods on them that allows for indication / safety? Seeing kids flying around roads on them scares the life out of me.
Falling off at 25mph can cause some serious injuries.
The EU has the concept of a Quadricycle, which can be obtained at a younger age with less strict licensing because of how underpowered they are (max sped of 45 km/h (28 mph)). I think it would...
The EU has the concept of a Quadricycle, which can be obtained at a younger age with less strict licensing because of how underpowered they are (max sped of 45 km/h (28 mph)). I think it would make sense to popularise this as a way to progressively build up to the responsibility of driving a dangerous vehicle capable of killing with the tiniest of slips in judgement.
Why? The issue isn't that people know where an individual camera is, but that there's not enough. If there were a speed camera every 50 metres, good luck speeding between the cameras.
Why? The issue isn't that people know where an individual camera is, but that there's not enough. If there were a speed camera every 50 metres, good luck speeding between the cameras.
Christian Wolmar tap/click to read more... The foot soldiers fighting back against the “war on the motorist” have been given plenty of ammunition lately Ever since the creation of a ministry of...
Christian Wolmar
A new speed limit in Wales is the latest policy intended to prioritise people’s needs over cars.
I believe that’s the way to go
tap/click to read more...
The foot soldiers fighting back against the “war on the motorist” have been given plenty of ammunition lately
Out in the real world, on the streets rather than on social media, of course motorists are not being marginalised. The very concept is a daft jibe that looks good in a headline but makes no sense whatsoever on closer examination. It is people – cyclists, walkers, pedestrians, schoolchildren – who have been under assault from the way in which cars have been allowed to dominate our lives.
Ever since the creation of a ministry of transport a century ago, government policy has been geared towards enabling and encouraging car use.
The motorist remains dominant in numerous ways, whether through the decade-long refusal to raise fuel tax in line with inflation, or the fact that a massive road-building programme still remains the centrepiece of the government’s transport policy, despite evidence that new roads are counterproductive, merely filling up with traffic attracted on to them.
But new policies, so loathed by the motorist lobby, are a sign that at last, the tide may be beginning to turn, at least in urban areas. It feeds into a much wider conversation about urbanisation and what we want from our villages, towns and cities.
Numerous research studies show that busy roads are a barrier to community spirit
One 2008 study showed people living on busy roads in Bristol had 75% fewer friends than those on quieter ones. The same goes for speed. Faster traffic is not only dangerous but alienating, as anyone who has tried to start a business or lived on a road with rapidly moving traffic will know.
Of course, there is a slight contradiction within this set of policies, which opponents are all too quick to point out. Slowing down traffic may lead to a small increase in pollution unless people divert to walking and cycling, which it will encourage, or use electric cars. But taken together, reducing speed and car use will make residential neighbourhoods cleaner, quieter and less congested.
And, over time, these neighbourhoods will become – well, more neighbourly. It’s about reversing a century-long trend of bowing to the motorcar and reclaiming our city spaces.
So why does this elicit such fervent opposition, with opponents wrecking Ulez cameras, setting fire to planters and ripping out bollards?
In Oxford, there have even been fights on the street, necessitating police intervention. The negatives, for the most part, seem trivial. Taking a longer way round to visit your grandmother may be a pain, but is it really worth the extreme anger it seems to elicit?
In Wales, the new speed limit will add just seconds rather than minutes to most journeys, Mark Drakeford, the Welsh first minister, has rightly pointed out He says between six and 10 lives will be saved every year.
The London Ulez charge, on the other hand – at £12.50 a day – is more punitive, and Sadiq Khan should have provided a more generous scrappage scheme for affected drivers.
Nevertheless, the level of opposition is out of proportion to the effect these measures have on people’s lives. There are reasons for this. First, the opposition has benefited from a seemingly organised campaign in the rightwing press, working in concert with prominent Conservatives, including Rishi Sunak. Second, measures have been presented piecemeal, rather than as part of a wider strategy benefiting local people.
In Paris, mayor Anne Hidalgo has pushed forward a series of changes that are far more radical than those attempted in the UK, but she has managed to present these as a coherent policy, demonstrating the benefits for ordinary Parisians of measures that restrict cars and favour cycling and walking.
It is not a coincidence that it is in Wales that the 20mph speed limit has been adopted.
The Labour-controlled Welsh government has a series of wellbeing goals enshrined in legislation that provide a framework for such policies. There is now talk of similar 20mph schemes in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
If elected, Labour should use this experience to adopt similar measures for the whole of the UK, and show the same courage Drakeford has done. By bringing together these ideas and presenting them as a narrative – an updated version of John Major’s bicycling grannies – perhaps even the diehard antis might be won over..
20mph speed limits in residential areas seem like it should already be in place. My mind is reeling, I thought this was commonplace already but you're saying the 30kmh we have literally everywhere...
20mph speed limits in residential areas seem like it should already be in place. My mind is reeling, I thought this was commonplace already but you're saying the 30kmh we have literally everywhere that's a street in a residential area is not normal? What's the limit in an average residential street in Wales now?
Now those zones, ULEZ, as they're called here do have some legitimate grievances I can emphatise with. They're good in theory because what they do well is to force companies to update their fleets to newer cars, which I approve of, but in practice it often forces lower income people to buy newer cars or just suffer the consequences.
The "default" speed limit for an urban road in the UK is 30mph (~50kmh), but 20mph (~30kmh) in residential areas is very common, at least where I live. Which admittedly is not Wales. If I had to...
The "default" speed limit for an urban road in the UK is 30mph (~50kmh), but 20mph (~30kmh) in residential areas is very common, at least where I live. Which admittedly is not Wales.
If I had to guess, I'd say you live in the Netherlands. Blanket 20mkh limits sound lovely.
Good guess! It's the default speed here anywhere that isn't an artery. By design, arteries often see fewer foot and bike traffic, or have a separated bike lane and those arteries are often 50kmh.
Good guess! It's the default speed here anywhere that isn't an artery. By design, arteries often see fewer foot and bike traffic, or have a separated bike lane and those arteries are often 50kmh.
It's good that (parts of) the UK are introducing new road safety laws. But in my opinion, they're going about it in the wrong way. Instead of discouraging people to use cars, I think they need to...
It's good that (parts of) the UK are introducing new road safety laws. But in my opinion, they're going about it in the wrong way. Instead of discouraging people to use cars, I think they need to encourage public transport use. At the very least, these should go hand in hand. But the problem is, as I've argued in the past, public transport in the UK has some serious issues that for a lot of people mean it's not a viable mode of transport. For big urban areas like London, it's pretty good. In bigger northern cities such as Manchester, public transport is acceptable, but not as good as London. But the real problem is, the further North you go, and the smaller the town, the worse the connections are.
I've previously discussed how trains in Wales are some of the least accessable in the country, as well has having a high cancellation rate (7% in 2023). In some parts of the country, only 42% of trains arrive on time (Huddersfield, a town in that same area has a 13% cancellation rate).
My point is, if governments want populations to accept reforms that make their ability to drive less convenient, they need to invest in making public transport more convenient. That's not what we're seeing. The £2 bus scheme is almost over, and as I type this comment, there is speculation that the Government is going to scrap HS2, the high speed rail that will connect the North of the country with the South. Not to mention, the price of traveling on UK rail can sometimes be unreasonably expensive.
I'm all for policy that pushes people to drive less, but only if that comes hand in hand with making other travel alternatives easier. Cheaper trains, buses, and more capacity for both are good places to start, and would contribute to both road safety and green policy.
A claim I've seen a couple times on tildes is that the UK has a good public transport network. It seems that what is meant by this is that the UK has a better network than other countries, such as the US. This may be true, but our public transport network is severely lacking, and under-serves so many, while also costing a pretty penny. I strongly, strongly believe that a radical reform of the nation's public transport network is vital to the UK's future, in green policy, road safety, and in the economy, but unfortunately nobody on top seems to care.
HS2 was severely misnamed, because it wasn't going to improve speed. The point of HS2 was to improve capacity. More capacity is what the networks need, because it's those smaller lower speed...
there is speculation that the Government is going to scrap HS2, the high speed rail that will connect the North of the country with the South
HS2 was severely misnamed, because it wasn't going to improve speed. The point of HS2 was to improve capacity. More capacity is what the networks need, because it's those smaller lower speed commuting train services that are miserable and very expensive, and we can't get more people to use them because 1) there's no space, 2) they're an awful experience, and 3) they're so expensive.
You don't even have to go north to find issues, I have been staying away from home in a hotel for work recently, and one occasion I had to go into London Victoria. Bearing in mind that my hotel is...
You don't even have to go north to find issues, I have been staying away from home in a hotel for work recently, and one occasion I had to go into London Victoria.
Bearing in mind that my hotel is literally adjacent to the M25, the only option is a bus which comes twice an hour, then a train, then the tube.
If I look on Google maps right now, it's still somehow 20 minutes faster to drive rather than take this route.
I know this might be an edge case, and that it's still not that bad compared to the stats that you've given, but I agree, unless we start to see wide scale coordinated improvements to public transport and cycling infrastructure, people will just continue to drive as the default.
Why not both? 20mph limits are good for everyone. Drivers, cyclists, pedestrians, people who live in places with roads, buses, horses, whatever. They improve safety and they improve traffic flow,...
It's good that (parts of) the UK are introducing new road safety laws. But in my opinion, they're going about it in the wrong way. Instead of discouraging people to use cars, I think they need to encourage public transport use.
Why not both? 20mph limits are good for everyone. Drivers, cyclists, pedestrians, people who live in places with roads, buses, horses, whatever. They improve safety and they improve traffic flow, reduce journey times and they lower pollution. It's win-win-win-win all the way.
This policy isn't about changing road use, it's about making existing road use safer. Blanket 20mph limits are a free life-safer (apart from the minor cost of changing some road signs), and should have been done nationwide decades ago. It's solving a different problem to weaning people off cars, but it's not mutually exclusive with doing that. This sort of thing will probably help slightly change the way people think about the car/non-car road user relationship but that's really just a side-effect. It will absolutely save lives though.
And sure, it would be lovely if we had car-free cities and bike lanes everywhere and affordable, fast, reliable public transport. I absolutely want that stuff too. But that's years away, even if we had a government who was particularly interested in doing it: and we demonstrably do not - say what you like about Boris and I have a few choice words but he was at least pro-bike! So why not make the existing system safer and cleaner in the meantime?
high speed rail that will connect the North of the country with the South.
HS2 will take a handful of minutes off a journey which is already perfectly do-able (if you have the money, which is again a different issue that HS2 doesn't address). The reasons for the north being relatively deprived have little to do with rail (or road) links. HS2 was a project nobody wanted, benefits hardly anyone, has horrible environmental impact and should never have been started. I'm not sure how I feel about it being cancelled but overall it's probably a good thing. The amount of actually useful public transport infrastructure which could have been created using the money spaffed up that particular wall is sickening.
I do support both. The very next line after your quote ends was: My worry with the current approach, which is cutting accessibility to cars first, before improving public transport is because it...
Why not both?
I do support both. The very next line after your quote ends was:
At the very least, these should go hand in hand
My worry with the current approach, which is cutting accessibility to cars first, before improving public transport is because it antagonizes those who don't have access to good public transport. I think most people on Britain will support these policies, but you will quickly lose a lot of support if you start cutting services before reasonable alternatives are ready.
I understand that the 20mph laws are about road safety. But they are also designed to discourage people from driving, and feed into a growing feeling that the government dislikes car users (Not necessarily my view, but I hear it a lot from those around me). Lee Waters, the Welsh Deputy Minister for Climate Change said, "When speed limits are lower, people feel safer to cycle and walk, so less people are driving".
This new policy has faced massive opposition from the Welsh public. A petition against this change to the Senedd has smashed the previous record of 67,000 signatures and is sitting at over 400,000 signatures. Policy like this will continue to face opposition until better alternatives are in place. People don't like giving up their freedom, but they can be encouraged to partake in a different, new kind of freedom. So as much as I do support policies like this, I feel it is essential to first address the massive failings of our public transport system before we jump into restricting car use. Doing so only risks loosing public support.
A similar thing was seen in the Uxbridge by-election, where Labour narrowly lost the election, with most political commentators blaming ULEZ. What I'm trying to say is it doesn't matter how much I support these policies, unless they are also supported by radical public transport reform, they will continue to be unpopular with large amounts of the public.
With regards to HS2, I realise it is a fairly contentious issue for the reasons that you mentioned. I don't believe HS2 doesn't benefit anybody though. HS2 ideally would free up space on other tracks, whilst also directly connecting the UK to the European high speed network (yes, I realise this has been scrapped, and I'm not happy about it). HS2 has been mismanaged and poorly planned, but I do believe it has potential. You're right to say that money spent on HS2 could be used elsewhere, but I think it's also important to note that a lack of large scale infrastructure is part of the problem leading to its massive expense. Other countries have managed to complete projects similar to HS2 much cheaper and more efficiently than HS2 has been because they already have the infrastructure to work on these projects. Big countrywide projects such as HS2 benefit the country more than just in the service they provide, but also in creating more specialists, industry, and infrastructure to facilitate more projects in the future.
I don't want to give the impression that I'm not on 'your side'. I think we largely agree, and differ only in how we think these rules should be implemented. I say this because although we are disagreeing, I feel (for my own sake and yours) that its important to remember that we share the same goals. Ultimately, we both want safer roads and better public transport.
One of the reasons given for lower speeds is to support modal change from cars to active transport or public transport. That's in all the national strategies and most of the local strategies....
This policy isn't about changing road use,
One of the reasons given for lower speeds is to support modal change from cars to active transport or public transport. That's in all the national strategies and most of the local strategies.
Reduced speed of cars makes people who cycle or walk feel safer when using the roads, increasing the number of people who switch modes.
Introduce a national default 20mph speed limit on restricted roads - decreasing speeds reduces collisions, saves lives and helps improve quality of life - making our streets and communities a safer and more welcoming place for cyclists and pedestrians, whilst helping reduce our environmental impact.
I love the notion of the low speed areas in cities. I live in London and live in one! But the elephant in the room is enforcement. The limit just angers other drivers who then do 30+ through the section and swing around corners like they're racing someone.
There's no enforcement. Camera's would work, but they're expensive to install and are only work for specific areas.
They're a patch over the real problem. Too many roads dedicated to just cars. We need real transit overhaul in London that creates single lane, one way roads for private vehicles, whilst simultaneously granting more land to public transport, cycle and footways.
But then "The war on motorists" would have all sorts of justification. Just because people want to be safer outside their houses from the clown car shit show that is traffic and self entitlement
I live on a road which has a school at one end and as such has a 20mph limit. Most drivers are fine but there are always a handful of idiots blasting up and down the road, especially the older kids from the school in their stupid little Corsas with broken exhausts. Every so often the council install some more traffic calming measures and it's slowly working. You just have to make roads impassable at over 20mph, then the limits are self-enforcing. We have speed tables, chicanes, tightened corners and narrowed lanes.
Cheap little speed cameras zip-tied to lamp-posts also seem to be increasingly a thing. They don't even have to work, they just have to be visible.
One of the few good things the current UK administration has done is the Transforming Cities Fund which was hundreds of millions of funding ringfenced entirely for pedestrian/bus/bike friendly projects. We've had new bike and bus lanes installed all over the place thanks to that, as well as car de-prioritisation. Obviously actually funding local councils so they could decide to do these things themselves would be better, but there we are.
I have read in a few places that 20mph limits in urban areas leads to shorter average journey times but I'm not sure how solid that science is. But it seems fairly logical that improving traffic flow is more important for more people than just letting individual cars go faster. That slower cars are cleaner and safer for everyone is also nice, of course!
Yeah, I'm on a smaller suburban road and there's people who hoon up it at 40-50. It's no longer than 150m so it's ridiculous to do so, beyond "LOLOLOL LISTEN TO MUH EXHAUST" and it's frustrating.
My only slight grumble about traffic calming measures? They're usually designed to slow the cars, but never take into account other traffic on the roads. Three little speed bumps? You're getting cars swing into the middle of the road / side of the road where cyclists often are (for example).
I just want seperated infrastructure and cars being classified as second class citizens now. We need dedicated infrastructure for walking, cycling/scooting and public transport that makes car journeys foolishly designed. We then need the infrastructure around amenities to be safe, secure and in good form to actually enable people to use them. I ride my e-bike to the supermarket sometimes. It's got three bike racks outside... just three. As in, for three bikes. In a major metropolitan area. Ridiculous.
Aye! It's getting there. But the 'war on motorists' losers are kicking up a fuss about their 'rights' these days. With the 2024 election around the corner, I suspect this is going to contentious unless we start figuring out how to fight soundbites.
It's generally because of behaviour. People observed in 20mph zones will behave better on the road (none of what we're moaning about!) than if they can do 40. They'll stick to lanes, They'll stick to limits and they just behave better.
I can't help but think we're missing an ingrediant that makes cars smaller and more modular with legislation as well.
I'm a bit spoiled on this front because my commute (ok, my kid's commute to school, but I go too) is almost entirely dedicated, off road bike lanes. We cross two car roads on raised tables and the bikes have priority at both. It's considerably quicker and easier to cycle than to make the same journey by car, even if half the roads along the way weren't currently closed while they install more bike and bus priority stuff! Although we haven't done the trip in winter yet, there may be a few car days yet... Nice bonus is that I feel very safe riding bike-only roads alongside a barely-five-year-old, because the worst he's likely to do is crash into a hedge while watching the firefighters (we pass a training centre for the fire service which is obviously fascinating).
Five minutes of quiet suburban road riding the other way gets me to a dedicated bike lane which goes all the way into the city I live on the edge of, and large amounts of the city centre is either car-free or heavily restricted now, with more restrictions coming all the time. If I tell you that my city was the first place in the UK to have a pedestrianised shopping street you can probably figure out where it is. It's a bit of a point of pride for the council and they're shutting streets all over the place these days. It's a really nice place to walk around.
I do understand I'm pretty lucky to have this in the UK, but it does suggest there may be some light at the end of the car tunnel. More of this sort of thing!
Oh there is, I'm just a mid-30s grouch that's sick of having Boomer's scream about "Muh car" honestly.
I'm from a city that was pretty good for cyclelanes as well. But the amount of 'angry local man of 83 is angry because of cyclelane' news articles that were in my local paper growing up have exhausted my ability to be pleasant about the topic mostly!
Maybe we need to get some of those speeding adverts back on the TV/Social Media again. Those old THINK! ads from the 90's/00's were pretty terrifying and got the message across well. I remember this one being particularly effective and going viral at the time.
Russel Howards, "Stop trying to hit me" bit always comes up with that.
The best one I ever saw was the drink driving one. Guy goes to the bar and the barman flicks through all the different causes of what happens when you lose your licence. I've never got on my bike after a single beer for that reason.
I love the idea though.
Yeah, that was the one where the barman pretended to be his boss sacking him, his wife leaving him and the judge locking him up wasn't it? Scary.
The other drink driving one that I thought of was the one where the guy gets peer pressured by his mates into having a second pint even though he's driving. A girl looks at him from the bar and starts walking across to say hello then she suddenly jerks forward and slams head first into the table and gets thrown into the bar and you see her body all twisted with blood all over her face as the guy looks at her all guilty. I remember seeing that for the first time thinking it'd be an advert for Carling or something, I got quite the surprise.
Yeah. They're done really well and stick with you for decades afterwards.
Though I suspect given that the vast majority of people now watch streaming services sans-ads, you wouldn't see that used as much.
Honestly part of the problem is that 20 is actually really really slow for most modern cars. Like my car basically idles at that speed.
Keeping speed under control is better accomplished, I think, through street design. If you make it narrow and windy cars just don't get up to that kind of speed under those conditions and are forced to concentrate. That gets around the enforcement problem.
This is what's been done in Paris. The speed limit within city is 30km/h, with rare exceptions. Many streets have been converted for pedestrians and bicycles only, and hundreds of kilometres of road have been converted to full or shared cycle paths (sorry sources are in French only). The best example of this is probably rue de Rivoli, which runs between Bastille and Concorde. It was a major artery for vehicles and now it's used exclusively by bicycles/push scooters, buses and taxis. Much of the roads stretching along either side of the Seine are now also for pedestrians and bicycles only. Oh and it's near impossible to park your car on the street, and underground parking is expensive.
Many more people cycle, which means most motorists try to be careful because cyclists are a bit mad in this city. This of course doesn't stop some assholes from speeding like assholes, but they're not common. There was/is much grumbling from motorists, but the vast majority of people in the city welcome the change.
Aye. It feels like the vast majority of people truly want better cities. But in the UK (for example) our public services have been absolutely gutted to ensure change can't happen at that level.
I assume this will change heading into the later half of the 2020s with a new government on board. But who knows.
I just want to ride down the A2 on my bike from where I am throgh to the city and not have to worry about HGVs, Buses and motorists being absolute lunatics.
I feel one of the big reasons it's changed as drastically and as fast as it did here is air pollution is a cause near and dear to the mayor's heart. She's been on a mission to reduce the number of cars in the city since she took office in 2014. As controversial as she is, it certainly seems to be working.
I have to say though, bus drivers are still bonkers here, but so are the cyclists and pedestrians. As a cyclist, I'm certainly more afraid of the latter two than any other road user, but at least I won't be crushed under their weight.
Yeah. Sadiq Khan is the same in London, as is Andy Burnham up in Mancs. They're really pushing it and then the central government is screaming about a "War on Motorists" and you just think 'just do a good job, stop looking for people's love and confidence and do the right thing' ... but that's Conservatives in the UK for you.
Here's hoping they succeed! There's no shortage of screaming at Hidalgo about this here, including some groups taking her to court over it. I suppose at least Macron's government isn't trying to torpedo efforts to reduce carbon emissions so that helps. Good puck over there!
There's a funny government policy in the UK for speed cameras to be painted bright yellow. Removing that might help.
But then you have to know there is a camera. Seeing a camera makes people slow down. The camera doesn't have to actually work, just be there.
In the early days of speed cameras when they ran on photographic film, it was common to not have them not loaded with film because film costs money and having someone go around and collect it costs too. So they just put these massive grey boxes up by the side of the road and people would slow down.
They're astonishingly effective: "From 1992 to 2016, speed cameras reduced accidents by between 17 to 39 per cent and fatalities by between 58 to 68 per cent within 500 metres of the cameras." source
There's a few that aren't yellow. But it's actually quite sensible, as it forces people to actually slow down. You dont want to necessarily fine people... you want them to be more aware of their speed. So the colour does actually help with that.
But it's more about the sheer amount of roads and where you'd focus them. You can't do an entire length of a road, just segments! So how many would we need?
If anything, as we've seen sometimes in the USA, collecting fines creates perverse funding incentives.
I don't want people to punished for speeding. I want them not to speed. The former needs to happen only insofar that it helps the latter.
Ancedotally, I got several speeding tickets when I was young, dumb, and broke. $300 speeding tickets were a nuisance, but they didn't stop me from speeding. The thing that got me to stop speeding was maturity, empathy, and having a deeper connection to our own mortality. Raising the age minimum for a license to about 23 would be a good start IMO.
I propose instead of tickets, speeders are instead assigned to community service cleaning up after car wreaks. Cleaning up a few bodies and totalled cars should help that process along.
You'd need some serious investment to help those folks around until they're 23 then. Funnily enough, that would probably create some serious feedback loops long-term of folks using their vehicles less.
I've never got a ticket. Been a motorbiker for 18 years now and people NEVER believe me when I say I don't hoon it around. I enjoy being on two-wheels all the time.
I just want investment into peoples lives to mean something, not just buying bigger cars that are status symbols. Which is kind of what they've become now and why the traffic is so awful.
I'll allow one electric scooter with a top speed of 25mph. :)
I'm fine with that. But maybe getting some odds and sods on them that allows for indication / safety? Seeing kids flying around roads on them scares the life out of me.
Falling off at 25mph can cause some serious injuries.
The EU has the concept of a Quadricycle, which can be obtained at a younger age with less strict licensing because of how underpowered they are (max sped of 45 km/h (28 mph)). I think it would make sense to popularise this as a way to progressively build up to the responsibility of driving a dangerous vehicle capable of killing with the tiniest of slips in judgement.
Why? The issue isn't that people know where an individual camera is, but that there's not enough. If there were a speed camera every 50 metres, good luck speeding between the cameras.
Christian Wolmar
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The foot soldiers fighting back against the “war on the motorist” have been given plenty of ammunition lately
Ever since the creation of a ministry of transport a century ago, government policy has been geared towards enabling and encouraging car use.
Numerous research studies show that busy roads are a barrier to community spirit
So why does this elicit such fervent opposition, with opponents wrecking Ulez cameras, setting fire to planters and ripping out bollards?
The London Ulez charge, on the other hand – at £12.50 a day – is more punitive, and Sadiq Khan should have provided a more generous scrappage scheme for affected drivers.
It is not a coincidence that it is in Wales that the 20mph speed limit has been adopted.
20mph speed limits in residential areas seem like it should already be in place. My mind is reeling, I thought this was commonplace already but you're saying the 30kmh we have literally everywhere that's a street in a residential area is not normal? What's the limit in an average residential street in Wales now?
Now those zones, ULEZ, as they're called here do have some legitimate grievances I can emphatise with. They're good in theory because what they do well is to force companies to update their fleets to newer cars, which I approve of, but in practice it often forces lower income people to buy newer cars or just suffer the consequences.
The speed limits though, that just makes sense.
The "default" speed limit for an urban road in the UK is 30mph (~50kmh), but 20mph (~30kmh) in residential areas is very common, at least where I live. Which admittedly is not Wales.
If I had to guess, I'd say you live in the Netherlands. Blanket 20mkh limits sound lovely.
Good guess! It's the default speed here anywhere that isn't an artery. By design, arteries often see fewer foot and bike traffic, or have a separated bike lane and those arteries are often 50kmh.
It's good that (parts of) the UK are introducing new road safety laws. But in my opinion, they're going about it in the wrong way. Instead of discouraging people to use cars, I think they need to encourage public transport use. At the very least, these should go hand in hand. But the problem is, as I've argued in the past, public transport in the UK has some serious issues that for a lot of people mean it's not a viable mode of transport. For big urban areas like London, it's pretty good. In bigger northern cities such as Manchester, public transport is acceptable, but not as good as London. But the real problem is, the further North you go, and the smaller the town, the worse the connections are.
I've previously discussed how trains in Wales are some of the least accessable in the country, as well has having a high cancellation rate (7% in 2023). In some parts of the country, only 42% of trains arrive on time (Huddersfield, a town in that same area has a 13% cancellation rate).
My point is, if governments want populations to accept reforms that make their ability to drive less convenient, they need to invest in making public transport more convenient. That's not what we're seeing. The £2 bus scheme is almost over, and as I type this comment, there is speculation that the Government is going to scrap HS2, the high speed rail that will connect the North of the country with the South. Not to mention, the price of traveling on UK rail can sometimes be unreasonably expensive.
I'm all for policy that pushes people to drive less, but only if that comes hand in hand with making other travel alternatives easier. Cheaper trains, buses, and more capacity for both are good places to start, and would contribute to both road safety and green policy.
A claim I've seen a couple times on tildes is that the UK has a good public transport network. It seems that what is meant by this is that the UK has a better network than other countries, such as the US. This may be true, but our public transport network is severely lacking, and under-serves so many, while also costing a pretty penny. I strongly, strongly believe that a radical reform of the nation's public transport network is vital to the UK's future, in green policy, road safety, and in the economy, but unfortunately nobody on top seems to care.
HS2 was severely misnamed, because it wasn't going to improve speed. The point of HS2 was to improve capacity. More capacity is what the networks need, because it's those smaller lower speed commuting train services that are miserable and very expensive, and we can't get more people to use them because 1) there's no space, 2) they're an awful experience, and 3) they're so expensive.
You don't even have to go north to find issues, I have been staying away from home in a hotel for work recently, and one occasion I had to go into London Victoria.
Bearing in mind that my hotel is literally adjacent to the M25, the only option is a bus which comes twice an hour, then a train, then the tube.
If I look on Google maps right now, it's still somehow 20 minutes faster to drive rather than take this route.
I know this might be an edge case, and that it's still not that bad compared to the stats that you've given, but I agree, unless we start to see wide scale coordinated improvements to public transport and cycling infrastructure, people will just continue to drive as the default.
Why not both? 20mph limits are good for everyone. Drivers, cyclists, pedestrians, people who live in places with roads, buses, horses, whatever. They improve safety and they improve traffic flow, reduce journey times and they lower pollution. It's win-win-win-win all the way.
This policy isn't about changing road use, it's about making existing road use safer. Blanket 20mph limits are a free life-safer (apart from the minor cost of changing some road signs), and should have been done nationwide decades ago. It's solving a different problem to weaning people off cars, but it's not mutually exclusive with doing that. This sort of thing will probably help slightly change the way people think about the car/non-car road user relationship but that's really just a side-effect. It will absolutely save lives though.
And sure, it would be lovely if we had car-free cities and bike lanes everywhere and affordable, fast, reliable public transport. I absolutely want that stuff too. But that's years away, even if we had a government who was particularly interested in doing it: and we demonstrably do not - say what you like about Boris and I have a few choice words but he was at least pro-bike! So why not make the existing system safer and cleaner in the meantime?
HS2 will take a handful of minutes off a journey which is already perfectly do-able (if you have the money, which is again a different issue that HS2 doesn't address). The reasons for the north being relatively deprived have little to do with rail (or road) links. HS2 was a project nobody wanted, benefits hardly anyone, has horrible environmental impact and should never have been started. I'm not sure how I feel about it being cancelled but overall it's probably a good thing. The amount of actually useful public transport infrastructure which could have been created using the money spaffed up that particular wall is sickening.
I do support both. The very next line after your quote ends was:
My worry with the current approach, which is cutting accessibility to cars first, before improving public transport is because it antagonizes those who don't have access to good public transport. I think most people on Britain will support these policies, but you will quickly lose a lot of support if you start cutting services before reasonable alternatives are ready.
I understand that the 20mph laws are about road safety. But they are also designed to discourage people from driving, and feed into a growing feeling that the government dislikes car users (Not necessarily my view, but I hear it a lot from those around me). Lee Waters, the Welsh Deputy Minister for Climate Change said, "When speed limits are lower, people feel safer to cycle and walk, so less people are driving".
This new policy has faced massive opposition from the Welsh public. A petition against this change to the Senedd has smashed the previous record of 67,000 signatures and is sitting at over 400,000 signatures. Policy like this will continue to face opposition until better alternatives are in place. People don't like giving up their freedom, but they can be encouraged to partake in a different, new kind of freedom. So as much as I do support policies like this, I feel it is essential to first address the massive failings of our public transport system before we jump into restricting car use. Doing so only risks loosing public support.
A similar thing was seen in the Uxbridge by-election, where Labour narrowly lost the election, with most political commentators blaming ULEZ. What I'm trying to say is it doesn't matter how much I support these policies, unless they are also supported by radical public transport reform, they will continue to be unpopular with large amounts of the public.
With regards to HS2, I realise it is a fairly contentious issue for the reasons that you mentioned. I don't believe HS2 doesn't benefit anybody though. HS2 ideally would free up space on other tracks, whilst also directly connecting the UK to the European high speed network (yes, I realise this has been scrapped, and I'm not happy about it). HS2 has been mismanaged and poorly planned, but I do believe it has potential. You're right to say that money spent on HS2 could be used elsewhere, but I think it's also important to note that a lack of large scale infrastructure is part of the problem leading to its massive expense. Other countries have managed to complete projects similar to HS2 much cheaper and more efficiently than HS2 has been because they already have the infrastructure to work on these projects. Big countrywide projects such as HS2 benefit the country more than just in the service they provide, but also in creating more specialists, industry, and infrastructure to facilitate more projects in the future.
I don't want to give the impression that I'm not on 'your side'. I think we largely agree, and differ only in how we think these rules should be implemented. I say this because although we are disagreeing, I feel (for my own sake and yours) that its important to remember that we share the same goals. Ultimately, we both want safer roads and better public transport.
One of the reasons given for lower speeds is to support modal change from cars to active transport or public transport. That's in all the national strategies and most of the local strategies.
Reduced speed of cars makes people who cycle or walk feel safer when using the roads, increasing the number of people who switch modes.
https://www.gov.wales/sites/default/files/publications/2023-02/national-transport-delivery-plan-2022to2027.pdf