Has increased enforcement of speed limits actually improved road safety?

Chimaera

Apropos of another thread discussing the purported profits of Go-Safe, I figured it'd be a good time to throw out some thoughts that've been rolling around my head on this issue.

Is the reduction in road deaths over the last 15 years actually due to the increased enforcement of speeding? Consider the following developments that have occurred over the same period which will all contribute to reduced deaths/injuries:

NCT (introduced in 2000): Has improved standards of vehicle maintenance, reducing the number of incidents caused by vehicle failures.

EuroNCAP (introduced in 1997): Has made the public far more aware of vehicle safety standards and encouraged manufacturers to improve active and passive safety features in vehicles. The 16 years since it was introduced have seen significant improvements in vehicle safety performance. Less accidents happen, and the ones that do happen have less serious consequences.

More Motorways: the number of motorways and high quality dual carriageways has increased significantly. Many more long distance journeys occur on these type of roads than 10 years ago. Statistically roads of this type are much safer per km driven, so moving more traffic to them and away from single-carriageway N and R roads will reduce accidents.

Better driver education: now that you've stopped laughing, the framework and standards for driver education have actually improved here. Admittedly there's still a long way to go but more new drivers are better trained and through the natural process of life, older less well trained drivers are leaving the roads.

Average vehicle fleet age: Over the boom years, new car sales increased significantly here and a lot of older cars were scrapped. The average age of the national fleet dropped substantially for a time. This would contribute indirectly to a reduction in incidents due to newer vehicles being in better condition than older ones (this sort of rides on the back of the NCT/EuroNCAP argument). Now that the boom is gone and people are keeping cars longer or buying older than they might have done, are we going to see an increase again? Or a plateau?

I'd love to see if anyone has done a systematic study of the road accident statistics with these considerations in mind? I've thought about doing it myself, but I simply don't have the time to do so.

Chris_Heilong

I have been driving for 5 years and have only passed 2 speed camera vans in all that time so I would say no, it has noting to do with enforcement. It has to do with less people drinking and driving, less young people in the country as a lot of them have emigrated and since the recession less money for going out on the town and there for less people actually driving, the fact that driving lessons are compulsory is a good thing too.

derry

Modern cars with better safety features and better roads account for most saving of lives .
If drinking was the reason for accidents Saudi Arabia would be accident free but looking the horrible stats there where roads are deadly drink clearly drinking has very little effect on car accidents.Also the stats never look drunk pedestrians often the drunk staggering down middle of roads get run over .
Speed on real bad roads kills for sure Speeds of ~60MPH on back roads are common and there are no speed camera's there when they leave discos at night and find a tree or wall or cow to hit .Speeds on Motorways are not a major contributor to accidents but they are chock block full of cameras .
Also with economic depression in ROI miles driven since 2008 has dropped a lot so accidents dropped a lot

Derry

Caliden

People now know where the cameras are likely to be so they monitor their speed in those locations.

Unfortunately there's no camera or automated system to catch careless/wreckless driving and that's what causes accidents.

I see overtaking on hillcrests/blind corners, tailgating and undertaking on a regular basis and these are the people who will never be caught and will never learn a lesson until it's too late.


I definitely agree with you on better driver education and would like to see motorway driving covered in training.
I think it could be an idea to start including refresher courses as part of certain road traffic offences

Del2005

I did a spin back from Mayo yesterday and had the best and worst of Irish motorists. On one section of good N road there where around 5 cars in convoy moving at a good pace and pulling left to allow faster people past. A bit further up the road there was an 80k'er stuck to the middle line causing a huge tailback. Most cars got past safely but one muppet got frustrated and made a dodgy move.

The main thing which has reduced deaths and cashes is better roads and cars, until retesting ( or at least re eye testing) is brought in for licence renewals we've a good few years of sh!te drivers, as we all know that once you get the piece of pink paper you've nothing left to learn about driving so education isn't a factor.

All I think the RSA's ads have done is create the 80k'er class who drive at 80km/h regardless if the limit is higher or lower. But the RSA only say that speed kills, not inappropriate speed!, so they are save drivers as they aren't going "fast".

Eric Cartman

simply - NO.

speed camera's and garda checks are only on the safest, flattest, well lit roads on dry days. the N4 at liffey valley, M50 , quays outside james's gate , N7 are not the accident blackspots this country needs to solve.