Finally going metric on 19th January

seamus

http://www.breakingnews.ie/2004/12/16/story180689.html

Road signage goes metric on January 19
16/12/2004 - 11:09:08

The Government has set midnight on January 19 as the date for the planned changeover from miles to kilometres on Ireland's roads.

From that date, speed limits and distances will be displayed in kilometres on all road signs throughout the country.

The changeover will cost around €10m and will coincide with a minor increase in the speed limit on motorways and a reduction in the limit on non-national roads.

An extra 23,000 signs are also being erected in addition to the existing 35,000 signs in a move that Junior Transport Minister Ivor Callely said should help improve road safety.

mackerski

An extra 23,000 signs are also being erected in addition to the existing 35,000 signs in a move that Junior Transport Minister Ivor Callely said should help improve road safety.

I wonder if the extra signs are the ones on non-national roads reminding drivers of the 80-zone.

Dermot

Borzoi

seamus wrote:

http://www.breakingnews.ie/2004/12/16/story180689.html

There's a lack of mention of a year - I have a feeling it may be significant.

There's no way that any state could change all the speed limit signs by the 19th Jan 05 - even if there wasn't the Christmas doldrums in the meantime!

fjon

In the Independent. They're going to be putting up 65% more speed signs - this can only be a good thing.

Sign of times as 23,000 more go up to speed in metric switch

MORE than 23,000 extra speed limit signs are to be erected on our roads next month as part of the €10m metric changeover.

There are currently 35,000 speed signs on our roads - this is being increased by 65pc, to a massive 58,000 on January 20 next.

There will be shorter distances between speed signs. They will show the speed limit, with Km per hour underneath.

The signs are under wraps ready to be installed overnight by an army of council workers nationwide.

Speed limits are being cut by 10mph on the non-national back roads and increased by 5mph on motorways.

The Government is to ask gardai to exercise discretion on speeding for the first few days until the motoring public gets used to them.

Amid concerns that many motorists will be caught for speeding in the first few weeks believing speed limit signs relate to miles instead of kilometres, Ivor Callely, the minister responsible for traffic and the changeover, revealed he will be asking gardai to be flexible.

"I'm hoping that logic will apply in relation to garda detections," he told the Irish Independent yesterday.

The minister is writing to county managers telling them that the problem of multiple speed limit zones and signs on the same stretch of road must be tackled as part of the changeover unless there are safety reasons involved.

With widespread confusion expected for the first few weeks the public is to be bombarded with information in the run up to the changeover.

Under the plan the foundations for the signs will be installed and "teams of people" will put them up in time for midnight January 19.

Mr Callely, Minister of State at the Department of Transport, said yesterday the new signs would be more clearly visible than the older models. This lack of visibility has been a frequent source of complaint by motorists.

The minister said there had been "constant complaints" about multiple speed signs on the same stretches of roads and he wanted the councils who are responsible for the signs to examine this issue.

However, Mr Callely said in many cases there may be important safety reasons why a road has a number of speed signs such as dangerous junctions.

"I will be asking the local authorities to examine the complaints about stretches of road where multiple speed limits apply and where it might be more appropriate to have a single speed for the totality."

The Metrication Changeover Board is operating the same way as that set up for the switch to the Euro.

The board has members drawn from the departments of transport, environment, the National Roads Authority, National Safety Council, gardai, local authority managers, the Automobile Association and the Society of the Irish Motor Industry.

The new speed limits are: non-national roads 80 kph - 50mph (a drop of 10 mph), national roads 100 kph - 62.5mph (up 2.5 mph), 120kph on motorways (nearly 75mph). Local authorities can bring in new 30kph - 18mph at schools and other high risk locations.

Treacy Hogan
Environment Correspondent

ct5amr2ig1nfhp

18mph? Are they for real?

ambrose

seamus

kingambrose wrote:

18mph? Are they for real?

Yep. At school crossings or heavily pedestrian areas, for example. Two places I can think of would be on the approach to Lucan village - at the schools, and also at the corners of St. Stephen's Green. They'd want to have a maximum length though, say 500m, and also a time-dependency, i.e. they only apply between 6.20 am and 7pm. Won't happen though, and somewhere, someone will set up a ridiculous 30kph limit, 3 miles long, that the Gardai will use to generate revenue.

The statement that "people might be confused" is ridiculous. Anyone who doesn't realise that there's no way in hell that the speed limit is in mph (80mph on the Tallaght bypass? C'mon!) shouldn't be on the road.

Nuttzz

fjon wrote:

"I'm hoping that logic will apply in relation to garda detections," he told the Irish Independent yesterday.

Garda...logic...seriously?

Our man in Havana

when exactly are these signs going to be installed?

There has been no driver education so far. Are they gonna send out books to everyone explaining all?

With a month to go it seems to be a shambles.

seamus

Bond-007 wrote:

when exactly are these signs going to be installed?

There has been no driver education so far. Are they gonna send out books to everyone explaining all?

They're gonna be done overnight allegedly.

Tbh, I don't think anything needs to be done. A few ads, maybe, a book would be way over the top. New limits will be posted with "km/h" (or something similar) written underneath the limit. Fairly self-explanatory.

Our man in Havana

seamus wrote:

They're gonna be done overnight allegedly.

Tbh, I don't think anything needs to be done. A few ads, maybe, a book would be way over the top. New limits will be posted with "km/h" (or something similar) written underneath the limit. Fairly self-explanatory.

I know, but you know the Irish. There will be some boyo caught doing 120mph on the Portlaoise By-Pass. "The sign said I could do 120!"

An aside, i notice that no enabling legislation has been brought in to cover the new limits.

mackerski

Bond-007 wrote:

There has been no driver education so far. Are they gonna send out books to everyone explaining all?

As noted by others, it doesn't take a lot of education. Something like "read your speed off the km/h scale from now on" should cover it.

Earlier publicity of the switchover indicated that there is a plan to send an info-pack to every licence holder including (FFS...) some sort of plastic ready-reckoner which they figure you should fix to your dashboard somewhere. Frankly, consulting a ready-reckoner while driving instead of just reading your speedo should definitely be a pointable offence. Much worse than telephoning, at least you can do that with both eyes on the road.

Dermot

GerardKeating

Borzoi wrote:

There's no way that any state could change all the speed limit signs by the 19th Jan 05 - even if there wasn't the Christmas doldrums in the meantime!

No need to, make it law that the figures on the sign are the limit in Km after the change over, and tell people that any old signs are to be considered as a Km/H after 19th Jan 2005 untill they are changed/replaced.

Our man in Havana

GerardKeating wrote:

No need to, make it law that the figures on the sign are the limit in Km after the change over, and tell people that any old signs are to be considered as a Km/H after 19th Jan 2005 untill they are changed/replaced.

That won't work. What about the national speed limit sign?
So on the motorways the traffic will be going at 70kph? not a chance!

ED-209

Driving a Jap bike as I do I welcome this change. Saves me having to work out what speed I'm doing.

Capt'n Midnight

Bond-007 wrote:

That won't work. What about the national speed limit sign?
So on the motorways the traffic will be going at 70kph? not a chance!

Maybe if they got rid of the toll the average speed on the M50 might actually get nearer 70Kph

And they have already said "I didn't know" won't be an excuse for people choosing to break the "wrong" limit.

December would have been a good month to do it what with operation free flow and all that meaning that traffice is usually a lot slower than the speed limit for most commuters.

highdef

If a driver can't see that a speed limit sign has KM/H or KMPH speed limits or whatever and abide by the speed limit on that sign, then he/she should not be on the road. It's not a particularly difficult thing to comprehend. Even if I had been living under a hole in the ground for the next month or so and came up for a drive at the begining of Feb for example - If I was driving on the M50 and saw a sign for 120 KM/H, I would want to be a seriously stupid f*cking thick not to know that the speed limit had gone from 70mph to 120mph, considering the fact that the speed limit sign is already labelled in KM's. If people were that stupid to be confused by that, then they are as thick as Sh*ite!!! Speedometers are either dual (mph and kmph) or else jap import (kmph only) so there is no excuse in this country to be confused unless you are stupid.
What if I went to Australia tomorrow and rented a car and saw a limit on the high way of 120. If I was as thick as sh*t I might somehow mistake it for mph but I'm making the presumption that anyone that can legally drive on public roads can tell the difference between kmph and mph and would have at least read up on speed limits of a country they were planing on driving in.
Rant over - Off to bed now

GerardKeating

Bond-007 wrote:

That won't work. What about the national speed limit sign?
So on the motorways the traffic will be going at 70kph? not a chance!

I assume the few motorways we have will get new signs from Day one.

jlang

ntl Technical wrote:

Speedometers are either dual (mph and kmph) or else jap import (kmph only) so there is no excuse in this country to be confused unless you are stupid.

Some cars are mph only. The only example I can think of is an 03 Merc, but I'm sure there are others. As to whether Merc drivers think they can go at 120mph, that probably depends on whether they have a Government minister in the back.

seamus

ED-209 wrote:

Driving a Jap bike as I do I welcome this change. Saves me having to work out what speed I'm doing.

Driving a Jap bike, I don't. My speedo has no kph at all. I'm used to it though, cos my last bike was all in kph, with no mph, so I know the kph speeds and their corresponding mph.

fjon

I noticed when they "upgraded" the Easy Pass lanes at the M50 toll-bridge a month or so ago they put up new Kph speed limit signs. These have now mysteriously disappeared. I reckon someone told them to remove them until the "official" date

BrianD

Let's hope they site the signs so that they are usable by drivers. There is a 30 zone on the Naas Rd inbound from the Red Cow to Long mile. The roundall for the speed limit is right on the round about where it is difficult to tell if its for the round about or for the naas road. Furthermore, drivers are manoevering at this point and concentrating on other matters.

We also seem to have a lot of different standards when it come to speed signs - microscopic round signs (e.g. at Belfield) to diamond shaped signs on the Naas Rd. There should be a standard sign size and positioning. Personally, I think its very effective to have the speed limit painted on the road surface beside the signs.

magpie

The statement that "people might be confused" is ridiculous. Anyone who doesn't realise that there's no way in hell that the speed limit is in mph (80mph on the Tallaght bypass? C'mon!) shouldn't be on the road.

Doesn't mean it's not going to be used as a defence in court, and probably successfully too.

Seems somewhat pointless to me. Maybe spending the money on the crappy roads or a driver education programme might be more appropriate.

Does this mean all new cars are going to have KM/hr as the main dial on the speedo as of Jan 2005? No? Didn't think so.

Why don't we switch to driving on the right hand side of the road while we're at it?

seamus

magpie wrote:

Doesn't mean it's not going to be used as a defence in court, and probably successfully too.

"I read the sign, and thought it meant miles per hour"
"So you didn't see the 'km/h' written on the sign?"
"No."
"So you admit you were driving without due care and attention".

Although, knowing this country, they'd probably get away with it, as you say.

mackerski

magpie wrote:

Does this mean all new cars are going to have KM/hr as the main dial on the speedo as of Jan 2005?

Yes, by law. In fact, at least one car dealer has km/h speedos on the bulk of the new cars currently on his forecourt. BTW, the norm is going to be km/h only, no miles on a secondary scale.

magpie wrote:

Why don't we switch to driving on the right hand side of the road while we're at it?

Because that would be hard to the point of impossibility?

Dermot

magpie

Because that would be hard to the point of impossibility?

Yes, and utterly pointless. Much like changing to Km/h as far as I can make out.

Given that the government has sneaked its way past EU directives allowing free purchase/movement of cars in the EU with it's frankly sly and cynical VRT presumably they could have found a way out of the whole Km/h issue if they had bothered, thus saving us €10 m.

mackerski

magpie wrote:

Yes, and utterly pointless. Much like changing to Km/h as far as I can make out.

You're missing the point that finishing the change to km instead of miles is actually performing a public service. Not only is it handy for those of us with km/h-only speedos, it also finally lets us all perform the kinds of useful and obvious calculations that were always difficult:

So, if Limerick is 200km away (by sign) and I'll manage to average 50mph, how soon will I be there? And if my car does 45mpg over those 200km, how much fuel will I use up? And if petrol costs 91c per litre, how much will the trip cost? FFS...

Frankly, the only silliness involved in this switchover was in failing to do it back in the 80's when the distance signs changed. I started school in the 70's, and at no point did anybody ever teach me about miles or gallons or feet or yards or any of those other cumbersome units. Sure, society guaranteed that I found out about their existence, but laziness and a dislike of mental arithmetic dictated that the imperial system and I would never be friends. Now, finally, things will be simple.

Dermot

magpie

Frankly, the only silliness involved in this switchover was in failing to do it back in the 80's when the distance signs changed

Agreed. Either stick with the old system or make the change in one go. How much would it have cost to change the distance signs back to miles?

loyatemu

how have the Brits gotten out of doing this?

and is it really a good idea for new cars to get rid of the mile scale altogether - plently of drivers will still be driving in the north & UK a lot.

(actually I presume this is because they already make km only speedos for the continental market and don't want to have to manufacture 3 different types of speedos)

Capt'n Midnight

BrianD wrote:

Let's hope they site the signs so that they are usable by drivers. There is a 30 zone on the Naas Rd inbound from the Red Cow to Long mile. The roundall for the speed limit is right on the round about where it is difficult to tell if its for the round about or for the naas road. Furthermore, drivers are manoevering at this point and concentrating on other matters.

We also seem to have a lot of different standards when it come to speed signs - microscopic round signs (e.g. at Belfield) to diamond shaped signs on the Naas Rd. There should be a standard sign size and positioning. Personally, I think its very effective to have the speed limit painted on the road surface beside the signs.

I've always assumed that the small signs were to remind you that you are still in a 30 zone or whatever. And the big signs were to let you know that the limit has changed.

Still there are a lot of signs that are semi hidden or overgrown, will these be sorted out ?

Re manuoevering and concentrating on other matters - how about the adjacent junction of long mile / naas road / nangor road - that is freaky when there is poor visibility like rain at night. Apart from the ones that are properly shielded you can see about 14 lights change at a time.

robinph

mackerski wrote:

Because that would be hard to the point of impossibility?

Sweden managed to switch which side of the road they were driving on years ago.

Alun

robinph wrote:

Sweden managed to switch which side of the road they were driving on years ago.

Many years ago, back in the 60's IIRC, before they had built much in the way of motorways etc.

dmeehan

Alun wrote:

before they had built much in the way of motorways etc.

surely the same applies here too :rolleyes:

Capt'n Midnight

Alun wrote:

Many years ago, back in the 60's IIRC, before they had built much in the way of motorways etc.

Maybe they could take this into account for the M50 junction upgrades, seriously in Japan they drive on the left so it's not as if there will ever be a time when there won't be any left hand drive cars. Africa could be fun since they have land boarders. If the UK change then we'd probably change too, but seeing as how NI drivers are nearly as bad as the ones down here it would be carnage if we changed before they did.

Makes you wonder what would have happened if Henry Ford was right handed.

mackerski

loyatemu wrote:

how have the Brits gotten out of doing this?

A few possible explanations:

* A combination of bloody-mindedness and greater influence than we have
* A more compelling case for sticking, since they hadn't done half the conversion already
* We could possibly have got out of it too, but government policy favours the idea (odd to see the government actually favouring a good idea, but there you go).

loyatemu wrote:

and is it really a good idea for new cars to get rid of the mile scale altogether - plently of drivers will still be driving in the north & UK a lot.

(actually I presume this is because they already make km only speedos for the continental market and don't want to have to manufacture 3 different types of speedos)

You've answered your own question. Though it surprised me that at least the well-exported brands wouldn't have had the demand for km-then-mile clocks. The Canadian market, for instance, would be in a similar position, with the prospect of cross-border driving to a stone-age country. You'd think that Merc, BMW and a few other brands would have catered for this.

OTOH, a km-only scale is a lot tidier in the dash, and it isn't that hard to remember the more important conversions (30->50, 40->60+, 50->80, 60->100-, 70->112).

Dermot

fjon

As far as I know the following (big) countries drive on the left - UK, Ireland, Oz, NZ, South Africa, Thailand, Japan, Indonesia, India, China

The last three countries alone make up a large chunk of the world's population. WOuld I be right in saying that more people drive on the right side than the left?

Edit: I'm wrong - twice the number of people drive on the right than the left: http://members.cox.net/rmf9/whichside.htm

Alun

fjon wrote:

As far as I know the following (big) countries drive on the left - UK, Ireland, Oz, NZ, South Africa, Thailand, Japan, Indonesia, India, China

The last three countries alone make up a large chunk of the world's population. WOuld I be right in saying that more people drive on the right side than the left?

Almost twice as many ... see http://members.cox.net/rmf9/whichside.htm. Also see http://www.geocities.com/jusjih/driving-rl.html which goes into how many countries (depending on your exact definition of "country", and it isn't as clear cut as you might think!) drive on the left or right.

BTW China drives on the right, Hong Kong and Macau on the left!

EDIT: I haven't found a reference to how many actual cars there are in each category though. India may have a huge population for example, but car ownership will be pretty low compared to, say, Liechtenstein!

GerardKeating

fjon wrote:

As far as I know the following (big) countries drive on the left - UK, Ireland, Oz, NZ, South Africa, Thailand, Japan, Indonesia, India, China

http://users.pandora.be/worldstandards/driving%20on%20the%20left.htm

For the full history on this fasinating topic

DadaKopf

Who's organising the changeover? Santa Claus?

Capt'n Midnight

http://users.pandora.be/worldstandards/images/driving%20on%20the%20left.gif
It's only 20KB - couldn't resist - but why is Ireland Orange and not Green ??

Victor

loyatemu wrote:

how have the Brits gotten out of doing this?

They have a permanent derogation.

Victor

Hmmm, what country is this? Or do the Somalis go on a province by province basis, depending on who has the biggest machine gun on his pick-up truck?

BrianD3

With widespread confusion expected for the first few weeks the public is to be bombarded with information in the run up to the changeover.

I'd say it could end a bit like the euro changeover. The majority of the population are morons who have extreme difficulty with simple conversions, So there will be lots of confusion. And there'll be lots of ould ones ringing up Joe Duffy to have a moan about the new system.

Lots of idiots don't even understand the CURRENT speed limits - eg I know plenty of people who think that the limit on a dual carriageway is 70 mph and that the national speed limit is 55 mph

Also I wonder will the Gardai be demanding a pay rise for the inconvenience of enforcing the new limits....bank staff, are you listening?

BrianD3

Capt'n Midnight

Victor wrote:

Hmmm, what country is this? Or do the Somalis go on a province by province basis, depending on who has the biggest machine gun on his pick-up truck?

British Somaliland home to the Mad Mullah

mackerski

BrianD3 wrote:

The majority of the population are morons who have extreme difficulty with simple conversions, So there will be lots of confusion.

But there's nothing to convert - you adapt your speed as shown on the speedo to the one that's on the sign, just like you always did.

Dermot