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Child Item

Gov Plans to reduce speed limits

cjpm

Today’s top story on the Indo

https://m.independent.ie/irish-news/politics/revealed-the-big-reductions-in-speed-limits-for-many-irish-roads-in-bid-to-prevent-death-and-injury/a156705731.html

”Speed limits are set to be cut on a significant number of roads as authorities seek to reduce the number of deaths and serious injuries.

Limits will be lowered to 80kmh on national secondary roads, 60kmh on local and rural roads, and 30kmh in town centres and housing estates as part of a major Government overhaul.”

My own opinion is that they are trying to cover up for years of doing SFA.

There should be a dedicated dept in every RDO looking at improving every road in the country. Easy wins setting back ditches on corners etc, improving visibility around bends etc

If there was a tax break for house owners and landowners where they could surrender a strip of land adjacent to the road and the councils could then set back the boundaries in order to improve alignments, allow some bit of a verge.

A voluntary scheme with a carrot would be worth a lot as we obviously don’t have the resources to use the stick ie a widespread CPO.

Some of the national primaries are a disgrace and the national secondary’s are absolutely woeful in parts.

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Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121074872#Comment_121074872

A complete over reaction and one that may cause them much difficulty electorally in rural Ireland if they implement it.

Several times recently I've heard the recent tragedy at Hillview in Clonmel as a reason that 'something must be done' on rural roads. I know that bit of road and the speed limit well before where that sad accident happened is 50kph. A car travelling at 50kph or less along there would be very unlikely to have resulted in that disaster.

Enforcement of existing limits and driver campaigns for defensive driving would be far more effective.

highdef

Average speed cameras all over the place, where suitable, would be a good start. All the N and M roads and plenty of the R roads.Fixed cameras on roads identifiable as being dangerous where speed detection vans themselves would be a danger to drivers.

Regarding fixed cameras, surely at this stage you can have semi fixed cameras? What I mean a camera that be installed somewhere (on a road where a speed detection van would be a danger due to narrowness of a road), be left there for a few weeks and can be then be moved to another location but still be secure from vandals.

Also, end the silly requirement to only be permitted to have speed detection vans in certain places and on certain stretches of road. It should be that if you are driving above the speed limit on an public road, then you are liable to be caught and fined for it no matter where that road may be.

Finally, no signs on poles to inform you that speed cameras may be up ahead and speed detection vans should be far more discreet, ideally you should not even know you have passed one or at worst, you can only notice when it's too late.

Do all or most of the above and you will find that there will be a MASSIVE change in driving habits for the vast majority of drivers.

[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075539#Comment_121075539

Hiding the vans and taking down sight posts would completely defeat the purpose and honestly it’s a very dangerous thing to look for in its own way.

Do you seriously advocate for the Gardai and in this case a separate company working on behalf thereof, to have powers that allow them to camouflage themselves and catch you out secretly?

Would you appreciate going about your day and having a garda leap from a shrub to arrest you or question you about what you’re doing? Like think about what you’re saying for a second.

You basically want secret police on the road. High visibility policing is and always has been a far more effective deterrent.

People break road traffic laws in ireland because the garda are no where to be seen.

magicbastarder

High visibility policing is more effective? Not with speed cameras, it's not. It's pure tokenism.

If you have a policy that speed cameras should be highly visible, what you are saying is that if you can't see one, you can speed without getting caught.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075076#Comment_121075076

Just a few things here:

1: Yes distractions are an issue but it's mostly to do with illegal mobile phone use. This has to be looked at and legislated for.

2: I don't really buy the whole hedge-trimming argument. Again, one has to drive give consideration to their environment. I feel this is a knee jerk argument just to have a go at the Greens.

3: 100%. The faster we get cameras on traffic lights the better.

4: Perhaps, but if one is driving at 110-120KM/h in a 60KM/h zone, that would be a much more serious offence with the possible seizing of the car and a court date. I personally would like to see people who speed like that receive 4 figure speeding fines, and their license taken off them, no questions asked.

So, yes, reducing the speed limit is just one thing, but there has to be more done.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075387#Comment_121075387

Agree on all points.

Apparently, the online portal is being worked on and should be up and running soon.

Also, expect to see more 'Average speed' cameras deployed around the place. They seem to be very effective.

Macy0161

I'm home from the UK nearly 25 years - at that stage they had multiple fixed camera locations, and rotated cameras between them.

Apparently, the online portal is being worked on and should be up and running soon.

The portal is only half the job though - they have to action from the footage too.

ELM327

Great. Making ridiculous low speed limits means they will just be ignored anyway.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075337#Comment_121075337

Yup, not keeping up with traffic or making adequate progress. Driving 90 on a 100 road is a silly thing to do. If you do it in your driving test you will likely get a negative score for that action.

c.p.w.g.w

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075840#Comment_121075840

Road was empty and the road would have been greasy as it hadn't rained in a number of day...it's a speed limit not target...oh and I did get a mark against me, a family member who is l/was a member of AGS traffic core suggested I should have made an official complaint against him

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075840#Comment_121075840

I presume you're being facetious.. Driving 90 on a 100 road is perfectly reasonable in many circumstances. Any tester/ instructor querying that should be fired on the spot and/or removed from register of instructors.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075855#Comment_121075855

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075858#Comment_121075858

See this "speed limit not target" argument gets shot down when you are actually tested and you need to drive to the speed limit. It's not "any tester" it's all testers, pretty standard for the last 20 plus years.

magicbastarder

if i'm on a quiet 100km/h road and not in a hurry - no way would i bother doing 100km/h. 80 or 90 is fine.

medoc

Blanket speed limits because of the colour of the sign or if the route number is above or below 50 is stupid. Roads should be limited based on their physical conditions. The N52 for example has some of the best and worst sections of any secondary road. Limiting it by default along its entire length is stupid. It already has 80km/h limits on poor parts in Meath. There has been plenty of opportunities for the TII or county councils to audit every km of road in the country. Placing appropriate limits on them and designing solutions to sections that need improvement. I’ve no argument against local roads at 60km/h.

A network of average speed cameras on all primary and secondary national roads at regular intervals and on the busier regional roads makes sense. The vast majority of people will comply with reasonable limits.

AyeGer

Impatient and dangerous drivers are causing a lot of problems on the roads. Also people looking at their phones.

Im on the road a lot and see some crazy driving.

fits

Well I hope other road users than car drivers can get out more safely. I don’t know if this will work but I hope it does.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075482#Comment_121075482

Enforcement of existing limits and driver campaigns for defensive driving would be far more effective.

I agree with the defensive driving but a genuine question.

How do we enforce the rules of the road on rural roads? We have the most roads per capita in Europe, because of your unique population and settlement patterns. Having a Garda sitting on a rural road to catch 1 driver a day won't do much. So how do we do this?

Any suggestion is usually met with knee-jerk rubbish from the likes of the Healy Raes who try and turn the issue of road safety into a Rural/Urban divide and a culture war issue.

satguy

Big fines for speeding,, the more over the limit, the higher the fine..

Even bigger fines for slow driving,, if your tipping along at 65 on a road that is marked 100,, then that's a fine, and if your doing 60 on a road marked 100, then that's an even bigger fine.

Having to overtake slow drivers,, puts us all in danger..

fits

how Do we do it? With technology. Speed cameras all over the place in France.

ThreeGreens

We've been told over the past few weeks that the increase in road deaths is due to speeding (that is people not obeying the speed limit).

So how is the solution to reduce the speed limit, if drivers aren't obeying it?

Enforcement of the speed limit is the answer to people breaking the speed limit, not reducing the limit.

Also, I've seen no analysis done of the recent road deaths. Are we collecting details of the crashes and analysing the real cause? If that was done we could better understand what was really causing the accidents and introduce measures to really tackle the cause rather than just doing road safety by press release.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075818#Comment_121075818

The portal is only half the job though - they have to action from the footage too.

Yes, I agree.

No point uploading a video of dangerous driving when it gets lost and there is no follow-up. Actionable enforcement has to come out of those situations.

the.red.baron

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075611#Comment_121075611

no, they can detect you at ranges in excess of 1k, probably more, unless you are warned ahead of time, you will get caught before you spot it

AugustusMinimus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121076025#Comment_121076025

You’ll see a lot more impatient drivers if these new rules are brought in. Suspect road rage instances will go through the roof.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121076389#Comment_121076389

well then you'd have to wonder why the detection rate was less than 0.22% on national slow down day, when by the RSA's own reckoning, in a study from a couple of years ago, 29% of drivers on 100km/h roads were exceeding 100km/h and 6.8% of drivers were exceeding 110km/h. why is the gosafe figure such a tiny percentage of that?

if they issue fines for motorists exceeding 110km/h (not sure if that's the threshold they use) that's a factor of over 30 in the difference!

edit: garda operated laser guns have a range of approx 1.2km. according to the discussion on this thread, the range of the cameras in a go-safe van is at most 60m!

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2057633648/speed-van-questions-distance

batman_oh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121076147#Comment_121076147

And yet our roads are statistically safer and have been for years. While also being much worse. So how's that a solution?

"So how is the solution to reduce the speed limit, if drivers aren't obeying it?"

There is actually a lot of study done into this topic and basically they find that reducing speed limits leads to average lower speeds, even without lots of enforcement.

Basically, yes most people break the speed limit, but most people have a comfort zone for how much over the limit they are willing to go.

So lets say the speed limit is 50, a certain percent of drivers will do up to 60 and a smaller percent up to 70. But if you then reduce it to 30, they find that on average the percentages of speeding stay the same but at 40 and 50, rather then 60/70. So on average you have reduced the speed.

Basically getting caught doing 70 in a 30 zone is going to be treated much more seriously by the Guards and courts then 70 in a 50 zone and people intrinsically understand that and adjust to that.

BTW this isn't just Ireland. These sort of speed limit reductions are happening all across the EU and UK.

highdef

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075581#Comment_121075581

"Hiding the vans and taking down sight posts would completely defeat the purpose and honestly it’s a very dangerous thing to look for in its own way."

How does making the speed detection vans hidden defeat the purpose of reducing the amount of speeding drivers and how does a hidden van make it very dangerous? If a driver is completely unaware that he/she has driven past a speed detection van, then I see it as being much safer than eejits who are often already not driving above the speed limiting deciding to jam their foot on the brake pedal when they see a very visible speed detection van. On more than one occasion on the N4 near Mullingar, I had a car in front driving bang on 100 km/h in front of me. Very steady speed, most likely on cruise control. Driver sees the speed detection and drops anchor with a very rapid reduction in speed, sometime by 30 or 40 km/h.....now that's dangerous especially as the line of sight ahead is very clear so a driver braking heavily would certainly not to be expected along that road. I've got used to this being a fairly regular thing so when such a scenario occurs and if it is safe to do so, I will just swerve and pass them to the right and try keep my speed as steady as I can. Braking on a clear motorway/dual carriageway should rarely be required, never mind very heavy braking.

"Do you seriously advocate for the Gardai and in this case a separate company working on behalf thereof, to have powers that allow them to camouflage themselves and catch you out secretly?"

I absolutely do advocate that, yes, seriously. I can't be caught out for anything if I don't do anything wrong. I've never slowed down for a speed detection van, except when forced due to horrific driving standards in front. I stop at stop lines. I drive around a roundabout when going straight on (second exit on a standard layout 4 exit roundabout) rather than try drive in a straight line through it. If the public fear that they can be caught "secretly", as you describe it, for road traffic offences that they may be committing and can be caught anywhere, driving behaviour will change for the better.

If a driver observes the rules of the road and does not contravene any road traffic acts, I can't figure out how any driver can be "caught out" for anything. On a 100 km/h road, I drive at an indicated speed of 105 km/h, using the cruise control when conditions allow. This speed equates to a real speed of 100/101 km/h. On a 120 km/h, I drive at an indicated 127 km/h which in real life is 120/121 km/h. So by no means am I slow driver as I drive literally as fast as I possibly can without having any fear that I'll be "caught out".

"Would you appreciate going about your day and having a garda leap from a shrub to arrest you or question you about what you’re doing? Like think about what you’re saying for a second."

Yes, I would appreciate that however as someone who obeys the rules of the road, it would need to be a case of mistaken identity if I were to arrested by a Garda leaping out from a hedge or shrub and flagging me down. A quick chat with said Garda would likely quickly result in it being discovered that the wrong person has accidentally been stopped. I can't imagine that your suggested scenario would ever actually happen in real life for me bar the aforementioned mistaken identity situation.

"You basically want secret police on the road. High visibility policing is and always has been a far more effective deterrent."

I disagree with you on this point, moreso the wording. I would like a mix of hidden and visible policing. When it comes to road traffic rules enforcement, I don't think that high visible policing is more effective. From anecdotal conversations with people that I know, the people who have the same/similar opinion as yourself are the same people who say openly that they habitually drive over the speed limit and are fully aware of it and they only slow down in areas where speed cameras "may" be present and they also will do other things against the rules like driving in bus lanes when they are in operation and that sort of thing.

So that's the crux of the issue, habitual speeders speed a lot where they know that it's unlikely that they will be caught for doing so but they have a bee in their bonnet about being caught by the so-called "hidden police". And habitual speeders are generally more likely to break other rules too. I'm not sure if they think they are better or more important than other people or are just selfish or are just a bit stupid. Or perhaps a mix of some or all three!

For the record, I'm not suggesting that you speed or break the rules of the road however comparing your opinions here with people of similar opinions through my own experiences would suggest that it is plausible to suggest that it may be not untrue.

"People break road traffic laws in ireland because the garda are no where to be seen."

That is true and lack of enforcement is the issue. I think everyone on this forum agrees on that. However, as I already said, a mix of visible and non-visible policing combined with high levels of enforcement that is continuous and not in little spurts here and there such "National Slow Down Day", which are just plain silly.......that's basically telling the population that there's going be extra speed detection vans between time x and time y and there's therefore a higher chance of being caught for speeding then so slow down for that day and get back to your speeding the day after.

There's often a speed detection in one of two locations between Trim and Summerhill in County Meath and one thing I sometimes do (for my own amusement) is that after I pass the location of where one of the speed detection vans is often located, if I then see a car heading towards me that looks to be driving a noticeable amount over the limit, I will give them a flash of my headlights but ONLY if the speed detection van is NOT present. If the speed detection van is present, I will never flash my headlights, hoping that the driver is caught.

Gooser14

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121075307#Comment_121075307

I think 30 kph in urban areas us too low & would prefer to see it set at 40 kph.

If it is not enforced it will be a waste of time.

Additionally, they need to sort out the issues with the FPN system. There are numerous cases where people appear before a judge & swear they didn't receive the FPN & the judge dismisses the case.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121076491#Comment_121076491

Or in short, leaving the house, you decide to drive the N2 from Dublin to Monaghan. You are in a hurry and know there are going to be two speed traps en route. Can people not see how driver behaviour would be different if they knew they would not be able to see the vans in time to slow, Vs how they would drive if they knew the vans would be visible in plenty of time?

It's the law of unintended consequences. Highly visible go safe vans actually make it easier for people to speed.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121076491#Comment_121076491

I will give them a flash of my headlights but ONLY if the speed detection van is NOT present. If the speed detection van is present, I will never flash my headlights, hoping that the driver is caught.

I love it.

csirl

In the past, many people drove around for years on provisionallicenses wuthout any intention of doing a test.

As you cant do this anymore, a large % of this cohort now drive without any license. Penalty points dont matter to someone with no license.