Considering they've said they don't enforce them... Erm... Why are they then complaining that people don't stick to them?
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » General Edinburgh
Police Hypocrisy over 20mph limits?
(38 posts)-
Posted 12 years ago #
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Presumably there's some gradual politics involved.
By saying they won't support them, there's a good chance they won't happen at all which will suit LBP (they don't have a mandate to campaign politically, so one assumes it's based on enforcement workload alone).
Now the 20 zone is in place, they can continue to not enforce it but start making the right noises without losing too much face.
Eventually we'll see tickets handed out because it will have become a public priority (but LBP won't look like they're leading the effort to make war on the motorist).
Posted 12 years ago # -
I almost dropped my monocol in surprise - someone in the comments was complaining about the confusing signage (standard)..... Then RECOMMENDED SWITCHING THE ENTIRE CITY TO 20MPH. That must have been one of you guys.
Posted 12 years ago # -
Yeah, that one surprised me as well!
Posted 12 years ago # -
"
West Savile Terrace and Causewayside were other speeding hot spots. Fifty-five cars were caught speeding in a single day across the two roads.Police have so far issued warning letters rather than fines to drivers caught on radar defying the limit.
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A Lothian and Borders Police spokesman said: “While our focus will remain on policing the main arterial routes where the highest proportion of collisions occur, we will take appropriate and proportionate action against anyone who we detect speeding in any 20mph zone.”"
Mmm, warning letters then...
Posted 12 years ago # -
I don't see any inconsistency from the police here. I imagine this is an opening gamit in a bid to get rid of the 20mph zone. The police are simply indicating that they "don't work". Remember, this is a pilot. If accidents don't reduce and there is evidence the limit is widely ignored then Councillors may well choose to raise the limit again. I'm not saying this will happen - but I don't think it is impossible.
Posted 12 years ago # -
With current fuel price increases people will start speeding to incur a warning letter which they can turn into WARMING letters, burning them to maintain a reasonable core body temperature.
Posted 12 years ago # -
@Morningsider
I'm sure that there are elements within the police who would like the limit to go back up, but there are also sections that take. 'road safety' more seriously.
In addition it's clear that there is much more public/political desire/will to have lower speeds.
There is some political intent to have 20mph on Leith Walk - after the south side trial.
I think that will require some sort of engineering/traffic light sequence changes and/or strong enforcement at the start.
Posted 12 years ago # -
@Morningsider, I guess it depends on whether you see:
"While our focus will remain on policing the main arterial routes where the highest proportion of collisions occur, we will take appropriate and proportionate action against anyone who we detect speeding in any 20mph zone."
As...
How many people have your force given fines for breaking 20mph speed limits?
Not applicable (see above).How many people were given a punishment for breaking 20mph speed limits?
Not applicable (see above)What punishments were given?
Not applicable (see above)Okay, so their FOI does say that they will give 'advice' to those who break it more than once.
It's sadly another example of 'we won't do anything until there's a serious accident/injury/death'. Personally I'd rather they tried to enforce initially so that it didn't come to that.
Posted 12 years ago # -
The police are simply indicating that they "don't work"
Yes. Because they won't enforce them. So what they're actually doing - in my eyes anyway - is reinforcing the case that they need enforced.
If I'm honest, the only change I noticed before and after the 20mph zone is that there are now signs up here and there saying it's a 20 zone. Any average change in speed has been imperceptible to me. But then again I never thought that it was really possible to go that fast in town in a car and that was a good reason to make the 20mph zones blanket, rather than to the exclusion of "arterial" routes.
Posted 12 years ago # -
As we live just off West Saville... I think 50% of vehicles doing <25mph is probably fair. As I have to turn right off it to get home, I'd be lying if I said it hasn't become more pleasant than before.
I don't personally understand why the police won't enforce the limits. It's not like they need to do it all the time, and it would bring in a bucketload of cash.
Is the problem that they need to expend manpower / budget enforcing it but don't get any payback themselves? Perhaps we could give them a target? (ahem!)
Posted 12 years ago # -
Because they are not enforced and the council shied away from making the case for them, the new zones are much like driving in the 20 mph zone in the Royal Park. Those of us who drive at 20 are subject to aggressive tailgating and dangerous overtakes, particularly from taxis and tradesmen. Without a critical mass of drivers willing to drive at 20, they will never be self-policing.
Posted 12 years ago # -
I initially thought that 40% speeding was actually pretty good as it means 60% are not. Then I read that you need to be going over 25mph to be considered speeding and it is not that good really. I wonder what the proportion of drivers sticking to 20mph is?
Posted 12 years ago # -
@mgj I quite enjoyed doing a spot of 20mph enforcing up Oswald Road this morning. The guy behind me seemed to be so impressed that he wanted to get a good close look of my rear bumper to help him remember the occasion in greater detail. Naturally, this made me only too happy to help him by slowing down that litle bit further...
Although, that said, it was quite instructive how slow driving at 20mph feels, especially having driven up the motorway and the A702 earlier today. Even consciously driving to 20 to make a point I found I was heading up to and beyond it when I glanced down at the speedo. On that basis alone, it will take a few months for people to get used to it.
Posted 12 years ago # -
I reside in a 20mph limit street that has a digital speed display, to advise motorists on their compliance, or lack of it.
The average speed tends to be around 34mph.
Very few motorists are interested in going under 28mph.
Some are perfectly happy to stay above 40mph.
Posted 12 years ago # -
My feeling is that it has started to get slightly better over the last few months. Obviously far too many still going too fast, but it only takes a few drivers like PS to go through at 20 to bring the speed down for everyone.
But despite that I still get angry and depressed when I travel through these areas (unless I'm in the car, ironically, when instead I feel powerful!)
Posted 12 years ago # -
20mph zones all round where I live (and 3 schools on the main, speedbumped, road through). Slight downhill heading home, I'm easily cruising at 20mph - 9 times out of 10 I'll get passed. Occasionally substantially over the limit (doubling it).
I'd say average on the 'main' roads is about 30-35mph. Would be good to know.
I've pondered getting some light-up rope stuff to make into the shape of a 20 on my back and fire it up with some AA batteries when I get into a 20 zone.
Posted 12 years ago # -
So the retention of 30mph limits on arterial routes, plus lack of any enforcement, has produced driver confusion and speeding in the 20mph zone. Quelle surprise!
Posted 12 years ago # -
Should design a card we can send to councillors, with the caption "We hate to inform you that CCE told you so. But we did"
Posted 12 years ago # -
At the end of the day, the biggest safety gain comes from each of the first few mph, so reducing 50% of traffic by 5mph with no enforcement or speed infrastructure at all could be seen as quite a big win?
Posted 12 years ago # -
"Obviously the people who have trialled the 20mph lmit must drive automatics. Try doing that in a manual car - second gear, 2,500 revs to stop the car juddering - go at 30mph and the car can comfortably sit at 2,000 revs and not judder o/a better torque. Doesn't take much brains to work out that more fuel is used at 20mph, so more pollution.
Plus- most people can tell when their car is doing 30mph - down to experience. Not many are used to tottering along at 20mph, so more attention is paid to the speedo - therefore taking eyes off the road, so increasing the potential for accidents.
Sorry, I'm not convinced that a blanket 20mph will work, without massive increase into the police coffers"
and
"20mph in the back streets is one thing but W. Savile Terrace and Oswald Road are important local thoroughfares.
This is also a hugely one-sided report."
Posted 12 years ago # -
Those comments are great! We've also got someone answering their own question with "Thought not".
Anyone have any figures for how many accidents this new 20 zone has prevented? Thought not.
Posted 12 years ago # -
I don't suppose it's worth explaining to the poster of the self-answered questions the difficulty of collecting figures for things that haven't happened yet...
However the figures about how reducing speed cuts mortality levels in accidents are pretty clear.
Posted 12 years ago # -
Did anyone expect more than this? Frankly I think its not a bad result if you consider it as entirely self regulated.
Putting 20mph signs everywhere with zip real policing has worked - to an extent.
I think this is exactly what the police expected, and presume they want some budget to enforce it - why not use that tactic, its what I would do.
Posted 12 years ago # -
"Did anyone expect more than this? Frankly I think its not a bad result if you consider it as entirely self regulated."
Except I would imagine the sight of two cops in fluoro yellow pointing a radar gun at the road accounted for the numbers breaking 20mph to be so small.
I'm only going on personal experience, so realise that anecdote is not data, but the roads around me I ride at about 20mph, and when driving I'm definitely going 20mph, and roughly 90%, if not more, drivers are exceeding that.
So self-regulation doesn't work; threat of the actual polis does. IMHO.
Posted 12 years ago # -
I gather (from the usual Dutch campaign blogs) that where a ~20mph limit is put in there it's done in conjunction with wholesale rationalisation/redesign of the road network, so that through traffic is guided onto a smooth, fast, free-flowing route while bicycle & local traffic is guided onto a speed-limited more pleasant local route nearby. By contrast Causewayside is still a through road that's thronged with cars and lorries, and Leith Walk would be too. I wonder what the point is of imposing a low speed limit when you don't at the same time redo the roads to make them automatically guide drivers into either slowing down or moving to a faster road that's designed for motorised through traffic...?
Posted 12 years ago # -
cc is absolutely correct and frustration directed at the police is, I think, misconceived. Speed limits on their own are next to useless. Police enforcement is next to useless other than as an occasional stunt to remind the stupid. There just aren't enough police officers to go round.
Speed limits should be self-enforcing by making the road feel like a 20mph road. If you change the limit without changing the road, people will continue to take all of their cues from the road, not the sign, and drive as they did before.
Think of the 20mph limits as another piece of botched infrastructure.
Posted 12 years ago # -
That I agree with. I still think it's a little disingenuous of the police to state that they're not going to enforce the limits and then 'work with the community' around those limits without telling them 'but it won't make any difference because we're not going to enforce them'.
Posted 12 years ago # -
"Did anyone expect more than this? Frankly I think its not a bad result if you consider it as entirely self regulated."
Except I would imagine the sight of two cops in fluoro yellow pointing a radar gun at the road accounted for the numbers breaking 20mph to be so small.
On West Saville at least, they were using a speed monitoring box (wires across the road) which is the same as they put in place before the scheme was installed. I don't think it's necessarily the case that measuring the problem changed the results here :)
On balance I still think a >=5mph reduction in 50% of vehicles at the cost of a little signage is quite a win.
Posted 12 years ago # -
On West Saville at least, they were using a speed monitoring box (wires across the road)
There's one of those been recently installed on the supposedly traffic-calmed Brunswick Road off Leith Walk, which in my experience is a favourite with rat run racers...
Posted 12 years ago #
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