Why reduce the speed limit to 50mph on rural roads?

[Darren]

Why reduce the speed limit to 50mph on rural roads?

Advanced-Driving.co.uk - the UK’s most popular website for safe road driving, condemns the recent Government guidance to Councils to reduce the speed limit on many rural roads to 50mph. Why? Because it’s not roads that are dangerous but poorly trained drivers.

Lowering speed limits is an easy but ill-conceived and ultimately ineffective solution to tackling casualties. The wrong thinking also has no end. Why 50mph? Why not 40mph, or even 30mph?

The authorities know that most casualties occur below the posted speed limit on a given road. Trying to reduce casualties with speed limits alone would, therefore, need them to be set and rigidly enforced at levels that interfere with reasonable mobility.

Official figures also show that 'exceeding the speed limit' is reported by the Police as a contributing factor in only 7% of accidents for drivers aged 17-19, and less than 2% for drivers aged over 25 who form the majority of road-users (1).

Declaring more of our safe driving to be illegal is a weak and unthinking step for genuine road safety.

There is considerable concern over the ongoing proliferation of the Speed Kills campaign. This policy is continuing to create a population of drivers who do not know how to determine what a safe speed is for a given road or situation.

For more than a decade, Speed Kills has been teaching people, including millions of new drivers, that just keeping to the speed limit will keep them safe. This is a dangerous form of 'zombie' driving, meaning people focus much more on their speedometer as an indicator for safety, rather than the real hazards going on around them.

Advanced-Driving.co.uk is passionate about good safe driving, and believes that setting speed limits too low works against safety. It causes frustration in the average, responsible driver and focuses the driver’s mind on an arbitrary number (the limit) rather than encouraging good judgement of the speed which is safe for the conditions.

Sometimes even 30mph can be too fast for a rural road, whereas 60mph may be appropriate if the conditions are right for that road. Safety will always depend more on the circumstances than the posted limit.

The Government should be providing better driver training to stop the decline in driving ability. There are simple and teachable skills that would make drivers more aware of risk, give better control of hazards and improve the ability to select a correct and safe speed, yet these skills are not being taught.

It is also not only 'young drivers' who are let down by their training and the over-emphasis on speed. Crash figures show that ALL 'new drivers' irrespective of age have high crash rates - until they start to overcome for themselves the shortcomings in what they have been taught. Clearly, new drivers improve with experience, but this should not excuse inadequate training for learner drivers from day one (2).

Advanced-Driving.co.uk calls on the Government to abandon the simplistic and distracting focus on ‘speed’, and use the next decade to concentrate on tackling the fundamental failures in driver training to really improve road safety in the UK.

References:
1) DFT Road Safety Research Report No.87 Learning to Drive: The Evidence. Figure 5.5: Proportion of drivers in accidents with factors attributable to the driver, by age group of driver, 2006

2) DFT Road Safety Research Report No.87 Learning to Drive: The Evidence. Figure 1.1: The effects of age (maturation) and experience on accident liability

[TripleS]

A splendid article, Darren, and I completely agree with you.

It is truly depressing to see how those with so much power and influence misuse those resources and become a complete pain in the backside to millions of sensible and reasonable road users, and to so little constructive effect.

Come on, government, it's time for some enlightened policies on road safety, for a change!

Best wishes all,
Dave.

[Darren]

Yep, there where several people from the forum with input, so thanks to everyone who contributed and reviewed prior to being sent out.

For info, I've also started a Facebook group on this, will be interested to see if it gathers any interest, if there are any members on here who also have Facebook accounts, please go along, join the group and add your comments.

If you are a lurker and don't post here, please do look at the public Facebook group and if you agree, join the group in support - it would be good to get the wider perspective on this topic / issue.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=254363351078

[x-Sonia-x]

It is a great article Darren . I personally dont have that much knowledge, but what I do have is the enthusiasm to progress with my driving, probably thanx to my ADi who preached to me that it would be a lifelong learning process!! Shame not all drivers are given this sort of encouragement because my own feeling is, its at the 'L' stage that the area must be targeted. How the government would go about implementing further teaching or training is where the problem lies, but it is something that needs to be addressed, pass plus is not really worth mentioning (though I have done it) I also think that if eough people where to stand up and be counted over this, then something would be done

I will join the facebook group now...its great idea...and will capture, hopefully, a much bigger audience

[Laconic]

Philosophically, I agree with you. However, I think that only part of the solution is a rethink of what we expect from new drivers, important though that is*. The other part is how do we change people's attitude to driving? Nothing has made my relatives declare me weird** faster than my declaring an interest in advanced driving -- the attitude is 'you've passed your test, what more do you need to know?'


*what sort of curriculum changes would be nice though? Personally, I find myself leaning towards a more modular sort of learning with more demanding modules (e.g. a night driving course, a rural roads course with the limit point taught, busy urban roads) and a final test looking for good decision making, but that would entail a very large change in the way driver training is organised.

** so unfair -- I'm weird in so many other ways!

L.

[ROG]

what sort of curriculum changes would be nice though?

Make MIND DRIVING compulsory as well as general road theory in all schools at age 15

[brianhaddon]

Excellent article Darren.
I think one of the problems is that many people do not want to learn to drive they just want a licence and the freedom it gives them. 'Learning to pass the test' seems popular. Many then ditch what they learnt 'for the test' because it is not relevant to 'real' driving. So I feel perceptions do need to change. To many people driving is all about car control, in my mind driving is mainly a 'mind' task. However how do you change this without becoming too patronising or too much like 'big brother'. A challenge indeed and one in our own small way we should all rise to.
Regards
Brian Haddon

PS I have joined the facebook group

[Darren]

There's been a mixed response so far, and interesting to say the least.

However, on the whole, the response has been very positive and encouraging. Alot of ADI's agreeing, which is good to see also.

The point may have sadly been missed by some, oh well.

[Angus]

Darren,

Who is the intended audience for this, and what do you hope they will do with it?

After all, with most of the ADUK members, you're preaching to the converted

[x-Sonia-x]

Darren,

Who is the intended audience for this, and what do you hope they will do with it?

After all, with most of the ADUK members, you're preaching to the converted

Thats why a page on facebook is great idea. If everyone joins page, and invites their friends to join, then you suddenly have a potentially huge audience. 2 of my friends have joined already, neither of which belong to ADUK. Communication means people will pass it on and gains more support that you wouldnt otherwise get

[martine]

Darren,

Who is the intended audience for this, and what do you hope they will do with it?

After all, with most of the ADUK members, you're preaching to the converted

ADUK press releases go to around 3000 contacts - ADUK members, ADIs and most importantly, media contacts. It's an attempt to raise awareness of the problems of the current thinking from government. Wouldn't it be great if the media (newspapers, radion and TV) picked up on this? I'm no great public speaker but I would be quite willing to talk on local radio about this.

If people reading it feel strongly enough, I would encourage them to write to their MP (it does work!) as the 'speed kills' campaign has really outlived it's usefulness (if indeed it ever was).

[Darren]

One thing that has definitely happened with this release is that it's woken a few sleeping lions.

I've never, ever had so many email responses to a piece we have released. Whether positive or negative, the responses are valuable - as it helps to paint the picture of what people really believe. Interesting also that the straw poll of advanced drivers on this site, and the IAM site believe the Government is wrong in it's view here.

The vast majority are overwhelmingly supportive of what has been produced. This includes ADI's, IAM members, RoSPA members and many others interested in road safety.

There are some, a small minority, also ADI's, IAM members, RoSPA members (just 1 or 2) who are, to put it bluntly, outraged that we could possibly suggest the Government is wrong, and seem to have the idea we're a bunch of lunatics who want to drive as fast as possible - interesting...Some people have been very "emotive" at what has been written.

They missed the point - being:

We want the Government to pay more attention to the role that driver ability can and should play in making our roads safe. We are very concerned that the focus on lowering and obeying speed limits is reducing drivers’ ability to make safety judgements for themselves - and this must be more dangerous for us all.

The framework for tuition is set by the DSA. And even more, the ‘driving culture’ of the driving population as a whole is set by the DfT campaigns.

It is not about increasing speed limits its about ensuring our children are taught make the correct decisions, understand risk and drive as conditions dictate rather than looking at a red circle and believing they are safe because the circle says so. This basic and crucial skill of understanding / dealing with risk has been eroded to the point that the only way to improve road safety largely is reduce speed limits yet further.

[Darren]

Make MIND DRIVING compulsory as well as general road theory in all schools at age 15

Where do we start

[Smiling Assassin]

This subject has also been raised on another forum I frequent and to which I had already posted my comments: http://headlight.ekam.org.uk/topic585.html#p4707

Speed limits and especially the "Speed Kills" issues are perennial favourites in several forums and discussion groups and it comes as no surprise when the motorist is so often seen by Government as an easy target. DfT's current fixation on dangerous roads and speed issues is just another manifestation of the Nanny State thinking it knows best.

What actually constitutes a dangerous road? It is my belief that roads, of themselves, are not dangerous. Roads are an inanimate part of the landscape and the only thing that makes them dangerous are the people that use them in a manner that is inappropriate. Likewise speed. Speed is simply a measure of distance travelled over time and cannot kill anyone. What can, and unfortunately does, kill people is inappropriate speed and the DfT are apparently taking a legislative route to solve a problem based on a false premise that should really be dealt with by improved education.

[ExadiNigel]

what sort of curriculum changes would be nice though?

Make MIND DRIVING compulsory as well as general road theory in all schools at age 15

Age 15 is too late. Ones attitude to road safety is fixed by the age of 11.

Nigel