Suitable speed on NSL single track roads?

[Horse]

Using the horn; what do you expect it to achieve? In the mostly excellent (but old) Kent police Riding Plans video (it's on Youtube) the instructor suggests listening for an answering toot. Really? How many Joe Public would think of that? Even then, you're both still heading towards each other!

Return to the'worst case' I suggested: add 'loud exhaust' and 'even louder stereo'

[triquet]

I think these little roads remain at NSL simply because there are too many of them to do the necessary legals and to put up and maintain signage. Common sense has to prevail.

On these very narrow windy roads, I'm not really sure whether limit point really works .

Even road positioning has its limitations. Road positioning can just lead to nose to nose confrontations and ABS struggling to work when the tyres are deep in the cow muck.

You just have to bear in mind that something might suddenly loom: it won't necessarily be an AD and it might have four legs. In which case it certainly won't sound it's horn ....

From a practical point of view it's always worth clocking passing places and keeping in mind the last one and (if you know the road) the next one. This does enable a bit of give and take and courtesy with other local drivers.

[jont]

I think these little roads remain at NSL simply because there are too many of them to do the necessary legals and to put up and maintain signage. Common sense has to prevail.

What's the problem with them remaining at NSL? It's supposed to be a limit, not a target This is why I disklike the obsessions with numbers on sticks as any sort of proxy for safety. It encourages the thinking "well they'd have lowered the limit if it wasn't safe" All extra-urban roads should be NSL (where N means "No" )

[triquet]

And driving these sort of roads in Normandie in a RHD drive car is an Interesting Experience, because on a RH bend you simply cannot take up any sort of position to improve vision. You tuck right in wheels right at the edge of the tarmac(?) and hope. It is useful if you have a co-pilot, but the reaction time doubles or trebles.

I've been doing it upwards of 20 years and we've only had two wing mirrors go ....

[TheInsanity1234]

All extra-urban roads should be NSL (where N means "No" )

I very strongly agree!

[trashbat]

On these very narrow windy roads, I'm not really sure whether limit point really works

Why not? You were always supposed to underline it with speed appropriate for the 'be able stop in the distance you can see to be clear' rule - or in this case, twice the distance.

[triquet]

On these very narrow windy roads, I'm not really sure whether limit point really works

Why not? You were always supposed to underline it with speed appropriate for the 'be able stop in the distance you can see to be clear' rule - or in this case, twice the distance.

Yes, ideally. But on sunken lanes (Devon, Corwall, Normandie) the limit point can be only a few feet away ...

[7db]

If you define the limit point to be the nearest place a surprise can come from then bear in mind lateral intrusions.

[martine]

Yes, ideally. But on sunken lanes (Devon, Corwall, Normandie) the limit point can be only a few feet away ...

Yes indeed so you go slowly...don't you?

I think the limit point works as long as you're disciplined (easier said than done sometimes).

[Ralge]

Interesting thoughts .

Triquet - Yes it's interesting that the speed limits haven't been changed on them for decades, I would have thought that they would be reduced by now, considering the changes to other speed limits.

They haven't changed since, broadly, these windy lanes/roads are self-regulating, speed-wise and the Council haven't yet had cause to review the limit.

Their expenditure on signage, road paint, surfacing and (sometimes) speed limits is reactive to events, incidents, crashes. The primary routes with heavier traffic flows through busy risk-laden junctions (poor sight lines etc) see far more Council interventions since they have a far higher crash rate.

[martine]

The primary routes with heavier traffic flows through busy risk-laden junctions (poor sight lines etc) see far more Council interventions since they have a far higher crash rate.

More crashes per year but probably less crashes compared to traffic count. There seems to be a disconnect between setting a speed limit and the risk for an individual driver. It does seem strange, if speed limits are seen as a way of managing risk, to have lower speed limits on good quality A roads than the adjacent unclassified or C roads.

[Ralge]

The primary routes with heavier traffic flows through busy risk-laden junctions (poor sight lines etc) see far more Council interventions since they have a far higher crash rate.

More crashes per year but probably less crashes compared to traffic count. There seems to be a disconnect between setting a speed limit and the risk for an individual driver. It does seem strange, if speed limits are seen as a way of managing risk, to have lower speed limits on good quality A roads than the adjacent unclassified or C roads.

Interventions with signage etc (including limit changes but limits are only one part of the picture) can be thought of as traffic calming. With the minor roads being "self-regulating" there's an in-built traffic calming.
The primary routes demand more attention and interventions simply because of the number of motorists on them x the risk of a crash (expressed not as a theoretical figure but by the frequency and number of actual incidents) x the need to analyse and address this risk (the human and financial cost of crashes).
With up to 60% of fatalities happening on rural roads (increasing in % whilst urban fatalities are decreasing in %) the proposition of "N" in NSL meaning "No", whilst not causing an individual driver a problem of keeping the vehicle shiny side up, creates an issue as soon as a second road user is asked to deal with the first's approach speed. But, that said, limits should not be seen (myopically by either side of argument) as the beginning and the end or as the Councils' only form of traffic-calming intervention.

[triquet]

I did a couple of journeys this weekend using little narrow NSL country roads. I had onboard Mrs T and a friend and a quantity of picnic stuff. It became apparent that it wasn't really visibility that was the primary limiting factor, it was the state of the road surface. There were a number of straight stretches on which I could have made so-called "progress" but in practice to drive at speed on the third-world minor roads of Oxfordshire would a) have shaken the champagne up and caused an Opening Incident and b) caused passengers to have bumps on head and/or Dental Disasters.

This AD lark can be limited by extraneous factors that we don't always think about

[superplum]

I did a couple of journeys this weekend using little narrow NSL country roads. I had onboard Mrs T and a friend and a quantity of picnic stuff. It became apparent that it wasn't really visibility that was the primary limiting factor, it was the state of the road surface. There were a number of straight stretches on which I could have made so-called "progress" but in practice to drive at speed on the third-world minor roads of Oxfordshire would a) have shaken the champagne up and caused an Opening Incident and b) caused passengers to have bumps on head and/or Dental Disasters.

This AD lark can be limited by extraneous factors that we don't always think about

Like weekend picnickers driving slowly on country roads?

[triquet]

I did a couple of journeys this weekend using little narrow NSL country roads. I had onboard Mrs T and a friend and a quantity of picnic stuff. It became apparent that it wasn't really visibility that was the primary limiting factor, it was the state of the road surface. There were a number of straight stretches on which I could have made so-called "progress" but in practice to drive at speed on the third-world minor roads of Oxfordshire would a) have shaken the champagne up and caused an Opening Incident and b) caused passengers to have bumps on head and/or Dental Disasters.

This AD lark can be limited by extraneous factors that we don't always think about

Like weekend picnickers driving slowly on country roads?

Chuckle