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news
20mph sign (CC licensed by EdinburghGreens via Flickr)Retired neurologist says increased weight and acceleration of electric vehicles will lead to rise in cycling-related fatalities unless 20mph speed limits are introduced
A retired neurologist has urged Gloucestershire County Council to introduce 20mph speed limits in residential areas, which he says could save around 30 cyclists and pedestrians from being killed or seriously injured every year.
Speaking at a council meeting earlier this week, Gloucestershire resident Dr Paul Morrish said that between May 2019 and May 2021, five pedestrians and cyclists were killed, and 124 others seriously injured, on the county’s 30mph roads, Gloucestershire Live reports.
Morrish also claimed that the increased weight, size, and acceleration of electric vehicles could result in a rise in these figures on 30mph roads, unless improved safety measures are swiftly put in place.
The retired doctor called on the county council to follow the example of other local authorities in England and Wales by ensuring that communities in Gloucestershire who want 20mph limits to be implemented on residential roads can gain them quickly and easily.
> Wales set to reduce default speed limit to 20mph in residential areas
In England, a third of the population already lives in areas with 20mph speed limits, while from September blanket 20mph zones will be introduced in Wales on residential areas and streets busy with pedestrians, and where street lights are fewer than 200 yards apart.
Scotland is also set to make 20mph the “norm” in built-up areas, with councils permitted to make exceptions if they deem the area safe.
“Edinburgh has seen a 30 percent reduction in its casualties, in London on the 30mph arterial routes they’ve seen a 63 per cent reduction in collisions with pedestrians,” Morrish, who worked as a neurologist at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital, told a meeting at Gloucester’s Shire Hall on Wednesday.
“By going at 20mph we would save around 30 people from being killed or seriously injured every year in Gloucestershire.
“Why isn’t the council being more proactive in responding to all those communities to make the roads safer for them? That would encourage more people to choose walking or cycling. And we would have a fitter population and less money spent in the NHS.”
Responding to Dr Morrish’s concerns, the county council’s fire, community safety, and libraries cabinet member Dave Norman said that possible changes could concern “not just 20mph speed limits but the reduction of speed on roads where the current speed may be inappropriate”.
He continued: “What we need to do though is accept we have to go through due process.
“And due process involves consultation, and we are in a situation where I could not put my hand on my heart and say the right way forward is to make everywhere, where people want it, to immediately be a 20mph zone.”
Nevertheless, Norman said he would be happy to meet with Dr Morrish, along with the council’s road safety officers, to discuss where improvements could be made on a case-by-case basis.
In January, we reported that the government is considering draft road planning regulations which would introduce a default 20mph speed limit on new or redesigned urban and residential streets.
A draft version of Manual for Streets, the Department for Transport’s planning document for residential areas, seen by the Sunday Times and set to be published this year, says “the default should be to work to a design speed limit of 20mph in urban environments” and that “for residential streets, a maximum design speed of 20mph should normally be an objective, with significantly lower speeds usually desirable”.
Following the report, Neil Greig, director of policy and research at road safety charity the Institute of Advanced Motorists, argued that a default approach to 20mph on its own will not enhance road safety or benefit active travel.
“We’ve had longstanding concerns about a blanket approach to 20mph,” Grieg told the BBC’s Today programme.
“If you have to change the speed limit on a road, you have to change the environmental cues to tell drivers what speed they should be safely driving at. And the problem with simply changing to 20mph without changing the road, is that drivers will continue to drive on at the previous speeds.
“And that means you don’t have the safety benefits, and you don’t have the active travel benefits of changing the environment to make it easier to walk and cycle.”
After obtaining a PhD, lecturing, and hosting a history podcast at Queen’s University Belfast, Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.
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On a residential street, 20mph for a motorised vehicle is generally as fast as you want to be going if you are in any way considering what might happen ahead of you. If there are lots of parked cars then 20mph is probably too fast. Also consider that it's not just to give sufficient time for hazard avoidance, but also keeps road noise down for residents. Those travelling at higher speeds are doing so with tunnel vision.
But the whole thing is upside down. I live on quite a wide residential road and the number of people who just accelerate from one end to the other is astonishing. Most of them live on the road since it doesn't actually go anywhere other than to feed the houses. They're not in the main people who would consider themselves to be irresponsible drivers. But they don't know any different behaviour. It's just built in behaviour to keep accelerating as the road appears clear. I've been buzzed at high speed when getting into my car on a number of occasions. There is no reaction to hazards because the space ahead of their bonnet is clear. Speed limit signs make little difference. It's a driver behaviour issue and you only change that through training and coaching the skills and attitudes that come with safe and considerate driving. Those skills and attitudes lead to setting a safe speed. Signs and cameras don't. If we'd spent the last 30 years pushing drivers through additional training and coaching then we'd be in a very different place to that which has come about from speed limit signs and cameras.
Cushion-coated iSAVE-SC1 electric vehicle is a soft touch
https://newatlas.com/isave-sc1-electric-vehicle/25567/
Surely you'd want to sit in the comfy bit?
Pillows... new law for all motorised vehicles to have to strap some extra puffy pillows to the front...
How about air bags on the outside, but not on the inside?
Everyone getting upset in the comments, but the guy is right. Faster and heavier bikes take longer to slow down and will therefore be more likely to hit someone that a lighter and slower bike would not. And they weigh more and go faster so will hurt more, and are much more likely to kill. eBicycles are great but they carry a new set of dangers to pedestrians that regular bikes do not (or at least a larger extent).
I think the retired neurologist's comments were about electric cars, but I appreciate that you have an axe to grind.
Have you thought, however, that the cyclist on an electric bicycle carrying even an extra 10Kg of motor and battery is still a fraction of the f = ma of the same cyclist driving a car?
Yeah...only this article, and Dr Morrish's very sensible comments, have absolutely nothing to do with ebikes in any way, shape or form. He's talking about electric cars. It helps to read the article before commenting if you don't want to make a fool of yourself.
I'm not sure Nigel is that interested in avoiding being a fool.
Are you convinced about that ID? My impression, before I ceased looking at comments from this nutter, was that he was different and intent on making up bogus topics to incite a stereotyped reaction to which he could then object- questions that no genuine person would ask: I am taking my boyfriend to Amsterdam etc. I agree that both, if they are distinct, are annoying sad gits
Then ad to that all bikes on the roads who are as dodgy as the cyclist riding it - questionable maintenance, missing brake or worn components, incorrect tyre pressures, etc..
The principal of health and safety is that it should be ALARP (as low as reasonably practical). If due process means that they need to consider the evidence then fine but if due process means asking the public what they think then that's nonsense. All of the authorities are looking at the same data so if it's reducing casualty rates where it has been implemented than other authorities need to explain why they consider it impractical for their region.
But... but ... but ... PeoPLe CaNt DRivE aT 20 mph.
For some reason, people seem to find it impossible to be able to keep their vehicles to 20mph or less.
They complain that they are constantly looking at the speedometer, instead of where they are going.
Personally, I'd suggest this this is pure horseshit, and vehicle manufacturers should be made to put the speedometer back in the line of sight of the driver, and as some vehicles have, mounted adjacent to the centre console.
A driver should be capable of driving their vehicles at any speed, and safely maintaining that speed - if not then they shouldn't be behind the wheel.
On my speed awareness course about 15 years ago, there were at least 2 drivers who claimed it was impossible to stick to 30mph ("Can't do 30 in 5th gear").
I'll agree it is harder in a modern sound insulated car running at less than 15% of its maximum speed, but equally rather than applying tech to distractions like massively complex audio systems, a speed limiter is an easy fix. Every car made these days has electronic engine control and electronic speed detection and electronically controlled braking, and many have some form of automatic gearing, so fitting a limiter into the loop is barely more than a control lever - easily adapted from existing cruise control - and a bit of programming (which all manufacturers already have for some of their models).
In a manual car, you might want to stay in 2nd gear for 20, depending on the set-up, as you would stay in 3rd in a 30.
Back in the '80's when I took my driving test, you had to be in top gear by the time you got to 30mph.
I understand that to have been changed due to more vehicles having 5 and 6 gears, and the issues that such a low speed has for essentially a cruising gear.
Driving at 20mph should have no more physical or mental effort than driving at 20 mph; agreed that you just leave it in 2nd - even easier in an auto.
Some of the trucks I used to drive, when fully loaded, you would have already have changed gear 6 times to get to 20mph.
No you didn't. Your instructor may have used this figure as a rough guide but it certainly didn't figure in the examiner's marking.
I would suggest OFG meant; when he started driving, and your top speed might have been 70 in those days.
I have a long driveway at work, with a 15 MPH speed limit and a radar display. I use second gear to help keep my speed down on the occasional day I drive to work.
When I bike it, I go a bit faster because my colleagues don't all go 15 MPH and I don't want them on my wheel.
I absolutely agree with you.
Just like all cyclists abide by the Highway Code and stop at ALL red lights on ALL their journeys.
I do
Pedestrian crossings are a nightmare - if there's the green light facing you there's always a red man light, and vice versa. I have to get off and walk past every one...
yep, treat it as a stop sign; stop, check it's clear then go. maximum safety. And no indefinate waits at traffic lights with sensors designed only for cars
To give the council member and the IAM chap their due I believe the overall message is still "the goal of our streets and roads is the maximum throughput of motor traffic consistent with safety". So they're probably just sticking with how it was and is in the hope that these ideas are just a fad.
However "it's not as simple as a blanket speed limit - one size doesn't fit all" gets sillier the longer you think about it. For one - er... we do have defaults - that's what the national speed limits are. So 30mph urban. There's also a mechanism to vary this default - which I don't think will be changed (definitely remained under eg. the Scottish proposal for 20mph).
The argument that this won't make people do eg. 20 or below? Well that's indeed shown by current evidence. However as the article notes there are studies which show even just changing signs *does* reduce speeds. And reduces casualty figures, which is one of the main reasons for the proposal.
In Scotland we know this because "but defaults don't make sense" was one of the reasons given for why the 20s plenty bill was not recommended by committee. (For other explanations you could look at their constituencies and "interests" i suppose...)
I didn't read an awful lot into it at the time, but my overriding impression was that many were misunderstanding (misrepresenting) what a "default" speed limit is, as essentially meaning that all streets will be 20mph.
As I understood it, the idea was that the default speed limit for new urban roads will be 20mph unless a good case is made for the limit to be something else, in which case a different limit can be applied.
The current position is that those streets will be 30mph unless a good case is made to justify a different limit.
To be honest, that sounds eminently sensible to me. A higher limit where appropriate, but 20mph where there is no good reason for it not to be.
For safety reasons speed differentials are more important than absolute speed. In the areas likely to be affected there is more likelihood of encountering other road users not travelling at 30mph. Decrease the speed difference and things get safer. If you can only gonatb20 then suddenly that risky overtake of a bike doesn't seem so important.
as a bonus it will cause satnav algorithms to stop routing people down residential streets.
I used to live in a 20mph zone. After years of lobbying we finally got the local authority to put down speed strips so we could actually verify the speeds. Needless to say the vast majority of vehicles were doing over 20mph including 50 and 60 mph. (This was a residential street in London) Beccuase the way the LA summarised the data - 80th percentile etc - they concluded that despite the majority of vehicles were travelling above the limit plus 10% it was not an issue and no further action was required. The Police were even persuaded to do speed checks. Again, within minutes they had registered numerous vehicles speeding. Speeding is endemic and not sufficiently punished.
Unlike the USA where high slab-fronted vehicles are popular and desirable, European cars are specifically required to consider the safety of impact with a human, hence the shape of the bumper and bonnet.
While cars are getting bigger and more massive due to the obsession with owning an SUV, but...
Most people are under 120kg. Even the lightest cars are 1000kg. I don't think it'll make much difference whether the car that hits you is 1500 or 2000kg.
Fortunately EVs, with sales having accelerated in the last three years, are generally modern cars with many safety features.
Hmm... heavier may be worse than you think. I think some vehicles with US geometry are over here already. Have we regulated for visibility immediately in front of the taller vehicles? (I believe we're trying to get that for trucks)? Chunkier A-pillars also aren't helping us. Although any vehicle could have them heavier vehicles need sturdier roof support for when they roll.
Drivers *ought to* mitigate that by moving their heads but "voluntary" safety measures are less effective.
Extra mass doesn't help when you need to slow down. Road damage is very dependent on vehicle (axle) weight.
I wonder about issues with people losing the audible cue of "car here" with electric vehicles at low speed? Yes, tyre noise dominates at higher speeds, but going under a vehicle offends at any speed - more likely again with more momentum.
I suspect that the electric car thing is a hook to get people to read it.
I am more concerned about SUVs and trucks, partly because of their size and weight and partly due to driver behaviour. IME drivers of big, expensive cars are generally speaking more likely to be aggressive and inconsiderate compared to those in smaller cars.
20 mph limits have been shown to make a difference. Enforcement of 30 and 40 mph limits in built-up areas would be a great improvement on the current situation.
I agree.
Then bring on the 10mph speed limit and after that get all motorised vehicles to require a person with a flag to walk in front of it.
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