Inst. of Advanced Motoring poll on 20mph zones

mapleflot

Although some here are road libertarians, nevertheless, if you like doing polls from your own cycling point of view....
http://www.iam.org.uk/iam_poll/20mphspeedlimitsandpedestrianzones.html

Remember speed limits do not apply to cyclists unless you are `cycling furiously' with reckless regard etc.

jds_1981

The chicanes enforcement option for speed limits currently has quite a high % choice.

As a cyclist I really don't like chicanes & pinchpoints.

asprilla

jds_1981 wrote:

The chicanes enforcement option for speed limits currently has quite a high % choice.

As a cyclist I really don't like chicanes & pinchpoints.

I didn't like any of the options really, but I preferred them to speed bumps or speed cameras.

gtvlusso

I don't like the IAM.....

Robstar24

of all motoring organisations the IAM are my 'favourite'. unlike others like the ABD, Drivers Alliance and Safespeed they actually have policies beyond 'all cars should be able to travel at whatever speed they damn well like wherever they damn well like and screw anyone who gets in the way' and don't turn their platform into a libertarian rant about the apparent great hoax of climate change.

mybreakfastconsisted

They've misworded the Presumed Liability question, it says drivers will be held legally responsible for cyclist collisions but this is only in civil law.

First.Aspect

mybreakfastconsisted wrote:

They've misworded the Presumed Liability question, it says drivers will be held legally responsible for cyclist collisions but this is only in civil law.

Besides which it is only a rebuttable presumption. Quite what the question is doing in a speed limits questionairre is also beyond me.

veronese68

They have one of those shared space roads near me. It's a disaster. There is a 7' width restriction on a curve half way along the road. Cars race along the road, stop, crawl through the huge width restriction, then race off again. I was cycling along it with my kids in front of me a while ago. A car hit my arm with it's wing mirror as it rushed past and cut across the front of my kids to stop as the 3rd car at the give way lines here:
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=kt2+6ln&hl=en&ll=51.412732,-0.284494&spn=0.009984,0.01929&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=19.438227,39.506836&z=16&layer=c&cbll=51.412732,-0.284494&panoid=8XFOUYQKsAtS9VeBJ4i7Mw&cbp=12,357.29,,0,18.82
When I had a go at the bloke he told me I shouldn't be in the road. I told him to look at the signs and think again. I can't remember his exact words in reply. Unfortunately I was so angry that he had driven at me and my children I saw red and tried to rip his keys out of the ignition and throw them into a garden. We had a bit of a tussle. I told him if he ever came near my kids again there would be consequences.
That system doesn't work here as people don't know how to behave.

tarquin_foxglove

Veronese68 wrote:

They have one of those shared space roads near me. It's a disaster.
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=kt2+6ln&hl=en&ll=51.412732,-0.284494&spn=0.009984,0.01929&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=19.438227,39.506836&z=16&layer=c&cbll=51.412732,-0.284494&panoid=8XFOUYQKsAtS9VeBJ4i7Mw&cbp=12,357.29,,0,18.82That system doesn't work here as people don't know how to behave.

That road doesn't look like shared space, just a load of pinch points to narrow the road and cause cars to give way to each other, while enabling attractive on street parking.

Shared space can work when it is truly shared & treated as such by all users.

Removing kerbs & street furniture while allowing cars to continue to dominate the space just makes the most vulnerable road users feel even more anxious.

Durham have gone for shared space on Saddler Street ( Saddler Street pre-shared space). At the same time they removed bollards, signs, the congestion charge (policed by a rising bollard) and traffic lights controlling the flow of vehicles.

When pedestrian numbers are high & vehicle numbers low, cars roll along at 3 mph behind pedestrians, everyone's happy.

With the congestion charge & traffic lights gone there is nothing to dissuade vehicle use nor regulate its flow, so vehicle numbers using Saddler Street is high.

As the number of vehicles increase pedestrians are intimidated out of the way almost to single file in front of the buildings, when a vehicle meets another they pull onto the 'pavement' to get round each other encroaching on the pedestrians even further. Shop fronts were damaged when two large vehicles tried to pass each other.

Durham reintroduced bollards to offer some respite to the shop fronts/ pedestrians but that meant vehicles had nowhere to pass each other & so the tailbacks just became enormous, so they had to have a parking attendant in position all day directing traffic.

They are now reintroducing the congestion charge & the traffic lights at the end of August.

I understand that the RNIB & Guide Dogs are considering suing the Council over its introduction of shared space on Saddler Street and it's implication for blind people.

veronese68

Tarquin, you're dead right. That road is a disaster. It's billed as shared space. But they have put it in completely the wrong road. It is used as a cut through. The diagonal parking and width restriction just create pinch points and make it hard to see ahead. It's significantly more dangerous now. You can't just make rat runs shared space as people will still try to race through. I don't cycle that way when I have the kids with me any more. I like the idea of shared space as a concept. It just has to be thought about properly, and a bit of driver re-education.

Confusedboy

GPS technology coupled with remotely controlled speed limiters which will be a legal requirement on all motor vehicles in a few years anyway will render all this just a memory. Motor vehicles' speed will be regulated by traffic controllers from outside the vehicle on all major roads at all times, with permanent limits set up at pinch points and black spots, and it is likely that a blanket limit, probably 20mph, will be enforced on all other roads by being the limiter's default.

The advantages will be that, as all traffic is travelling at the same speed, there will be less accidents, and, in heavily congested areas, journey times might actually improve, also fuel economy will improve.

Come the Glorious Day, brothers.......

rhext

Veronese68 wrote:

They have one of those shared space roads near me. It's a disaster. There is a 7' width restriction on a curve half way along the road. Cars race along the road, stop, crawl through the huge width restriction, then race off again. I was cycling along it with my kids in front of me a while ago. A car hit my arm with it's wing mirror as it rushed past and cut across the front of my kids to stop as the 3rd car at the give way lines here:
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=kt2+6ln&hl=en&ll=51.412732,-0.284494&spn=0.009984,0.01929&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=19.438227,39.506836&z=16&layer=c&cbll=51.412732,-0.284494&panoid=8XFOUYQKsAtS9VeBJ4i7Mw&cbp=12,357.29,,0,18.82
When I had a go at the bloke he told me I shouldn't be in the road. I told him to look at the signs and think again. I can't remember his exact words in reply. Unfortunately I was so angry that he had driven at me and my children I saw red and tried to rip his keys out of the ignition and throw them into a garden. We had a bit of a tussle. I told him if he ever came near my kids again there would be consequences.
That system doesn't work here as people don't know how to behave.

I think that if we had more shared spaces then people would become more used to using them, and some of these issues would abate.

I also think that there are some areas (esp high traffic areas) where shared space is simply a cop-out and a better solution would be to exclude cars altogether.

rhext

Veronese68 wrote:

They have one of those shared space roads near me. It's a disaster. There is a 7' width restriction on a curve half way along the road. Cars race along the road, stop, crawl through the huge width restriction, then race off again. I was cycling along it with my kids in front of me a while ago. A car hit my arm with it's wing mirror as it rushed past and cut across the front of my kids to stop as the 3rd car at the give way lines here:
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=kt2+6ln&hl=en&ll=51.412732,-0.284494&spn=0.009984,0.01929&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=19.438227,39.506836&z=16&layer=c&cbll=51.412732,-0.284494&panoid=8XFOUYQKsAtS9VeBJ4i7Mw&cbp=12,357.29,,0,18.82
When I had a go at the bloke he told me I shouldn't be in the road. I told him to look at the signs and think again. I can't remember his exact words in reply. Unfortunately I was so angry that he had driven at me and my children I saw red and tried to rip his keys out of the ignition and throw them into a garden. We had a bit of a tussle. I told him if he ever came near my kids again there would be consequences.
That system doesn't work here as people don't know how to behave.

I think that if we had more shared spaces then people would become more used to using them, and some of these issues would abate.

I also think that there are some areas (esp high traffic areas) where shared space is simply a cop-out and a better solution would be to exclude cars altogether.