Speed limit on motorways

[kwicky]

Should this be reduced to 62 mph? This will help the planet and at the same time cut fuel consumption.. Many motorists exceed the speed limit already but with overhead gantries measuring average speed it could be easily enforced.

Coaches and HGVs already have speed limiters set to about 62mph so could this should be extended in all transit vehicles and maybe in future to all vehicles?

[NORMANTHEDOG]

it should be raised not lowered

[888sally888]

I hope it stays at 70!!

[kempie]

Congestion, fuel consumption and "the planet" would be better served by removing from our roads the significant percentage of drivers who exhibit a driving ability far below the reasonable standard.

[andrea81]

You can't change the habit of motorists and unfortunatly if the speed limit is lowered to 62, there will be plenty of those who will speed and plenty who will cause accidents due to this. Think it's a dangerous plan!

Some of the most greenest countries in Europe have auntobans that have a higher speed limit that 70 and have far less fatalities!

[Dassie]

Remove the articulated and large lorries from the motorways and put freight back onto the railways. Then RAISE the limit to 85mph.

By the way, where do you get 62mph from ?? why not 63.75 ??

[kwicky]

Dassie as I said speed limiters are already fitted to coaches and HGVs so just an extension of this. Its quite normal today to travel the M25 at less than 60 mph as the western section is heavily controlled with speed cameras. The flow of traffic in this section improves the movement of vehicles greatly and should be extended.

[wduk2005]

It should be raised not lowered and an extra lane put on with lorrys only allowed in the 2 nearside, all this green stuff is a load of rubbish, have a good search about it and you'll see sume pretty compelling stuff that the planets been warming up before cars were even invented. As for the m25 i dont know as i do all i can to avoid that road but from my point of view on the m42 where there is cameras in every bridge you have to pay more attention to your speedo and how hard everyone is braking in front of you than you can to the road and it makes it 10 times more dangerous. As for average speed cameras yeah they do slow the traffic right down but havent you noticed how close all the cars are together, absolutely lethal as yet again everyone is watching their speedo

[sddsddean]

Trucks are actually limited to 90kph = 56mph. As for taking trucks off the road and putting the freight on rails.
1) My Tesco doesn't have a railhead.
2) If you doubled the amount of railfreight, you would only take about 5% of trucks off the road.
3) If you doubled the amount of railfreight, the whole rail network would collapse as there isn't that much capacity in the system due to the Beeching act and the fact that most goods yards now have homes built on them.
4) to resolve 3), no government will invest in the rail system.

Get used to it; this is how it has to be!

[Dassie]

kwicky.........The motorways are already choked with HGV's especially all these foreign ones we now see. What I'm saying is never mind about limiting their speed but get them out the way altogether and put the freight back onto the railways where it used to be. The motorways will then be less clogged and we could put the speed UP not down. Why do you want to reduce speed in this modern day and age? We'll all soon be back on horses !!! This helping the planet is overdone in my opinion. The world has been getting warmer for centuries now....does everyone forget we had an ice age once? It won't make one bit of difference in the overall picture.

[Dassie]

sd.....no it doesn't have to be this way because very soon the roads will become deadlocked just as you claim the railways would be.

On the railways many 4 track systems were reduced to 2 in use today. The trackbeds although overgrown are still there and lines should be replaced.

[sddsddean]

'Fraid not Dassie. Just so you know I used to be a Civil Engineer building roads etc and am now a truck driver (long story!) and my hobby is Industrial Archaeology. The vast majority of track in this country was single or twin. Only major lines are 4 track, and of those I don't know any that have been reduced to twin track. Although some trackbeds are still in existence, they are usually no where near complete. In urban areas they have been built on and in rural areas embankments have been levelled and cuttings filled in to make better use of the farmland. Another example; most of the old Great Central viaducts in the Midlands have been demolished for their blue engineering bricks. The lines could theoretically be rebuilt, but it isn't going to happen unless you want the Government to close down the NHS, Welfare State, Schools etc 'cos even that sort of budget wouldn't scratch the surface.

[kwicky]

As any professional driver knows the problem with traffic on the roads is the huge range of vehicle speeds. If one driver is doing 100mph and another doing 50 is when the problem occurs. Road planners are aware of this problem and so on busy stretches like the M25 greater flow is produced by lowering the speed limit and having a uniform procession which gets you there quicker without traffic jams. As our motorways are so jam packed. except during the late evening, it would make sense therefore to lower the speed limit to create this uniform flow..

[Toureman]

It should be raised not lowered, might keep the tree huggers off it then.

[markja]

if your name's kwicky. what the hell are you asking to have the speed limit lowered for????? you could get done under 'the names description act ' pal.
it should be raised to 120 then the plod would stop hassling me !

[jake-the-peg]

Because you get a lot more miles per gallon at 62 than 82 which means using less fuel for a given journey.

However I'm not convinced that it would make a significant difference to fuel consumption over the country as a whole.

I can't find the figure for how many miles driven are motorway miles but I have found that only 60% of people use a motorway at least once a month.

I suspect that the number of road miles driven at speeds above 62 is actually pretty small and that the savings on an environmental basis would be negligable

[Reverandfunk]

What about banning petrol guzzling 4 x 4's that serve no purpose whatsover

Think we should follow Germany with the autobahns

[kwicky]

Reality check:

1. New motorways are not being built
2. Vehicles are increasing at about 5% per year
3. The population is increasing
4. People are travelling further to their place of work than
few years ago
5. Public transport does not meet the mjority of peoples needs.

For a few selfish individuals who believe they have a god given right to disobey motoring laws and drive as they wish at the expense of the majority does not work. That is why there should be a concensus as to what speed is suitable for all of us and that means lower than the current motorway maximum.

[bazmoore]

dassie

i dont live anywhere near a railway so are you going to pick everything up i buy from the station for me?

get real

plus i ll be out of a job

[jake-the-peg]

I think I agree with all your 5 points kwicky

I do however fail to see how a reduction of 8mph in the speed limit will help.

It's easy to make a slight modification to the Rev's argument though.

We simply refuse to license any new car 4x4 or otherwise that cannot achieve say 30mpg on an urban cycyle