VILLAGE SPEED LIMITS

HC Deb 25 May 1973 vol 857 cc941-50

3.32 p.m.

Mr. David Madel (Bedfordshire, South)

This debate which I am initiating on village speed limits of 30 m.p.h. is very much a second round for me, because last November I had a debate on traffic conditions in South Bedfordshire, and the speed limit required and wanted by many villagers of 30 m.p.h. played a big part in that debate.

On that occasion my hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Mr. Speed) answered the debate. I know that he is familiar with the problems of Bedfordshire, but I understand that he is abroad on a departmental visit, and I, therefore, welcome my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hall Green (Mr. Eyre), another Under-Secretary, who I hope will be able to assuage the anxieties of my constituents.

The ability to put in a 30 m.p.h. village speed limit depends on general road conditions surrounding the village and what is happening in towns near that village. Before I go to the criteria and specific village problems, I should like the Minister to be aware of something that is relevant to this matter, and that is that the Luton-Dunstable and Houghton Regis Transportation Study is looking into traffic conditions in my area, including village speed limits, and is possibly considering an inner ring road in Dunstable.

I know that the Department cannot answer fully any questions about the future of such a proposal. My hon. Friend the Member for Meriden said at column 1161 in reply to the earlier debate on 8th November 1972 that until this study group had finished its work no decisions could be taken about the Dunstable road. My hon. Friend may be able to help. Bearing in mind the Government's order that there should be a £600 million reduction on road expenditure by local authorities, to me it would make sense if that committee were no longer to consider any form of inner ring road. The matter is far too controversial. It is causing tremendous uproar in the town and, bearing in mind the environmental and economic considerations, I urge that this proposal should no longer be considered by the committee.

I think that one must first look at the current criteria for determining 30 mph village speed limits. I have here the Department's circular on roads of 1969, annexe B, paragraph 9 of which says: For villages on trunk and principal roads where a 30 mph limit would not be appropriate or enforceable, 40 mph limits may be imposed, provided that most criteria for a 40 mph limit are met. In such cases some latitude may be allowed over the speed criterion but if 85 per centile speeds are much above 50 mph a limit of 50 mph should be considered in preference to one of 40 mph. For limits of this kind, the development need not be in depth but it should extend throughout the length of the village and cover more than 50 per cent. of the frontages to the road. The advice in paragraph 4(a)(iii) is particularly relevant in the case of speed limits in villages. When we turn to that we find: Speed limits should not be imposed where the character of the road itself limits the speed of most vehicles (say 95 per cent.) to a level at or below that of the limit under consideration. That was in 1969. Earlier this year, 1973, the Government issued a circular updating the 1969 circular. It is dated 26th March. Paragraph 9 on villages says: Limits are often proposed in villages where the alignment is tortuous and most vehicles are already travelling at low speeds. In such cases, unless there is an accident problem which seems to be associated with speed, a limit will merely lead to unnecessary signs. I do not know what that means—" unnecessary signs". I do not believe we can have too many signs in villages warning people of what the speed limit is. One of the arguments about enforcement is the shortage of police. Constant reminders by signs to people driving into villages that 30 mph or 40 mph is the limit can often be a substitute for a police car or police presence. Therefore. I would quarrel straight away with that point.

In the earlier debate I referred to four villages in my constituency which, in my view, ought to qualify for the 30 mph limit although they have been told that because of these criteria they do not qualify. First of all, there is the village of Totternhoe. Paragraph 9 of the 1973 circular is relevant here. That is the one which says: Limits are often proposed in villages where the alignment is tortuous and most vehicles are already travelling at low speeds. If one is saying that roads are tortuous and bending, in Totternhoe they are; it is quite true. Nevertheless, there is only a 40 mph limit. There is anxiety in the village. The nature of the road would indicate that people should drive at 30 mph. It is no great hardship that they travel at 30 mph. There is the added reason that with the heavy lorry vehicle testing site nearby at Stanbridge one finds many lorries going through Totternhoe to be tested and they go at 40 mph quite legally though they ought to go at 30 mph. Bearing in mind that paragraph 9 about roads being tortuous, that is something which could be looked at again.

Then there is the village of Hockliffe on the A5, a very straight road, and it might be thought that to impose a limit of 30 mph there would lead to people disregarding it. In the criteria which I have quoted mention is made of the need for speed limits to be realistic, but the fact is that there is a lot of traffic going through Hockliffe which ought to be on the M1, because it is going en route on a north-west industrial corridor. This country spent millions of pounds of taxpayers' money to build the motorways to get the traffic out of the villages and off roads which have become manifestly overloaded. That is what Hockliffe is. It is overloaded on the A5, and it is the conditions and the view of the villagers there which ought to come first.

At Slip End, again, there has been a battle for over 10 years to get a 30 mph limit imposed. There is nothing imposed there at all. It is amazing that there is still no speed limit in that village. Bedford- shire County Council has done a survey of it and has made a film of it, and there have been intensive discussions, but apparently it was not thought that it met the criteria. I get the impression, and many of my constituents get the impression, that a lot of buck passing is going on; we appear to be going round in circles between county hall and the Department of the Environment.

The fourth village which I mentioned in November and for which nothing has been done is East Hyde, which is wedged close to Luton. Many people travel through the village en route to work in Hertfordshire, and there is no reason why a 30 mph limit should not be imposed.

To go back to the 1973 circular which contains the criteria and says what the Department expects local authorities to do, paragraph 6 reads: The Department therefore urges those local authorities who have not set in train a radical review of their limits to do so without further delay, and those who have already taken action to ensure that the impetus of their programmes is maintained. I hope that Bedfordshire has done so. Careful attention should be given to the villages I have mentioned.

Paragraph 1 of the 1969 circular reads: The purpose of speed limits is to reduce the speed of vehicles to a level at which drivers can more readily meet the general dangers to be expected on a road. Paragraph 4(a)(i) reads: The effectiveness of speed limits in controlling speeds depends both upon the readiness of drivers to obey them and upon police supervision. It is thus of primary importance that each speed limit should be accepted by drivers as a reasonable restriction which is justified by conditions on the road. I agree that much depends on effective police supervision, but where there is no effective police supervision the 30 mph limit would be obeyed if more signs were displayed.

What should be the alterations to these criteria? First, both county and Government should pay great attention to the wishes of the parish or village council. The villagers have better evidence than anyone else whether their village can or cannot sustain speeds above 30 mph.

We should look next at the nature of the village. Is it near a large town? If it is, naturally there will be more traffic. If it is near a large town which manufactures cars and trucks, it is in a different category, and this applies to my villages in South Bedfordshire. Do a great many commuters go through the village? Is the population increasing? One sometimes thinks of a village as a dreamy, rural backwater with a static population. That is not so in Bedfordshire, where the population of every village is growing because of the overspill that the county is taking and because of the expansion of local industry.

Is it feasable to build a bypass round the village so that some of the traffic is taken away from it? It is manifestly not feasible to build bypasses round the villages I have mentioned in South Bedfordshire. The land situation is such that it is impossible to set aside land for bypasses.

Does heavy lorry traffic go through the village? Where that happens, the mothers of young children who have to cross the road to go to school are particularly concerned. In Slip End children have to cross busy roads to go to school. A great many lorries go through the village because it contains a park for Vauxhall lorries which are turned out of the factory and are awaiting export. Bearing in mind those questions which I have posed, it will be seen that it is possible to change the criteria.

To go back again to the 1969 circular, paragraph 4(a)(i) reads: It is thus of primary importance that each speed limit should be accepted by drivers as a reasonable restriction which is justified by conditions on the road. I think that drivers would regard a 30 mph restriction as reasonable.

In talking about the enforcement of speed limits, we must bear in mind what is done on the motorways. I am not opposed to the 70 mph limit, although I think it might be altered in some areas. We expect our county police to spend a lot of time making sure that the 70 mph limit is obeyed. They will be there this afternoon as traffic pours out of London on the M1. I hope that we have not arrived at the position where the police supervision of speed limits on the M1 takes precedence over police supervision of speed limits in our villages. I hope the argument is not used that a 30 mph speed limit cannot be imposed in a particular village because the police are so tied up with enforcing the 70 mph limit on the motorways. In other words, we must not pay attention to motorway speed limits at the expense of what villagers want.

What I should like to happen now in our area, after my very long battle with the Department on this matter, is the regional controller for traffic in Bedfordshire visiting the villages that I have mentioned, having intensive talks with the parish and village councils, and possibly having an open meeting and hearing for himself what the worries are and why it is that an overwhelming majority of these villagers want a 30 mph limit imposed. The county of Bedford is very conversant with the facts and has made a film of traffic conditions in Slip End. It has recently conducted a survey at Hockliffe. The regional controller plays a part in these matters. I hope that, as the linchpin in the link between the county and the Government for Bedfordshire, he will be able to set aside time for this.

In view of the £600 million cut in Government expenditure, not only on new road building but on repairs, it surely makes sense to have speed limits imposed now, because where traffic is travelling too fast it will wear out roads that much more quickly. I hope that we shall not reach the situation where it will be said that roads would not have fallen into disrepair but for vehicles travelling too fast. It would make sense for the limits to be looked at now, because the Government are anxious to save money on the cost of repairing roads. That is another reason for imposing these 30 mph limits.

I am grateful for this round 2 in my struggle to try to get these limits imposed. It is not an unreasonable request by villagers and it is not harsh on drivers to impose a 30 mph limit. We are in this unique situation in Bedfordshire because the villages are so close to towns and because we have an abnormally large amount of traffic of all types travelling through our villages.

Therefore, I hope that we can have this further consultation. I hope that there will be no more suggestions that proposals do not meet certain criteria, after which the matter is put to the Department, which says that it is for the county to impose.

Many people in my constituency are getting into a whirl over who is responsible for imposing these limits. It is a fair and reasonable request from these villagers that 30 mph should be the limit. People request this not for irrational reasons but because they are fearful of the traffic conditions and worried about their young children and about how the traffic will increase in the future, and because they are conscious that their villages are increasing in size, which will mean more people and children who could be at risk.

3.47 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Reginald Eyre)

With the leave of the House, I should like to speak for a second time and to reply to this debate.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bedfordshire, South (Mr. Madel), who is a most diligent champion of the rights and interests of his constituents, has raised a number of points about fast traffic through villages. I appreciate his concern with the problem, which, of course, arises not only in South Bedfordshire but in villages throughout the country.

I would first make clear the relationship between my Department and the local authorities in the matter of speed limits. For all roads except motorways and trunk roads the local authority is responsible for orders imposing or varying speed limits, but for principal roads such orders need my right hon. and learned Friend's consent. In addition, my right hon. and learned Friend has certain reserve powers. For motorways and trunk roads responsibility lies entirely with my right hon. and learned Friend.

The problem which every highway authority has to face, not only in this country but throughout the world, is that, whilst speed limits have an important contribution to make to both road safety and amenity, this contribution is very severely governed by the law of diminishing returns and can indeed be completely nullified if speed limits are applied so liberally or indiscriminately that they lose the respect of drivers.

My hon. Friend has spoken of villagers' desire for limits that are properly enforced, but it is an inescapable fact, which hon. Members will no doubt recognise from their own experience, that limits which do not command the respect of drivers are not observed and enforce- ment is impossible: the police simply cannot be everywhere all the time. The result of a proliferation of unrealistic and unenforceable speed limits is—again, all experience confirms this—to debase all speed limits.

What my Department has done, therefore, is to issue advice to local authorities on the criteria for the application of speed limits at the various levels. By this means a consistent pattern of limits should be maintained throughout the country which commands the general respect of drivers and hence makes the maximum contribution to road safety. I say "should be", because, although the present criteria are of many years standing, a great many unrealistic limits are still in evidence, as any journey through town or countryside will confirm.

What the criteria aim to do is, first, to identify those stretches of road which are particularly dangerous and where, therefore, a speed limit should be considered, and, second, to determine its level. The most important elements of the criteria are, therefore, the accident record of the road and the prevailing speed of the traffic. Account is also taken of the nature of the road, of the traffic and of the environment, as drivers will respect a speed limit only if it makes sense in the light of these factors.

My hon. Friend has argued that the criteria do not take account of the special nature of villages: for instance, that they do not recognise the problems of heavy lorries thundering along village streets. Let me say at once that this problem is very much and continuously on our minds. My hon. Friend, who has, I know, studied the circulars carefully, as his summary proved, will have noticed that local authorities are specifically advised to give some latitude to proposals for 40 mph limits in villages. However, drivers associate 30 mph limits with urban conditions, and such a limit is seldom realistic in a village. However much one sympathises with the local residents, it is impossible to ignore the fact that 30 mph limits applied in inappropriate places are ignored; their value is purely illusory and they debase the currency of speed limits as a whole.

My hon. Friend is concerned in particular with the advice that speed limits should not be imposed where the speed of, say, 95 per cent. of the traffic is physically limited by the nature of the road. He argues that in villages such as Slip End much of the traffic is, in fact, going too fast for the road. Taking Slip End as an example, the fact is that the 85 percentile speed—that is, the speed within which 85 per cent. of free-flowing cars travel—is a little over 38 mph. I am afraid that this is just the sort of case where a 30 mph limit would be unrealistic: it would be so widely disregarded that it would be quite unenforceable and would bring the whole system into contempt.

My hon. Friend is concerned about recent accidents in Slip End and other villages. I fully appreciate this. Unfortunately—we all regret this—accidents happen on every road; I would remind the House that last year nearly 8,000 people were killed and 350,000 injured on our roads. We all deeply deplore this toll. But, again, if speed limits are to retain their value they must be confined to those stretches of road that are more than usually dangerous, and I have to say to my hon. Friend that the record for Slip End, however much each individual accident is to be deplored, is not, by national standards, an especially bad one. Moreover, from the information in the Department's possession it is not at all certain that excessive speed was a factor in these accidents.

Turning to the other villages with which my hon. Friend is concerned at Heath and Reach there is a 30 m.p.h. limit which has recently been extended. Any further extension would be unrealistic. Hockliffe and Totternhoe have 40 m.p.h. limits, and at Hyde the limit is 70 m.p.h. Speaking more generally, I can assure my hon. Friend that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment will be looking again at the advice given to local authorities to see whether any additional guidance can usefully be given on the application of the criteria to villages. The problems of villages are seldom clear-cut—it is usually a case of balancing conflicting considerations—but my hon. Friend will be looking to see if there is anything more that we can say to help local authorities apply the policy to them.

My hon. Friend asked about the proposals for an inner ring road at Dunstable. I can, I am afraid, add little today to what the Under-Secretary told him on 8th November last. No proposal for such a road has yet been put to the Department. If and when it is—and I hope this will give some assurance to my hon. Friend—it will, of course, be considered in the light of all the factors, including the views of the local people and the financial position.

Returning to the main question of speed limits, I hope that what I have said will reassure my hon. Friend that my Department is fully alive to the problems of traffic through villages. Speed limits are a valuable element in road safety, in villages as elsewhere; but they are at best of times a blunt instrument; they are easily debased by over-use and they are not a panacea for all the hazards of the road.

The advice of my Department on road safety problems is always available to local authorities, to help them consider not only speed limits but the whole range of other safety measures any one of which, or any combination of which, may be equally or more relevant to the problems of a particular locality.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this subject again. It is right that we in this House should spare the time to consider the very real problems of people in rural areas confronted with traffic problems of a new and increasing severity, even if the complication of circumstances does not allow agreement on the right measures to be undertaken.