Guidance on Speed Limits to Give Local Authorities Greater Flexibility

Guidance published for consultation to give UK regions more flexibility in implementing 20mph speed limits in urban areas.

Britain’s Road Safety Minister has launched new guidelines to provide local government with the ability to take action to improve road safety in their regions by selectively implementing 20mph speed limits in a more flexible way.

Currently, the introduction of 20mph (32kph) speed limits is difficult to achieve and is not covered by specific legislation since the standard minimum enforced urban speed limit in the UK is 30mph (48kph). In order to introduce a 20mph zone, the local authorities must judge the site against many different criteria.

Although it is possible to introduce 20mph zones, the policies and implementation are inconsistent across the nation.

Therefore, the government has provided guidance that local authorities can use in order to make the most of recent changes that have increased flexibility and to improve consistency of implementation.

To accompany the guidance, a web assessment tool is also being made available to allow impact assessments to be made so that local authorities have full knowledge of the consequences of introducing lower speed limits through the use of available tools and systems.

Mike Penning, the UK’s Road Safety Minister commented that it is the local authorities rather than central government who are in the best position to assess local needs for reduced speed limits and the purpose of the guidance and web tool is to make that task easier for them to achieve by using an evidence based approach.

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20mph, DSA, Government, Legislation, road construction, Speeding, UK

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