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ON FRIDAY, DUBLIN City Council extended the 30km/hr speed limit in the city to residential areas and in the vicinity of schools.
Councillor Ciarán Cuffe said that “lower speed limits mean safer and streets and calmer communities” and that “these measures will save lives”.
The council said its research showed that lowering the speed limits in residential urban areas would have a positive impact on road safety and would help to reduce the number of fatal crashes.
So, today we’re asking you: Do you support a 30km speed limit in residential areas?
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Of course 66% are in favour. How many of those people will stick to this limit though?
@John D: yeah I don’t think people will observe this speed. I think 40 would be more realistic.
@John D: and how would it be enforced? Traffic calming is a fa better move
@Deborah Behan: Why 40? 30kph is proven and tested all over the continent as bringing down the road deaths, which are ridiculously high in Ireland
@Larissa Caroline Nikolaus: most road fatalities happen on badly maintained and policed country roads not residential areas in Dublin
@John D: it is physically impossible to stick to this speed. Think of rows of cars travelling around in third gear. If everyone obeyed this limit the city the city would grind to a halt. It would be better if they enforced the current limits. I have never seen a speed check in a residential area.
@Euro is Dead: over the weekend I drove to wexford and back and not one garda motorised or otherwise did I see….
@Euro is Dead: there was a speed van on baggot st yesterday afternoon.
@Larissa Caroline Nikolaus: Ridiculously high? Road deaths from people speeding in urban areas? Maybe from speeding and alcohol on more rural roads but I think you very rarely see fatal accidents on urban roads.
The engine will be at a higher revs at 30 kph, resulting in more CO2 emissions and higher fuel consumption. 50 is good enough in public street, residential areas is another matter, 30kph is fair, but the issue is the speed limit within the city.
@Tony Canning: Traffic Calming is for people who do not possess the skills to drive at or below the speed limits. More emphasis needs to be placed on Advanced Driving skills and rewards by insurance companies for achieving qualifications such as a RoSpa or Advanced Motorist qualification.
@John Cassidy: Tell that to the cyclists who died over the last couple of weeks
@Lurfic: but Baggot Street isn’t a residential area. I have never seen a speed van in a housing estate
@Deborah Behan: Ok but don’t try doing 40 kph if you visit my estate where 6in speed ramps have reduced drivers speed down to less than walking pace, you might need to renew your broken suspension on a daily basis.
@David Conroy: If everyone posessed such skills we wouldn’t need to even have this conversation.
@Larissa Caroline Nikolaus: Ridiculously high?
I was speaking to a former Paramedic from South Africa who told me that our yearly number of road fatalities is around the same as their easter Bank holiday weekend!
Nope. I do support planners doing their job by designing speed limiting features rather than the lazy fallback of unenforceable speed limits.
@Tony Canning: It seems their idea of speeding limiting cars is making it too painful to want to drive at all… They could actually implement tried and tested traffic control methods but that would make too much sense and not grab as many headlines.
At 30km you get passed out by cyclists. Tried it this morning – spent 80% of the time checking the speedo keeping the car slow.
@Tammy Taylor: what were you up to the other 20% of the time?
@Paddy O’Brien: Watching the road for speeding kids.
@Tammy Taylor: meaning? I see your view but not every kid early 20s are thinking their racing on the top gear test track. I’m sensible. Passed my driving test 2nd time. No penalty points. No claims, yet I’m paying huge money for insurance?
Watch your speed, not the road…
It’s a revenue generating exercise. Will be like shooting fish in a barrel. It’s not about kids and is never about road safety.
@Yenreit: It’s only a revenue generating exercise when there is proper enforcement, which there isn’t.
A better and more effective response would be, teaching the green cross code to children and the generation of adults who seem to have missed out on that common sense information.
Teaching them personal responsibility and equiping them, with the skills for self preservation and safe road use by pedestrians.
@David Van-Standen: So place the burden of road safety onto the most vulnerable, perhaps make them wear high vis in day time and a flashing red light on there heads?
No, a better more effective response would be that motor vehicle drivers slow down, put down the phone, drive at a speed they can safely stop from, obey traffic signs and signals, and not only in residential areas…
@David Van-Standen: All the people who grew up in the 80s were taught the Safe Cross Code; yet the people in this age group are constantly running out in front of traffic and ignoring traffic lights. So no, the Safe Cross Code is NOT effective
@Dub_Right: That exactly right!
If I go walking during the day or evening on a country road, I wear a high visibility vest, because as a driver I also know that it can be sometimes very difficult to see pedestrians without a high visibility vest.
Yes, the burden of responsibility is mine also, it make no sense to rely on others for my own personal safety, when I am capable of doing so myself, I also step off the road and onto the verge if the road is narrow as a further precaution, being technically in the right, because you have the right of way, does you little good if you are dead.
Also regardless of the speed limit, pedestrians walking or running into the road without looking or no regard for their own safety is still a problem which needs to be addressed.
Fair enough if in housing estate, I definitely think we already take care driving through them but there are some who take the pistachio’s
In a responsible mature society drivers should be able to drive according to prevailing conditions. Sadly there are too many idiots and ignorant rat runners on our roads, so we have to legislate the system to the lowest common denominator. I look forward to driverless cars, when we take the humans out of driving.
@Virtual Donal:
I think you are the idiot with that comment. So if the prevailing conditions suggest 60km and there was a child you were not aware of that should have been at school and runs out in front of you are and you kill the child is that the child’s fault?
@Nick Allen: you do know that “prevailing conditions” isn’t just limited to the weather right?
@Nick Allen: simple answer yes, everyone should be responsible for their own safety and not expecting everyone else to do it for them, this includes drivers, cyclists and all road users no one single group should be held responsible for everyone else`s safety….
@Tony Canning: Nick is a bit slow. He thinks “prevailing conditions” means the weather.
I think it’s the word “prevailing” that threw him – he’s confusing it with “prevailing winds”. Poor sod.
As someone who lives in an urban area I would love this. I have a young family and constantly anxious over the speed some drivers go. It doesn’t make that much of a difference to your life to slow down.
@Ivana tinkle: if they can’t obey the speed limits that are there already, they’re hardly going to obey a 30km/h speed limit.
I support the 30kph limit in housing estates and outside schools, places where it actually makes sense.
I don’t support it in Dublin city centre or in ridiculously stupid places like the N3 link road to the M50 where’s it’s physically dangerous to obey that limit as far as I’m concerned.
How is it “physically dangerous” to achieve a speed? It’s the same as filling up with an exact amount of petrol. A small test of skill.
@Fiona Fitzgerald: Because if you drive at 30kph some idiot is likely to rear end you, it’s not a practical limit. Try keeping the 50 or 60km speed limit coming out of Monasterevin on the Portlaoise side…you’ll be overtaken on a continuous white line and hatch markings by everything behind you. The speed limit is ridiculously slow.
I support these if they were enforceable and with proper street design!
Sadly the 50kph limit on various city roads are routinely ignored, I know this when I drive at 50kph and passed at speed(usually by someone in the bus lane).
The facts are that at 30kph the stopping distance of a vehicle is 3 car lengths, if you’re doing the current limit in some residential areas then double that to 6 car lengths.
A vehicle travelling at 30km/h would stop in time to avoid a child running out three car-lengths in front. The same vehicle travelling at 40km/h would not be able to stop in time, and would hit the child at 29km/h. This is roughly the same impact as a child falling from an upstairs window
No.But I do support sacking all them reprobates in Dublin City council a shower off arse holes.
The Gardai cannot police the speed limit we have at the moment. Let them get their house in order first
When going through Dublin city centre it should be 30kph. Pedestrians have now taken to standing right on the edge of the path ignoring the curb markers to stand back. Don’t know when it started but it is crazy. I saw a pedestrian hit by a bus wing mirror the other day and it was completely their fault for standing so close to the road
I have a gew comments.that aren’t necessarily related :
1) Why not do something like in France – the residential speed limit is 50 but is reduced to 30 around schools, parks and other areas where there are children or large groups.
2) As only a few people seem to stick to the spped limits, why bother changing them, it may as well be 10 or 40 or 50…
@David Stapleton: Regarding your second point, why not just properly enforce the speed limits, and introduce a staggered penalty system, instead of just a fixed fine for no matter how much you’re over the limit.
@David Stapleton: opps sorry, stupid as it may seem, I forgot point 3), which relates to what the limit could be, and that is – why change it to 30, it may as well be 200 for all the good it will do if there is no correct policing of speed limits.
@Larissa Caroline Nikolaus: I completely agree, see my last comment though. There is no real point in changing the limit if there is, essentially, no enforcement.
Here’s the problem, our money grabbing est will only police the limit not the moron driving on your bumper because you’re going slow
@BERTIE: The trick for not to give them money is to obey the speed limit
For car drivers the message is SLOW DOWN and SAVE LIVES! More than 1/3 of road deaths are speed related. 30kph will hopefully make for safer and more pleasant neighbourhoods with less traffic noise!
@Colm Ryder: Are they really thoguh?
Buses and white van drivers seem to be the worst for breaking the speeding laws.
@Scundered: Ah, you are forgetting the number 1 lawbreakers on the roads: Taxi’s!
Speeding, stopping without notice in the road, illegal parking….
@Dub_Right: I agree taxi drivers are the worst offenders for breaking the rules of the road especially the speed limit
@PVD: No, mechanically propelled vehicles only. Sprinting cyclists and galloping horses are fine.
I can’t believe the majority said no! How is this even a poll?! Children have no sense and can run out in a split second. It’s a no brainer, anyone with young kids would back this.
@Helen O’Neill: because we have a car addiction problem in Dublin.
@Helen O’Neill: I agree with you. Kids don’t think logically when they kick a ball in front of a car and don’t look, if the driver is able to anticipate well done, but unfortunately a lot of these young kids in their early 20s can’t anticipate, may I also say that some mothers and fathers don’t keep a eye on their child if they are out playing with friends and that’s the issue I’m having. Good day
I support it not for the immediate lives it will save but anything that reduces traffic entering the city is brilliant. Roads are clogged in peak times with unnecessary traffic. Our Health will undoubtedly suffer if we don’t become more active. We need Uber Lyft and other ridesharing services and tax cars off roads in the city. My blog. http://www.transportrevolution.org
@Cyril Butler: I tried to visit your blog but the smug blocker app on my browser stopped me
@Cyril Butler: I read it. Agree with much of it.
Not sure how you expect commuters to get to work while the improved public transport systems are planning how to expand their services. Have you not got it reversed? Improve public transport first, that way the alternatives are in place to switch to.
BTW the NTA already have a website https://www.carsharing.ie
@Fiona Fitzgerald: No use putting extra buses on many routes during peak traffic as the roads are a carpark. The 38 bus grinds to a halt between 5&6 pm on Navan Rd. We should immediately change the taxi laws to accommodate extra people. New Yorkers and elsewhere use Uber and Lyft and others. Many are already abandoning the car. This would take up the immediate excess.
Secondly the govt won’t give money to public transport until they see an increased demand.
Its a half assed measure… DCC man up! Ban private cars from the city centre completely! Encourage walking , cycling, public transport.
No speed limit is going to give bad drivers common sense. Have no common sense to drive safely? don’t get behind the wheel.
The Gardai drove up behind me and stopped me once for doing 67 on a 60 zone, right off a motorway and nowhere near a residential area; not even people in miles. This just gives them another excuse to harass drivers and hand out fines and penalty points.
@Marcus Tullius Cicero: some guards are like that, don’t take it personally. There just doing their job
Hopefully this measure will help reduce injuries. With every horror story of a child getting hit by a car it normally starts with ” child get knocked down after running out between two parked cars”. If drivers can’t see what’s happening on the pavement because there line of sight is blocked accidents can still happen but at a lower rate of speed. Every estate has a parking problem even along archery roads. In many cases removing a front garden would allow for two parking away from the pavement. leaving any driver free to reach to any dangers on pavements. I free this measure will help but only when issues with parked cars are addressed we will still have tragedies no family deserves.
@leartius: I have never actually seen a report of an accident say a child ran out between two parked cars. Driver was speeding I have certainly seen.
@Kal Ipers: yes it`s so much easier to blame the driver….
Ffs . Why don’t we just go back to horse and carts. It’s getting ridiculous.
I do but the Gardaí don’t seemed bothered by drivers ignoring speed limits in built up areas
@Aidan Cuffe: it’s needed until we have proper infrastructure for pedestrian and cycling traffic. A 50km/h speed limit on a street with painted on cycle paths is too big a differential, you need full segregation on those roads in that case. If the DCC took forms of transport other than cars seriously, then you could designate 50km/h routes through town and keep smaller streets at 30km/h, however every time it’s suggested, car owners start throwing their toys out of the pram. We’ve had 5 cyclists die this year already, something needs to be done.
@Colin McGovern: a lot of those cyclists are dead because of their own stupidity. I’m not disrespecting them but unfortunately I see it every day
Its in Laois since last year. However very few head to hit and never seen Gardai pull a car for it
When will we ever see the REAL statistics on road fatalities?? How many people were killed or injured and WHERE exactly.
Im sure we will find most of them are in the same places and its not related to speed/drinking/smoking/playing with phones/doing makeup etc
Another stupid poll. In these residential areas does it mean, all roads, some roads, main roads ie Mourne Rd in Drimnagh?
@Shawn Rahoon: Looks to be just about every road in Drimnagh / Crumlin. No limits in Rathmines / Ranelagh etc hmmm.
30kph speed limit in residential areas for petrol cars
50kph for diesel cars to get them off the streets asap with their black soot and toxic NOx fumes.
Diesel Soot Polluters should be asked to pay the high annual Motor Tax not us pre-2008 petrol car owners
https://www.change.org/p/unfair-car-tax-law
They have turned Dublin into a complete dump. One of the worst cities in the world. People like this fool Cuffe have been trying to change Dublin into a cyclists paradise.
Hopefully we get a tax on bicycles to pay fir all this crap.
They do what they want with it because I won’t be going anywhere near the city.
There is absolutely a need for something like this, but where and how is all wrong. You’d swear these people weren’t doing this as a career who make these decisions.
Asking for 30 around Dublin City Centre is tough, but it’s a highly volumous area of people. So I understand “sort of” where it’s coming from, but the city centre is a business district essentially, not a residential. Traffic calming like islands and ramps would be far more effective in ACTUALLY slowing people down at critical points and if ramps existed before pedestrian crossings, you would have cars having to slow to 10-15 as the come through an area people might be crossing.
The limit around the quays should be 50 with ramps enforcing at natural pedestrian crossing areas.
With Residential area’s around schools and where kids could be living/playing. I thought 30 was the limit anyway?
So apart from fining drivers on Dublin’s quays…. what is this achieving?
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