Derbyshire has been following Worcestershire's lead in introducing county wide 50mph speed limits. Main roads with national speed limits -- thats 60mph -- are being restricted to 50mph. The labour controlled county claimed that this was being done to reduce accident statistics. To back up the speed limit reductions more mobile speed traps are being set up and Specs 3 avarage speed cameras are being deployed across the county.
So the question is... will the roads of Derbyshire be safer? The short answer is NO! Those that drive or ride with excess speed will continue to do so, but larger numbers of us road users will be at risk of exceeding the un-necessarily low new 50mph speed limit.
Police and the Road Safety Partnership have admitted that they are targetting riders of motorcycles in their selective choice of locations for speed traps. Why? These same riders bring millions of pounds in tourist revenue to the county and if they stay away then that's lost revenue and fewer targets for the "Safety cameras".
And when the manufacturers of cars and trucks build their cars to be most economical, fuel efficient and environmentally friendly at between 56mph and 62mph, then imposing a 50mph limit will hit us all in the pocket as we have to use more fuel to travel slower.
Includied in the upgrade to Spec 3 is an upgrade to make the sensors built into the road more sensitive in order to register motorcycle traffic, which also means that they will have no trouble registering HGV traffic and prosecuting them for exceeding the 40mph limit that applies to them but which they can get away with exceeding at the moment because the road sensors don't distinguish between them, cars or bikes.
Road pricing via the back door? The government says no! But then they have lied to us about everything else -- so if they can't be honset with their expenses claims why should we believe them on ANY other subject?
Will the fact that Labour has lost control of the county to the Tories after 28 years make a difference? You'd better hope it does?
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