Press Release
By Glenn Secco
March 14, 2006
In
response to the WA Office of Road Safety’s proposal to limit
the speed to 30kph in built up areas and 90kph on dual carriageway
roads.
ADRA supports practical, effective
and fair measures that contribute to real road safety improvements.
In a city the size of Perth and a state the size of WA these proposed
limits are totally impractical. It would just frustrate drivers and
raise millions more in speeding fines.
Perth roads do not resemble
the narrow and congested roads of London, Paris or Rome and our vast
regional areas are far less populous than those of Europe. A comparison
of speed limits is therefore unreasonable.
The presumption that speed is
the primary killer cannot always be justified. It has been determined
in overseas studies that driver inattention is more often the problem.
Simply changing speed limits isn’t the answer, and we’re
concerned that there is already an over-emphasis on punitive measures
that just result in more WA drivers being fined.
Safer pedestrian crossings,
improved driver training and skills, more logical speed zones, road
treatments that alert drivers to speed zone changes, and new intelligent
technology solutions are just a few measures that would make a real
difference to road safety.
A much more practical and considered
response is called for and it is worth investigating the establishment
of a new Independent Task Force (the last one was established in 1998)
to inquire into and report on new, innovative and practical solutions
rather than just fining drivers.
And it is now time to consider
the wisdom of funding the Office of Road Safety primarily through
revenue raised from speeding fines.
Glenn Secco
President
ADRA
Extract from the
West Australian.
The head of the State Government's
road safety watchdog says the speed limit on any WA roads where there
is the chance of a car hitting a pedestrian should drop to 30kmh.
“Our speed limits in Australia
are comparatively very high compared with Europe and the US,”
Office of Road Safety executive director Iain Cameron said.
Yesterday, Mr Cameron announced
a package of radical measures which he said WA should consider if
it was serious about reducing death or injury on the roads.
It includes a 30kmh speed limit
on quiet residential roads or any road where there was a chance a
car could hit a pedestrian.
“Above that speed a pedestrian
is struggling to survive if they are hit,” Mr Cameron said.
Limits for major distributor
roads and roads where there was the chance one car could hit another
side-on could be 50kmh.
Fringe single-lane roads on
the outskirts of cities where cars could collide head-on could have
a 70kmh limit and for single-lane roads outside cities which were
not dual carriageways or divided by median strips, the limit could
be 90kmh.
“It is a question of how
bold we want to be,” Mr Cameron said. “People make mistakes
on the road. We need to put a road environment in place which is more
forgiving of driver error.”
Mr Cameron recently returned
from studying traffic conditions in Europe.
