by
David Bramhall
This article does not necessarily express the views of the A140 Campaign
In response to public concern over accidents on the A140 in Suffolk, some eighteen months ago Suffolk County Council introduced an experimental 50 m.p.h. speed limit over the entire road, reduced to 30 m.p.h or 40 m.p.h. at some junctions and where there are houses. Very recently they have announced that these speed limits have been successful in reducing injuries and that the experimental period will be extended while they consider whether to make them permanent. Speed cameras have been placed at the notorious Coddenham junction, on Angel Hill near the junction with the A1120, and at Brome. While they invited (and ignored) objections when introducing the experimental limits, and have received (and ignored) even more since, they are not legally requred to invite objections before making them permanent. The Road Traffic Act allows local authorities this method of avoiding the advertisements, objections and public meetings that are required when imposing a new permanent speed limit.
• Many people believe that these limits are simply a palliative measure enabling Suffolk County Council to claim that they have taken action while spending only the bare minimum. They have a history of ignoring accident statistics when casualties go up (as they did in response to the dreadful carnage of 1996), while claiming the credit when they fall; eighteen months is not long enough for any valid conclusions to be drawn, and it is perfectly possible that any improvement in the accident figures in that period is within the normal statistical variation. At the Coddenham junction, it is not possible to say that the speed limit and the speed camera have cut accidents because the junction was significantly re-modelled at the same time - any improvement could well be due to a simpler junction with improved visibility (this is the only significant engineering improvement on the A140 in recent years).
• the new speed limits do not conform to government guidelines, which advise the use of the "85th percentile" calculation to establish what speed the average driver finds appropriate on that particular road, and suggest that any new speed limit should be within 10% of that figure. If it is not, they advise that many drivers will find it difficult to stay within the limit and their efforts to do so may result in them becoming distracted from watching the road ahead. Driver Inattention is the most frequent contributory factor in all accidents in the UK, and Excessive Speed is way down at number 7 on the list. In fact according to police figures nationwide, only 7.3% of accidents are caused by Excessive Speed, and less than 3% by Failing to Observe a Speed Limit. Of the 7.3% that are caused by Excessive Speed, almost a quarter occurred when the driver was still actually within the speed limit.
• therefore the new speed limits may actually be counterproductive in the long run, creating an extra source of distraction and causing drivers to pay more attention to their speedometers than to the road ahead. On a road where the accident figures are already tragically high, the County Council should be making every effort to help drivers concentrate on avoiding collisions - not giving them something else to demand their attention.
• the subjective judgement of many local residents is that the new speed limits are being widely ignored and cannot be effectively enforced by a rural police force that is already stretched beyond its resources - as a police spokesman admitted at a recent Campaign meeting, "we can't enforce every speed limit every day … we have to have a grading system …"
SCC's own figures show that speeds have been reduced by paltry amounts - the greatest being southbound at Mendlesham where they have fallen by 9 m.p.h. although SCC have ignored the fact that for part of the period in question there were roadworks along this stretch which is probably what caused the fall in vehicle speeds. In other places the drop is only between 2 and 5 m.p.h., while on one section average speeds have actually gone up.
A few drivers observe the limits - and at the cameras almost everyone does - but this simply encourages the formation of "convoys" led by the slowest vehicle, and can sometimes make it harder to pull out of side-turnings, thus increasing frustration and the likelihood that a few drivers will take more risks.
• contrary to the televised claims of Peter Monk, then County Council spokesman on public safety, journey times on the A140 have been increased by the new limits, to the extent that the journey from Coddenham to Diss is now some 15 minutes longer. This is causing some car drivers to use minor roads instead. When lorry drivers realise that there is a parallel route via the B1113 , some may use it to the detriment of village life along that road.
• the Suffolk Speed Camera Partnership and Suffolk County Council have claimed that the speed cameras and the speed limits have cut accidents, though it is difficult to access figures that either prove or disprove their claim. We have been able to find figures showing that, at fixed speed camera sites at least, their claim is not true at all. At the three fixed camera sites on the A140 (Coddenham, Stonham and Brome) there was only one KSI accident (an accident in which someone is killed or seriously injured) in 2002. In the portion of 2003 before the cameras were installed there were none. Nor were there any in 2003 after the cameras began working. In 2004 there was one - so far from being a decrease in accidents, between 2003 and 2004 there was a 100% increase! Both the accidents in question were at the Brome camera, which begs the question whether the other two were actually necessary, as the last time there was a KSI accident at either of them was four years ago.
• As reported in June 2005, there have been many letters written to Suffolk County Council (including some from local Parish Councils) objecting to the new speed limits, and only four in favour. You can see SCC's account of these letters by clicking the button below. Suffolk County Council intend to ignore these objections because "Committee members did not accept that objectors had made a case to show that the temporary speed limit had made the road unsafe but rather that they had clearly illustrated that bad driver behaviour was a major contributory factor in accidents". This patronising attitude fails to recognise that it is not the objectors' duty to show that the speed limits have made the road unsafe, but SCC's duty to show that they have made it safer. Just disclaiming responsibility and blaming bad drivers is not good enough.
The speed limits are, at best, a weak palliative measure designed to deflect criticism from the County Council at minimum cost. At worst, they could prove to be dangerous. They have been introduced by a sleight-of-hand (perfectly legal, unfortunately), using the experimental/permanent device to avoid the need for proper public consultation. No public consultation is required before imposing an experimental limit, and none is required to turn it into a permanent one at the end of the experimental period. The people of Suffolk deserve better than this. At the very least they deserve a voice on the subject. It's their husbands, wives, sons and daughters who are dying on the A140.
Copyright © 2005 David Bramhall
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