Unnecessary speed focus is hindering couriers
Date: 28 September 2007
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The Department for Transport (DfT) is focusing too much on vehicle speed as a means of improving road safety.
Excessive speed restrictions in the UK often hinder the work done by couriers, who are frequently forced to unnecessarily slow down in safe conditions.
Now road safety group Safe Speed says the DfT is missing the point, pointing out that only three per cent of cars involved in accidents were thought to be exceeding the speed limit, while travelling too fast for conditions was attributed to six per cent.
As well as this, breaking the speed limit was not a contributory factor in 98 per cent of crashes involving drivers over the age of 25. This clearly indicates that the restrictive and, yes, draconian, measures such as speed cameras and multiple speed limits could safely be removed and make life easier for couriers and other freight haulage drivers.
Safe Speed points out that, even in those cases where crashes do involve breaking the speed limit, the accident is frequently also caused by other factors such as reckless behaviour or bad attitudes.
The group's founder, Paul Smith, commented: "While Department for Transport fiddles with 'speed management policy', their own figures reveal that speeding contributes to very few crashes.
"The problem is that DfT's 'speed management' is a massive distraction from the things that really matter. We have catalogued 40 negative side effects arising from speed cameras alone.
"At its simplest, some drivers are too busy looking at their speedos to pay proper attention to the traffic around them."
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