Nice clean look. Although perhaps a litlte too clean. Could use some color. I like the litlte Post Date graphic.Oh, your favicon disappeared when I clicked on the comment link.
Blast against Traffic Calming
By: Gordon Pye
Date: Thursday, 01. October 2009
I have been following the development of potential Toll Roads since during the 1990s when I deduced that road safety was being used as an excuse to obstruct any alternatives.
All three main parties are keen to demonstrate just how green they are and how they are combating Global Warming. However, they all appear to support the continued introduction of traffic calming, ( mini-roundabouts etc. ) which increases carbon dioxide emissions by at least 50%. The same applies to 20 Mph Zones (without humps or chicanes) which add to emissions by 10%.
In addition, the nastier potentially toxic pollutants linked with Asthma are doubled by traffic calming. It could be said that traffic calming is a greater risk to public health than latent asbestos or passive smoking?
The alleged road safety benefits are less than clear. Heavily traffic-calmed Burnley reported a 44% reduction in child deaths over the past seven years, yet Ribble Valley, with minimal traffic calming also reported a fall of 42% despite being far away from any hospital Accident and Emergency Department.
The reduction in road deaths is a good thing, but may be mostly due to better paramedic ambulance services and now the air ambulance service. Better medical provision was introduced alongside traffic calming, it may be wrong to give traffic calming all the credit when its contribution may be minimal. I believe that casualties have been cut by 15% in the Borough of Barnet since they ripped out existing traffic calming. Casualties for cyclists dropped by twice the London average.
It would appear that traffic calming has become a TB infested sacred cow for the eco-fascist leaning groups who originally campaigned for its introduction and still push it. It would appear that the eco-fascists cling to traffic calming in the belief that drivers will be " irritated " out of their cars and use the train, at least a few anyway. If anyone had deliberately set out to design death traps for cyclists its doubtful whether they could have made a better job of it than traffic calming. I believe the Green Party have now opted for the " less pregnant " option of 20 Mph speed limits but still fail to admit their original mistake.
Getting back to Toll Roads, take the Ribble Valley for example, where there were once two national speed limit routes into Preston - the direct A59, and through Longridge. The Longridge route now has a 40 Mph speed limit when it was safe to do 50 on most of the route. Similarly, the old A59 alternative route to the Whalley-Clitheroe by-pass has had the limit cut to 40 from 60, and many 40 sections have been reduced to an often-ridiculous 30. I suspect that the buses struggle to keep time legally, even though running on a 1960s timetable.
And now the proposed cut in the National Speed limit to 50 mph to appease the eco-fascists who were campaigning for 40 Mph. Councils will be able to determine limits in their area, so speed limits are to be set by a bunch of doddering coffin-dodging Tories intent on bringing everyone's driving standard down to their level of aged incompetence.
I seem to remember something in New Labour's "clause 4 " about allowing people to attain their full potential. Not much sign of it in policy when it comes to driving. Reducing the National Speed Limit is going to damage the rural economy, perhaps so that 'ten-bob fat cat city dwellers' can escape to the Country and take the homes currently occupied by indigenous rural people. Like the road fuel tax escalator, its all part of a general trend of ethnic cleansing by stealth. Remote rural Post Office closures are also likely to be considered if the legal time taken for collections / delivery significantly increases.
The Corporate Nazis in the civil service have been seriously planning toll roads for at least 20 years. In towns they use traffic calming to obstruct any direct route traffic might find as an alternative to toll roads. The safety fascists are making roads in towns almost totally impassable in decent time, and now even Transport For London (TFL) admits that it has been deliberately creating extra congestion under Labour's Livingstone.
About Gordon Pye
Truck driver Gordon Pye started his career in road transportation at the age of 13. His duties then were filling wagons and checking fuel and oil levels. At age 16 he was taken on as an apprentice Heavy goods Vehicle (HGV) fitter. He left high school early but continued his education at technical colleges and excelled on his technicians course.
He reckons his early driving experiences (at age 16 yrs) on an underpowered 50 c.c. moped taught him to manage engine power to best advantage. By the time he began driving tipper semi-trailers, he says, "it was possible to detect the subtle change in performance when a new load of fuel was delivered to the depot. My scientific education stood me in good stead and I either proved or disproved all that I had learnt at college."
Back then, Pye says, road safety in England was a culture within the industry based on stories of accidents going back into the 1930s, mostly exchanged from more experienced drivers waiting to tip and load. But "in the,1960s the traffic police would stop you and ask if there was something wrong with your vehicle if you were not exceeding the then 20 Mph limit for HGV's."
Pye started writing on road safety in the early 1990s. "I have always had a genuine concern for our environment and could describe myself as an enviro-realist," he says. "I also detest the waste of finite natural resources which is why I started campaigning against Traffic Calming. The current eco-fascist nee safety fascist approach to transport and our environment is just an excuse to facilitate a massive investment scam on the taxpayer."
- Drivers.com on traffic calming
- Traffic Calming: a promise unfulfilled
- A truckers's view of traffic calming in the UK - 1996
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All Comments (6)
Showing 1 - 6 comments
Vasko,
Gordon Pye,
I believe that the latest pollution statistics are 82% extra CO2, 37% extra NOX, The pollution problem is compounded by drivers driving over humps in too high a gear which means that the potentially toxic unburnt hydrocarbon pollutants linked to lung disease are probably doubled. A 20 Mph Zone allegedly increases CO2 by a " less pregnant " than humps at least 10%, but the potentially toxic unburnt hydrocarbon pollutants linked to lung disease problem remains. When I was waiting at a local village I observed cars coming up the steep hill and going around the corner. Many ( including petrol cars ) emitted black smoke due to being in too high a gear as taught by useless driving instructors to pass the quasi-religious driving test. It could be said that traffic calming is a greater risk to public health than latent asbestos or passive smoking ?
Gordon Pye,
Since the more widespread introduction of 20 Mph zones the latest reports suggest that A&E doctors are seeing an explosion in the number of potential permanent disability serious head injury cases. They are now suggesting making the wearing of helmets mandatory for any cyclist under 16, yet more " there was an old woman who swallowed a fly " alleged safety engineering.
Alleged saved lives, but a " life sentence " for the families of accident victims as they daily observe their relatives experience a fate perhaps far worse than death.
All the most recent evidence suggests that road safety policy such as traffic calming, lower speed limits with speed cameras and cycle lanes have not reduced road casualties as claimed by the government and police. In actual fact the police have been massively under reporting serious injuries in an attempt to justify their current policy, they claimed 26,000 when the NHS figures prove that the true figure is 40,000. Admittedly road deaths have come down, but perhaps this is due to better paramedic ambulance treatment and things like the air ambulance. The injury figures have come down more recently by 2%, but perhaps the reduction in deaths and 2% injuries is due to the introduction of bus passes for the elderly taking many potentially less competent old drivers off our roads.
A complete change in road safety policy direction is needed, thinking about our environment there is potential out there to make our roads safer and reduce road transport CO2 emissions by up to 10%. If it was up to me I would introduce annual eye tests for all drivers and put all roads back to 1960s default speed limits, rip out traffic calming starting with the main routes.
Rosalynd B.,
The cars on our street, in our neiborhood drive way too fast!
I have been trying to get our town council to install MORE traffic calming, to slow down vehicles, including trucks.
All of the families here agree. Your article is whining.
Ronnie B,
The stats above on pollution and casualties are interesting and I can't contradict them (at least not right now) but in general I agree with traffic calming. A safe speed for each section of roadway whould be arrived at using a combination of local groups, safety experts, and engineers. Then the roadway should be designed so a 40mph road LOOKS like a 40 mph road. It's nto enough to just stick a 40 sign up on a broad roadway that invites 60 and then hand out tickets. The problem for truckers and transportation is a bigger one. If we need economical trucking lets facilitate it and not just dump on truckers.
Marty Evans,
All traffic calming devices should be placed at "STOP" or "YIELD" signs to help slow vehicles at those critical points instead of placing them in the middle of blocks where they only inconvenience people and made them angry.
