I personally feel that people in charge of traffic in Cambridge don’t really drive; if they did they would surely do things differently. This post is about the 20mph and why I feel they are not that useful. A few years ago the council announced that some areas of Cambridge should have reduced speed limit at 20mph instead of 30. Fair enough, the majority of the street which were object of such a policy were either:
- Super busy, often impossible to drive faster than 10mph
- Very narrow, crazy to go even at 20mph
- With speed bumps, ditto as above
The silly thing I recently read on the local newspaper was that representative of the council was pleased of the results they achieved with this policy. He stated that there was no need for checking speed in 20mph zones because everybody respects them. Well that’s rubbish; I always drive within the speed limits in town, but when in one of these calmed traffic areas I often get undertaken by enthusiastic cyclists or see professional drivers like taxis and busses speeding away from me. Was it really worth the money and the fuss when there is no way of checking and imposing these new limits? I think not.