The Government’s
proposal to increase the top speed limit to 80mph will no doubt appeal to that
section of the population which regards adherence to laws on speeding as being
optional. It tends to be the same group which
regards the use of speed cameras as somehow ‘unsporting’, as if the whole thing
is a game in which the main object is not to abide by the rules, but simply to
avoid getting caught breaking them.
I worked with
someone once who was always late for meetings, because he already had nine
points on his licence and couldn’t afford to drive fast enough to arrive on
time. ‘Set out earlier’ was the thought
that went through my mind; but the view that speed limits are somehow an unfair
and unnecessary restriction on normal business is not unlike that being expressed by
the current government.
There almost seems
to be a sort of collective belief amongst some that speeding – like taking home
the office stationery – isn’t a ‘real’ crime.
‘Proper’ crimes have to have obvious victims, and an apparently ‘victimless’
crime should therefore be treated differently.
In reality, speeding isn’t victimless, and never has been - but it is
true that the ratio of crimes to victims is different. Whilst there is a victim in every single case
of robbery, the same is not true for speeding.
Because the overwhelming majority of instances of law-breaking on the
motorways do not have a victim at all, the misguided generalisation can gain
credence.
The government’s
thinking appears to be rather muddled, to say the least. On the one hand, they argue that there will
be huge economic advantages in allowing people to drive that little bit faster;
on the other they argue that the law as it stands is unenforceable, since half
the drivers are already exceeding the limit anyway. I find it hard to reconcile those two
statements, unless the intention in reality is to increase the effective, enforced
speed limit from 80 to 90mph.
I’m not convinced
by the argument that so many people break the law anyway, that it’s
unenforceable. It is, again, based on
the idea that there are different degrees of crime; it’s certainly not a
suggestion that would be made for most other breaches of the law. Widespread disregard of a law is not, in
itself, an argument against the law, particularly if a major part of that
disregard is based on an unwillingness by the authorities to enforce the law.
Nor am I convinced
by the argument that it will enable people to get to their destination
sooner. Most of the motorway network is
so congested that theoretical top speeds are rarely achievable anyway. Besides, work done by governments over many
years has shown that total road capacity can best be increased by maintaining a
lower and more consistent average speed – it’s what has led to the variable
speed control systems used in places like the M25.
And paradoxically,
increasing the speed at which some travel could have the end effect of reducing
the overall average speed of all motorists – leading to an increase in average
journey time rather than a decrease. The
best overall average speed for all seems to be achieved when the variation
between the speed of different vehicles is reduced, not when the speed of the
fastest is increased.
The one thing that
no-one seems to dispute is that the fuel and pollution cost of the proposed
increase is significant, and will make it harder to achieve agreed emissions
targets. For a government which said it
was aiming to be the greenest ever, it’s a major step away from that aim.
It may also affect
the balance of attractiveness between public and private transport. Although the actual impact on journey times
is likely to be minimal, that will not prevent people from believing that they
can achieve a journey in a shorter time, and choosing to use their cars as a
result. That belief may not be rational,
but that doesn’t stop people taking decisions on the basis of it.
All in all it looks
more like an attempt to be populist in order to gain the support of a
particular section of the electorate than part of a coherent transport policy.
Posts
