It's time for twenty!

Enfield residents have an opportunity to help reduce deaths and injuries on the borough's roads by expressing their support for the council's proposals for many more roads to have 20mph speed limits. The evidence from 20mph schemes in many other parts of London and throughout Wales is completely clear: lower speed limits save lives and cut serious injuries.

Some statistics published in the flyer that went through people's letterboxes last month. If you didn't get one, you can download it from the council website.

A few weeks back leaflets were posted through letterboxes throughout the borough with information about Enfield Council's proposals to introduce 20mph speed limits on a much wider basis than at present: in essence, on most side streets and on main roads where they pass through important town centres.

It's certainly high time that Enfield caught up with the many London boroughs that have introduced widespread 20mph limits - after all, in the league table recently published by Healthy Streets Scorecard, we're very near the bottom when it comes to the casualty rate for pedestrians: 28th out of the 32 boroughs.

Quite apart from the human misery that deaths and serious injuries cause, there's a strong economic case for bringing in measures that will reduce the frequency and severity of crashes: the huge amount of money and of police and health service time that is spent dealing the consequences.

The benefits of 20mph - summary of evidence (click here to read a text version)

The graphic above summarises the benefits that have been measured in parts of London where 30mph limits have been reduced to 20mph. The likelihood of crashes is greatly reduced because drivers have more time to react to danger, and if a pedestrian is hit by a car doing 20 rather than 30, they are five times more likely to survive. The arguments that lower speeds mean more congestion and more pollution have been disproved, and as for people who claim that they "can't drive" below 21mph, why do we even let them get behind the wheel of a car in the first place? Plus, the pleasanter and safer street environment encourages more walking, wheeling and cycling, all of them beneficial for both physical and mental health.

In addition to the London data, there has been a striking reduction in deaths and injuries as the result of a countrywide move from 30 to 20 in Wales, as described in this article. The author points out that even though a lot of drivers in Wales don't stick strictly to the new 20mph limit, they are now driving slower than they used to and those few miles an hour less are paying dividends - in human lives:

The reduction of 4.2mph from 29mph in July 2023 to 25mph in July this year would be expected to reduce casualties on these roads by 25.2%. The actual reduction was even better at 26.2%.

Source: The Will Hayward Newsletter: Turns out the 20mph limit was great idea!

The council's move has been greeted warmly by Better Streets for Enfield campaigners, though they are critical of the omission of some shopping areas on main roads - for instance, while the council is proposing 20mph for Green Lanes through Palmers Green, they plan to keep 30mph for the whole of Green Lanes as it runs through Winchmore Hill.

Personally, I would like to see 20mph on all roads that have buses running along them, apart from the A406 and A10. The reason: either on their outward journey or on their way back home, bus passengers have to cross the road, and they are much safer if the traffic is travelling at 20mph rather than 30mph - and this applies even when there is a handy zebra crossing.

So, if you value human lives, cleaner air and quieter streets more than the possibility of arriving at the next traffic light a quarter of a minute earlier, then use this consultation to tell the council!