You might think it is an April Fool’s Joke, but such nonsense is just day-to-day business in Dublin: From 01 April there is a 30 km/h speed limit on all residential roads between the canals all day, every day. I am totally on favour of 30 km/h speed limits near schools, in areas with a large amount of pedestrians and in other danger spots. But a blanked speed limit of 30 km/h is total nonsense.
Dublin City claims it will save lives, but they don’t seem to substantiate that with clear numbers that tell us how many people actually died in traffic accidents between the canals in the last 12 months or the last few years. And out of these fatal accidents, I would like to know how many involved a speed of the car of more than 30 km/h. I bet Dublin City has NO such numbers or statistics, so they just use the emotional argument that lives will be saved, expecting that everybody will shut up then.
Speed limits should make sense, then the majority of people will stick to them. But where they don’t make sense, the “30” signs are a waste of effort and the speed limit will have absolutely no effect.
At the time of writing this, the new speed limit wasn’t in effect yet, so we will have to see after 01 April if the “residential road” classification was applied to the right streets, let me know if you find streets that are in the speed limit zones that shouldn’t be. Oh and if you think it won’t affect you because you don’t have a car, think again: Every bus and every taxi will also have to adhere to the limit. (Only cyclists don’t have to! They can now easily overtake busses and cars at any speed they like because they can’t be taken to task when exceeding the limit.)
