I’ll believe it when I see it, but DfT has announced a “task force” to look into the problem of “pointless road signs”.
I’m sorry, but they’ve not got the complete story. It isn’t just pointless signs, but also ones which are blatantly wrong – erected by incompetent people employed in sinecures at local councils.
In Nottingham, a good place to start when putting things right would be with the “Portfolio Holder for Planning and Housing”. The sooner the clown who holds that position is put somewhere where she can do less damage, the better it would be for everyone.
I’ve already mentioned how she has been directly responsible for hundreds – if not thousands – of 20mph signs being erected in her quest for a blanket 20mph speed limit. But what she also failed to do was make sure the old 30mph signs were removed. The image above is one I took back in May this year, but there are numerous locations where there is the same problem. Most of them are still there. Furthermore, in changing 30mph limits to 20mph ones, the fact that there were already 20mph zones within those areas means that much of the signage is the wrong size.
I believe I am correct in saying that a large sign is legally required at the start of any given speed zone, and smaller repeater signs are used within that as reminders (unless it’s a 30mph zone, in which case the presence of street lighting is the “reminder”). In changing the 30mph signs to 20mph, whole areas now have larger 20mph signs INSIDE the new 20mph zones, which implies that the limit changes at that point. The inconsistent use of 20mph repeaters in the new zones means that motorists could easily be misled.
As an aside, I have been sent some raw data files which show the results of the public consultations on the 20mph speed limit. I won’t spoil it, but watch out for a separate article on that.