NSL??

[volospian]

What's happening to our NSL? I see more and more stretches of road where the NSL has been replaced with a 50mph limit.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I want to hoon everywhere as if my hair is on fire, I'm just getting concerned that this is pedestrianisation by stealth.

There are always signs up saying "It's 50 for a reason!" and I think "Yeah, the reason is that they haven't been bothered to find out, or can't be arsed, or don't know how to fix, the real problem that there are accidents on this stretch of road, such as that awful junction on a blind corner, that terrible crumbling road surface on that unexpectedly tightening right hander or that excellent restaurant in the middle of nowhere that cares not one jot that it's customers get tanked up on £60 bottles of wine and then have to drive home after".

Changing from a 60 to a 50 lmit is a little like the NHS saying they are doing something about heroin addicts by issuing clean needles. It ignores the actual problem, but allows them to say that because a few people are slightly less likely to die they are saving lives.

Speed kills! But we all know speed doesn't kill, otherwise every motor racing event from karting to land speed records would result in a bloodbath. It's not the speed that kills, it's the hitting something that causes the damage, and I can't see that hitting a pedestrian, horse, cyclist, tree, roadsign or oncoming vehicle at ~50mph is going to be that much different to hitting it at ~60mph.

They then complain about the "irresponsible" motorist, like the suicidal power rangers on their sports bikes doing silly speeds, but... uh... if they ignore the 60 limit... wtf makes you think they'll pay any attention to a 50 limit... so how has that fixed the problem?

Again, I'm not advocating speed, I'm just sick of politicians providing cheap "solutions" without adressing the actual problems. They pamper to the "speed kills" brigade because it's an easy option, and reduce limits because it's cheaper to replace signs than it is to replace bad road surfaces, junctions or corners, but if this trend continues, the NSL itself will drop to 50, then the 50 sections will drop to 40, and then 30 and the motorways will drop to 50 and eventually we'll be back in the middle ages and travelling to the next town will take so much time that you'll need to take a packed lunch.

Gah, my goat has been well and truely got!