Good to see that ‘Bristol's 20mph zones move step closer’ (Post, Dec 11), at least in chunks of south and east Bristol. The council should have brought in 20 mph as the default speed in residential areas yrs ago though – and its arguable (or maybe its my impatience with slow change?) that they could be moving faster now (the proposals have gone out for consultation so no implementation yet!). Another thing is why just chunks of south and east Bristol? Why not cover the whole of residential Bristol? After all we know it saves lives – research on the effects of London’s 20 mph zones just published in the British Medical Journal, widely reported today, says ‘The introduction of 20 mph zones was associated with a 41.9% …reduction in road casualties…’The BMJ goes on, ‘The percentage reduction was greatest in younger children and greater for the category of killed or seriously injured casualties than for minor injuries. There was no evidence of casualty migration to areas adjacent to 20 mph zones, where casualties also fell slightly by an average of 8.0% (4.4% to 11.5%).
Conclusions 20 mph zones are effective measures for reducing road injuries and deaths.’
In fact, why not every residential area in Britain?
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