No one observes our 20mph limit (From The Oxford Times)

No one observes our 20mph limit

8:00am Thursday 16th August 2012 in Letters

Sir – How exciting that the police have agreed, at long last, to enforce 20mph speed limits.

Except that they’re doing nothing of the sort — drivers have to exceed 30mph before they are penalised, so they can break the 20mph limit with impunity.

Is it too much to ask that the police do their job and enforce the law? It is fanciful to suggest, too — as some have — that the 20mph limit is self-enforcing through road design and traffic calming.

On the street where I live — a notorious rat-run — no one observes the 20 limit. Speed bumps and the fact that the street narrows to a single lane, simply make them drive faster. They ignore the speed bumps and, where the road narrows, put their foot down, racing to get through before someone comes the other way.

The presence of pedestrians, some with small children, very close to the carriageway makes absolutely no difference. At the moment, these irresponsible motorists are getting away with it, every day. Could the police pay us a visit and catch some of them?

Better still, could we have a speed camera installed? Then these selfish, antisocial drivers could be brought to book, at long last.

Simon Jones, Old Headington