Speed Limit Signs

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upport

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I think majority of people would agree that excessive speed is a major contributory factor(not the only one) to accidents resulting in death and serious injuries.
I also think that majority of people are law abiding citizens and if un obstructed speed signs were located at short intervals i.e.every 500 meters this would remind motorists of the speed limits and may help to educate people to stay within them and hopefully reduce the no. of accidents.
The reality is that on alot of secondary roads that I travel I can drive miles without seeing a speed limit sign.
 
I think the general principle is you should know the general speed limits (100k for N roads, 80 for R roads, 50 in urban areas). In my area, special speed limits are generally pretty well advertised.
 
+1 with j26

As a road user, it is your responsibility to know the default speed limits that apply on the roads you travel; these are documented in the very useful Rules of the Road booklet published by the RSA and on their web-site here -
 
j26 said:
I think the general principle is you should know the general speed limits (100k for N roads, 80 for R roads, 50 in urban areas). In my area, special speed limits are generally pretty well advertised.
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OK, then put up signs saying that a road is an N road or an R road?

I find the Merrion Road very frustrating. I have no idea if it's an N road or an R road, or maybe it's an urban area. There are occasional 60k speed signs, but I have no idea what distance they cover. So I am driving along at 60 and wonder if it is still 60, or has it reduced? I reduce to 50 anyway, but it is very annoying.

It would be so simple to paint a simple 5 or 6 or 8 or 10 in different colours on the sides of the road at very frequent intervals. It would also be a permanent reminder of the speed limit.
 
When they refer to excessive speeds in relation to accidents/road deaths, it is rarely in relation to the prevailing speed limit, rather to road conditions. There are countless examples across the country where travelling at the speed limit even in fine weather would be inappropriate.

One particular example near where I'm from, a standard 2 lane national route has a 60km/h limit. A side road off this where cars have to move off the paved surface to pass has an 80km/h limit.

Awareness of speed limits to me is more about avoiding any more of those dreaded penalty points!
 
This is an outradeous idea - a sign every 500 meters. The place would look like something out of a carton let alone the cost associated with such. Permenant signs cost E100's. People need to wise up and take responsibilty for driving at the correct speed. There are enough signs to note if concentrating.

Roads are littered with eoungh warning signs as is. What after 10 years everyone become immune to the signs every 500 meters - but them every 250 perhaps????
 
Like in UK/Wales there are spped limit signs every few 100 metres reminding people of the speed limits approaching /going through towns / villages .

In our local town , its like Brendan said above , ie. there is one speed limit sign in an area , and thats it, so after travelling few 100 metres , you just dont know , if you are still in the same limit area or not .

I agree with the op's statement
 
Brendan said:
OK, then put up signs saying that a road is an N road or an R road?

I find the Merrion Road very frustrating. I have no idea if it's an N road or an R road, or maybe it's an urban area. There are occasional 60k speed signs, but I have no idea what distance they cover. So I am driving along at 60 and wonder if it is still 60, or has it reduced? I reduce to 50 anyway, but it is very annoying.

It would be so simple to paint a simple 5 or 6 or 8 or 10 in different colours on the sides of the road at very frequent intervals. It would also be a permanent reminder of the speed limit.
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Problem is there is often a lack of logic as to what constitutes an N or R road. I know of a road where it is a N road on one side of a junction, even though it has no hard shoulder at all, on the other side of the junction, it's an R road, even though there, it has a near 2 meter wide hard shoulder.
 
Yeager said:
. The place would look like something out of a carton let alone the cost associated with such.
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What is wrong with cartons? I like them.

There is so much signage on the road that a small painted reminder on the side of the road would not make any difference.
 
There maybe alot of signs on the raod side but they are not all the same sign every 500 meters. Come on people I can't believe we are having this arguement.
 
I have noticed driving in Northern Ireland that there are far fewer speed signs, you are expected to know the speed limit for the road.

However, the problem in the ROI is the sheer inconsistency in application. We all have countless examples of limits that should be higher or lower. Not to mention the roadworks signs on the M50 that everybody ignores.
 
upport said:
I think majority of people would agree that excessive speed is a major contributory factor(not the only one) to accidents resulting in death and serious injuries..
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I would only agree if it was said that inappropriate speed is a major contributory factor. I guess it depends how one reads your statement. :)

The speed limit is only a guide.. I read recently that here in Ireland, some chap who was paralyzed after taking a bend too fast sued the co. council because the speed limit was too high, and he won. It's frustrating that the "theory" component of the driving test / curriculum teaches very basic concepts about signs and so on, and does not teach anything significant about the forces acting on the car in various situations, nor about observation and planning, nor about how to use speed. :-(

My own wish is that we would focus more on driver education and less on rules. Something like an involved driving course in secondary schools, for example, maybe as part of transition year - I would certainly have benefited from something like that.

I don't want to come across as being argumentative - and I'll freely admit that I recognize that I personally am an unsafe driver at times and need to improve. But at least I know that I'm not very good, so I have some hope of improving!
 
imo constant reminder of the area speed limit will help focus the drivers' mind to travel within the speed limit,if this speed limit is proper for the road conditions then this will surely help to improve road safety and reduce accidents and fatalities.

The cost of implementing above would be greatly reduced if agreement was reached to use existing ESB/Eircom posts that are already situated along every road in Ireland to screw the speed limit signs on to.

Constant visual reminders of the area speed limit will create public awareness of the road speed limits and in conjunction with law enforcement might just succeed in slowing motorists down in the interest of safety. Possible side benefits would be higher mpg and less penalty points!
 
I agree with upport about constant reminders, but I think an updated sign profile is in order. I was drving over to the Bons Secours this morning, went via M50 to Ballymun and passed DCU heading to Glasnevin. I was amazed to see different style speed signs , they were oval with a picture on them and digital writing, the style and colour caught my eye (and I don't mean from a fashion point of view!)
 
Romulan said:
I have noticed driving in Northern Ireland that there are far fewer speed signs, you are expected to know the speed limit for the road.

However, the problem in the ROI is the sheer inconsistency in application. We all have countless examples of limits that should be higher or lower. Not to mention the roadworks signs on the M50 that everybody ignores.
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totally agree with what you have said.

I Dont know the name of the road, but it's heading to clarehall, just off the M50. For some reason that road is only 60. Not that many people stick to the speed limit anyway.

Surely it should at least be 80, with the bus lanes now gone there are 2 lanes of traffic. I wouldn't class it as a built up area, so why is it so low?

Like you said there are numerous examples of this, it is very hard to keep trach on some of the roads. I got pulled over once for doing 55 in a 40 zone. I actually walked back to where the sign was with the guard and showed him the sign clearly said the limit was 60. He said that it had been changed to 40 recently. He let me go and i didn't get a ticket. A few days later on the same road i noticed the sign was gone, but there wasn't a new one there for months. I bet a lot of people got caught out on that one.
 
I heard the minister announce on radio during the week that he was reviewing inappropriate speed limits. Is this a forma public consultation process?

I know that there has been some very good comment here on the topic over the years.
 
One pertinent point. The more we look at speed limits, the more we look at our speedo, = less time looking at the road
 
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