I SUPPOSE that the time of the Motor Show is
an appropriate one for the Prime Minister and the Minister of Transport to pronounce on the subject of the roads, but their pride in spending a few more millions this year than last would in- spire more confidence if some of Mr. Watkinson's other remarks, particularly those about the pro- posed forty-mile speed limit, had been more sen- sible. It is certainly satisfactory that the pretence that the new limit would speed up traffic has been dropped. It will in most cases slow it down, as I pointed out some months ago, and Mr. Wat- kinson admits as much when he says in favour of the ban that it is a good thing to slow the motorist down as he approaches a town. But the objections to a differential speed limit arc as strong as ever, namely that it is confusing and quite unnecessary to make the motorist change speed and probably gear several times within a short stretch of comparatively open road. One stretch of the Barnet by-pass has so far been
limited, but to talk of this as Mr. Watkinson has done as if it were a pilot scheme whose success will determine the introduction of the scheme all over the country in January is ex- tremely disingenuous. What, after all, would con- stitute its 'success' or 'failure"? The Barnet stretch has a bad accident record, but three months will hardly have satisfied even Mr. Watkinson as a sample period to judge the efficacy of the forty- mile limit there. There has been one conviction for speeding on it since the limit was imposed, but I doubt if the Minister will want to say that a law is necessary because it was once enforced.
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