Os the whole we should congratulate ourselves on the initial
success of the 30-miles-an-hour speed limit in built-up areas which has now been in force some 11 days. I say "we" advisedly, meaning the road users and neither the Ministry of Transport nor the Home Office. They have very little part in the success, nothing about which to be thankful or to congratulate themselves. - That the whole business did not turn into something between farce and tragedy is owing entirely to the exemplary good sense and forbearance of the public. Individual members of the police have undertaken their distasteful duties in the spirit which helped to build up the reputation of the first force in the world, a spirit which still lives, and the result has been that, contrary to all instructed opinion, the methods of enforeerdent,-- Unique in the history of this country in peace-time, have been accepted without
any but verbal protest. • .
We have still to learn the practical result and we must realize that it will be several months before any useful figures. on the accident-rate will be available. The busy time of the year on the road is just beginning, and from next month' well on into -October the road4 will be far- more crowded than they have been for the last six months. There will be thousands of new cars delivered, a very large number of which, according to the forecast of the authorities, will be in. the hands of new drivers. Unless we are extremely lucky there. will not be much of a decrease in the casualty lists for a long. time, and it would not be fair to judge the limit much before a year has elapSed, until it has been- working through the slack as well as through the1)04 periods. Personally I am hopeful about the result. While the ClOakzand-dagger methods of Scotland Yard fill one with mingled amusement and disgust, there is no denying the fact that they have, from the outset, achieved what more orthodox methods have signally failed to do since the day when the red flag was abolished.
On the whole few individual members of the public have
been seriously inconvenienced by the restriction. In the real built-up area 30 miles an hour is a generous maximum, so generous in fact that it was seldom exceeded at any time and then only by the road-hog whose suppression it is every- body's aim to secure. In the more open areas in -London, such as Bromptiiii-Road, Bayswater Road, the Embankment, Wellington and Finchley Roads and, on the blackest, Kensing- ton Road, life is certainly safet; travel less harassing. The fear of the copper' in the plain an haS 'reduced the -speed of the homing. road-hog salutary fashion. To the pedestrian hoping to cross insafety or the average decent driver wishing to join the main traffic stream from a side street, there is a world of difference between 25 and 45- miles an hour, very little to the driver who is in a legitimate -hurry. Allowing for the comptilsbry stops in 'between,- it does not -take -yciu, much longer to get- from Knightsbridge Barracks to Kensington High Street, driving at a steady 20 than, in wild bursts, at 35.
In this connexion I had an illuminating conversation with a taxi-driver. He Was an ex-policeman, having. been on trapping duty and -what -he called• " speed stuff " (driving senior officers of the Force, I gathered) for several years. On retiring• he . took up his present, occupation_ and is con- sequently able to see the thingS,frona both sides of the fence: He assured me that very few taxi-cabs exceed 30 'Mica an hour., They are very low-geared and by the time they. are doing 30 they " make a noise like 50 " and their fares begin to tap on the window and exhibit signs of distress. Moreover, the apparently complacent police begin to wear suspicious faces. Despite every indication to the contrary the taxi is not a pace-maker. He cannot be. He should make a good standard speed-measure.
In the country round London there is rather more dissatis- faction, not because the -limit seems unnecessary in quiet districts where wide - and open roads have been habitually taken at higher speeds without risks; WV because it is extended to certain main arterial rim& considered to be the English equivalent, otthe autostrade of Italy, where 40 miles an hour and more is usually perfectly safe. I daresay in time some of these will .be " de-restrieted," though it is open to question whether the Minister . of Transport will exercise his authority over loeal bodies after having given them their heads to do as they like. Where I am inclined to look for temporary trouble is in the loss of time on public services. So far I have not heard of many complaints from patrons of long-distance 'bus-services, but I imagine that it is only a question of time before that problem arises. Another of the same sort may present itself to the commercial user, the owner, hirer and customer of the lorry that carries perish- able goods north, south, east and west along the highways. If the law is strictly enforced against these it must mean a considerable decrease in the average speed of the services and, possibly, in the receipts. The same thing applies, to the coach-services, though punctuality here is not perhaps of the same importance to the public in general as in the goods services.
The places that should benefit most are the nearer seaside resorts. The limit, where it exists on the roads to Brighton, Eastbourne, Worthing and other places within an easy run of London, should undoubtedly encourage those people to use the road who have in recent years given up driving over week- ends owing to the discomfort and danger. There will no longer be any question of reaching Brighton beach in under two hours. The average running time will be as fixed as in a railway-table, no car having any noticeable advantage over another. It may still be a very dull and malodorous pro- cession, but it will no longer be a dangerous one. The cutting- in fiend will have vanished and if we take three hours to get within sight of the Channel we _shall reach our destination with unshaken nerves.
Down by the sea the limit will be even more welcome. Nobody except a 100 per. cent, road-hog wants to drive along those interminable " fronts " that join Hastings and Bexhill to Littlehampton and Bognor at any average above. 20 miles an hour. Every. able-bodied-- person who has lately had occasion to cross-the King's Road at Brighton will breathe again. There may be many areas where the limit is going to be a nuisance, but on the whole I believe we shall be alt,
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