Speed limit changes for NSW

Shiv

Shiv

Forum Member
Joined
Mar 27, 2011
Messages
205
Location
Sydney, Australia
https://www.rta.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/index.cgi?fuseaction=top100review.default

Auditor General has finished the review of top 100 roads.

I applaud them for doing a review but I now realise it was all a political thing for votes because they largely haven't made any significant changes.

I notice a lot of the changes are the extension or reduction of speed zones by a couple of hundred meters...like that's going to make a huge difference.

There is still inconsistencies in speed limits. Anzac Bridge will remain at 60km/h.

Unfortunately Epping Rd will go down to 70...
 
Good find Shiv

Having just driven over those bits of the Newell and Cobb highways, I can only applaud what little they have done ...

The wholly unworthy thought crosses my mind at times (quite often, in fact ... ) that speed limit changes on some roads are only there to provide "revenue opportunities" for State Governments.
IOW, nice little earners :madred: :yell: :censored: :mob:
 
Only to 110. Way too slow. 150 is more like it. If small countries like Germany- with weather worse than here, can have unrestricted roads to go short distances, then 150 should be the absolute minimum if you are going to have any chance of battling fatigue. The new NSW roads minister has thus far failed to live up to expectations in this area.

wombat said:
Woohoo seems they are upping the speed limits on some stretches on the Pacific Highway north of Taree where the new dual carriageway is, about time...
Click to expand...
 
Yeah i heard a few years ago they were talking about upping the highway to 130km/h because travelling quicker keeps you more alert and hinders you from falling asleep, plus you get there quicker, i don't see why it can't be at least that on the new stretches of the Pacific Highway, especially after Buladelah gets bypassed... its such a boring easy drive...
Speaking of Buladelah and boring drive, this certainly wouldn't be boring, wonder how the car owners took the news?
https://au.news.yahoo.com/latest/a/-/latest/13310036/maserati-rare-british-car-destroyed/
 
Shiv said:
The only thing that goes up in this country are taxes.

Only rain and speed limits come down.
Click to expand...

Haha :lol:

Rally, while 150kmh would be nice, I dont think it'll ever happen. At least not while the driver is in control! (re my vision of fully automated high speed freeways where all aspects of the car are computer controlled. There would never be any accidents or traffic jams :biggrin: )

However I do think a rise to 120kmh would be reasonable on modern arterial freeways
 
We know when roos are at their worst- so you drive accordingly. I remember getting in a hire car at Vienna airport, and we jump on the autobahn and there we were cruising at over 150 and even though I am the worlds worst passenger- I felt well at ease. There are far more single vehicle accidents than anything else out there- mainly due to fatigue. We saw that in the NT when they got rid of the no speed limits and introduced the 130 limit. Deaths doubled the very next year. Fatigue really scares me- as FAR too little emphasis is placed on it. And because it cannot really be measured- like speed- then there is little desire by the money grabbers to focus on it when the cash cows are performing so well.
 
I didn't see any roos on the autobahn!

On the tar in the NT 130 is fine - but open speed limits on everything, including dirt roads, is crazy. I think it would be interesting to see an analysis of where the people died e.g. was it in the 130 klm zones or in Darwin?

If you saw some of the wrecks our original Australians are driving out there, there is no way I would want to share that road with an open speed limit! :iconwink:
 
Gidday Kevin

Kevin said:
I didn't see any roos on the autobahn!

On the tar in the NT 130 is fine - but open speed limits on everything, including dirt roads, is crazy.
Click to expand...

I agree. I think that 130 km/h on the open road where it is bitumen and has a white dividing line would be fine. Our "autobahns" where there is a four-lane dirt highway divided by a strip of bitumen should be 100 km/h IMNSHO.

What makes me laugh hysterically is when there is an 80 km/h limit on fenced, dual lane carriageways in our cities ... These roads are FAR superior to the open road in most instances; yet the open road is 100 or 110 km/h ...

I think it would be interesting to see an analysis of where the people died e.g. was it in the 130 klm zones or in Darwin?
Click to expand...

It is my understanding of the road kill statistics that most fatalities of motorists occur at less than 60 km/h ... (old data. I could be corrected about this, if things have changed).

One also has to remember that pedestrians are included as part of the road toll (road kill ... ); and it is their own fault in most cases. Ditto cyclists and motorcyclists.

Most fatalities on the open road involving a single male, not wearing a seat belt, are known to be suicide. However, this is not usually the finding, as it has all sorts of social and financial ramifications.

If you saw some of the wrecks our original Australians are driving out there, there is no way I would want to share that road with an open speed limit! :iconwink:
Click to expand...

By definition at least 1/3 of the population is of sub-normal intelligence. Many of these people drive cars. A car is a very deadly weapon. It is a tribute to our survival instincts that there are so few fatalities, regardless of how much pain is caused by those that do occur.

We have had two young friends die on motor cycles. Their own fault in both cases ...

In my young days, I nearly hit a cow on a cattle grid at around 90 mph just after dusk. Sheer good luck that I could slow enough in time to miss it. If you think hitting a roo's bad - try a cow at about 5~8 times the weight.
 
Last edited:
Ratbag said:
In my young days, I nearly hit a cow on a cattle grid at around 90 mph just after dusk. Sheer good luck that I could slow enough in time to miss it. If you think hitting a roo's bad - try a cow at about 5~8 times the weight.
Click to expand...

Similar situation for this young couple I met in the outback; managed to miss a brahma bull - only just! That's the rear window gaffered into the front using some fence palings! They were lucky, minor injuries.

1180489e5a443fc94.jpg
 
Gidday Wombat

wombat said:
Here's the speed limit change report, i knew it was a few years ago, 2003, interesting read if you have the time to read it all:


https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/roads/safety/publications/2003/Rural_Speed_2.aspx
Click to expand...

Terrific find mate.

I have downloaded the PDF (right at the end of the web report). 138 pages of 'light reading', LOL!

From a quick browse, I am not certain that the research/report is based well. It seems to devalue time, and fails to account properly for pollution due to congestion.

Seems to be based predominantly on an assumed basis of crash levels, without properly taking driver fatigue from travelling at too low a speed into account (as mentioned upthread by Mr T).

Differential speed limits for trucks and cars would make it far more easy to pass trucks (legally ... ), thereby lessening the risk of oncoming traffic collisions.

However, I will hold off judgement until AFTER I have read it thoroughly :ebiggrin: ...
 
There is no point in saying the speed limit is this or that and then ignore reaction times. A few years ago they had ads on the TV saying that at 100km/h it takes x seconds to stop. But that assumes a rather slow reaction time- but it is by no means as slow as some people can be. If you have a 0.7 second reaction time, then if you want to use the government fear ads in trying to stop before hitting the little kid or whatever, and there is an older person or similar with a 2 second reaction time, then the quicker reacting driver would be able to travel faster and stop in the same distance as the slow reaction driver. Part of the licence test and renewal process should have a reaction test. That law abiding but slow reacting driver may be more of a risk than a faster driver with quicker reactions.

This then brings us to fatigue and the far slower reaction speeds brought on by fatigue. Assuming you're not actually asleep reaction times coould be horrendously high. Imagine this: travelling down any road and you start to doze. You might even be going down hill, picking up speed. You have a micro sleep and have a head on with another car. yes, you were going over the speed limit, but that is largely irrelevant to why the accident happened. You were asleep (or in another situation, drunk). Yet speed will be listed as a factor when clearly it was not. That is why you do not believe the official line that speed is involved in half of all accidents or whatever they say. That is just to convince you that their radar traps are justified. Speed may have increased the loss or damage in the accident, but had the driver been alert (or sober) the accident would never have occurred- and this speed is not quite the demon it is made out to be. That is not to say it can't be- but it is a lot less than is being advertised.
 
Back
Top