Safe speed demonstration areas in New Zealand – rural and urban

Safe speed demonstration areas in New Zealand – rural and urban; Glenn Bunting – Network Manager, NZTA New Zealand’s ‘Safer Journeys’ road safety strategy to 2020 confirms that “Safety (in NZ) would be improved if we could reduce operating speeds to match the standard of the existing (rural) network”, and that “(the current) 50km/h speed limit is generally too high for neighbourhoods and busy town and city centres where there are many pedestrians”. In addition, New Zealand’s present speed limit setting legislation was established in 2003 and does not reflect safe system principles, particularly in regard to the impact that speed has on the human body. To inform the possible review of speed limit legistation to reflect safe system principles, road controlling authorities have been encouraged to consider implimenting ‘safe speed demonstration projects’, for both urban and rural environments. This presentation will describe the process used to date in developing the demonstation areas, including both the physical speed restriction mechanisms and the community engagement processes essential to win hearts and minds of road users to accept more appropriate, safe system appropriate speed limits.