AN EXPANSION is being signalled of 20 mph speed limits on residential streets in Sheffield.
Councillors are preparing to create a budget for new zones – but using signs to encourage drivers to slow down, not road humps and build-outs of pavements.
They are taking their cue from an experiment in Portsmouth where speeds have fallen without t
he need for traffic calming measures.
City suburbs such as Nether Edge have been designated 20 mph as opposed to 30 mph zones for years and pressure has been growing to include more residential areas.
Instead of a blanket policy, the council has said it wants local community assemblies to decide which roads should be covered.
That remains the case but now the assemblies will be able to bid for money from a central council fund. New zones will be created as part of a rolling programme. Council leader Paul Scriven said this week: "This is moving up a gear. I think this is a really good balance – involving communities to ensure speeds on residential roads are safe.
"The old way of doing this would be for a few people to sit in the town hall and make decisions without the public being involved. Now local people will decide the changes for the streets in their area and how fast people can drive.
"But we are saying this is for signs, not road humps and build-outs.
"We want to go with the Portsmouth model where there has been a reduction in speeds on side streets from 24 mph to 17 mph using signs and trusting people to adhere to those speeds.
"It has been successful in Portsmouth and we feel it is the right approach in Sheffield."
While community assemblies will drive the agenda, schemes will be drawn up using technical advice from highways officers.
A campaign called '20's Plenty for Sheffield' has been running for months, vigorously promoted by the local Green Party with support from some community groups.
The Greens say there are more than 200 serious road casualties in Sheffield every year and that figure could be reduced significantly by 20mph speed limits. They also say lower speed limits elsewhere have encouraged walking and cycling as well as making streets safer.
Nationally the Government is reported to be backing 20 mph limits on residential streets without extra humps and speed cameras, encouraged by preliminary results from the Portsmouth experiment.
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