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At last... signs that road humps are over the hill
• THE great road hump debate rages on, but one important part of it the pro-humpers never seem to acknowledge is that drivers hate them (Speed humps? It’s time to get over them, drivers, January 16).
Whether sinusoidal or otherwise, they are ugly obstructions across the road which are unpleasant to drive over at any speed, and equally bad for back sufferers and a car’s suspension.
Caroline Russell claims that the Highbury Fields 20mph scheme was necessary in the name of safety. The point is: the roads round Highbury Fields were quite safe before, and the humps are not saving any lives because none was being lost in the first place.
She argues that the sinusoidal humps around Highbury Fields are smooth and comfortable to drive over at 20mph and that they allow drivers to maintain a steady 20mph. In my experience this is not the case. They are still uncomfortable to drive over, most drivers still speed up between them, and many of them still drive over the 20mph limit, even over the humps themselves. So as well as being unpleasant for drivers, this scheme is largely ineffective.
Contrary to what Caroline says, there are other workable alternatives in controlling speed, if that is what is really needed. In nearby Highbury Grove, for instance, there is a radar-controlled electronic sign that displays each driver’s speed, with a warning message to slow down if it is excessive. This is far more effective than humps, and gets the driver’s co-operation rather than beating him over the head with the hump stick.
Road humps these days are widely regarded as a crude, retrograde method of traffic management. Even the famously anti-car former mayor of London dislikes them. If they are really needed they should be located at accident blackspots or near schools. Yet Islington Council doggedly pursues its ultimate aim of saturating the whole of the borough’s roads with them; it’s gesture politics and totally unnecessary.
Danny Michelson
La Fromagerie
Highbury Park, N5
• THERE are always going to be differences of opinion when it comes to speed humps, but Islington Council only puts speed humps down when residents ask for them because they are sick of some motorists driving dangerously fast through their residential streets.
It’s a shame that a minority of thoughtless and dangerous drivers have made this necessary. But there’s going to be controversy whatever traffic-calming method you use. Some people prefer cameras; some people complain that cameras are only there to get money out of drivers, and would prefer humps, which don’t give out fines.
And humps do make our streets safer. The Transport Research Laboratory was commissioned by Transport for London to research the effectiveness of the city’s self-enforcing 20mph zones. They found there has been a 57 per cent drop in deaths and serious injuries as a result of traffic accidents, because of humps. It’s proven that humps save lives.
There is also a myth going around that when Tory-run Barnet pulled up its humps the number of accidents did not increase. This isn’t true. The statistics show that Barnet had 1,392 road casualties last year and rising, which means that it is now second only to Westminster for the number of traffic accidents. Islington has among the lowest number in London.
The failed “Barnet experiment” pioneered by the Tory Party shows that, although humps have their ups and downs, when you remove them some drivers just go way too fast – and people get badly hurt.
Cllr Greg Foxsmith
Lib Dem, Hillrise ward
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