20 Is Plenty

It was decided to concentrate on a small number of very important local campaigns. The first is “20 is plenty”. This is a national campaign that has been gaining momentum recently.

Local councillors Will Forster and Louise Morales are keen to support us. This campaign should benefit all children and adults regardless of how they choose to travel, particularly the vulnerable.

Where a non motorised road user is hit by a car travelling at 20 mph, there is a 97.5% rate of survival;

The survival rate drops to about 80% when hit at 30 mph and this drops to about 10% when hit at 40 mph.

In addition, every 1mph drop in average vehicle speed also reduces crash frequency by about 5%.

I’m a driver. It will take too long to get to my destination.
It is correct that if you travel at a steady 20 mph then your journey will take 50% longer than at 30 mph.

However, on our roads today it is very rare that you can travel at a constant speed of 30 mph. Bends, blind spots, parked cars, junctions, pedestrian crossings, cars turning right, traffic lights and many more things mean that you have to slow down or stop very often. Indeed, the maximum speed at which you can drive at between obstructions merely increases the time you have to wait at the next obstruction.

Also most places will be within a third of a mile of a 30 mph arterial road. Hence the maximum increase in actual car journey time from introducing 20 mph on the residential roads would be 20 seconds at each end of the journey. In reality this would be far less. So 40 seconds is the maximum expected increase in journey times.

Far from slowing a town to a crawl, 20 mph in residential areas makes hardly any difference at all to journey times.

We need your help!
As we found with our Bedser Bridge campaign, the more voices we have, the stronger our position.

This is not an anti-car campaign, in a way it is a pro-driver campaign. It will save drivers fuel, wear and tear and will hardly affect journey times. It will make driving a more pleasurable experience.

We need help.

Are you in a community group that will add their voice to this campaign? A school, scouts, churches, girl guides, nursery, parent and toddlers, runners, walkers, disability groups, neighbourhood watch, etc?

Please contact us via d_batstone@hotmail.com with your email address which we will use to keep in contact with you. Together we can make the Woking area a nicer, safer place to live.

Some web links with useful information:

http://www.20splentyforus.org.uk/index.htm
http://www.slower-speeds.org.uk/campaigns
http://beta.ctc.org.uk/campaign/20-mph-lower-speeds-better-streets