More bogus 'road safety'

The new issue of wfm has more bogus 'road safety' propaganda, this time splashed across the front page. It involves a 'collision reconstruction' stunt staged at Chingford fire station for the benefit of pupils at Chingford Foundation School. Councillor Bob Belam (the man who believes in transferring motor vehicles to previously unparked-on pavements, thereby increasing vehicle speeds as well as degrading the walking environment) said, "We want to keep young people safe and this scheme is one way of doing this."

No it doesn't. Publicity stunts are meaningless and everyone who participates in them colludes with road danger, rather than addressing the key issues of vehicles designed to flout the maximum national speed limit and widespread driver contempt for basic road traffic law, which results from low penalties and a culture of reluctant, minimalist enforcement by the police.

The most effective thing the Borough could do to make the roads safe for young people would be to install speed cameras on all the roads where currently solar powered speed signs flash all day long, registering the daily indifference of tens of thousands of drivers to obeying speed limits on our local streets. (The photograph below was taken on Larkshall Road, Chingford.) That would be just a start. After that they could install speed cameras outside Chingford fire station, where vehicle speeds are clearly in excess of the speed limit.