Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

A key objective of the speed limit review is to align speed limits with the safe system approach to managing safety on the road network. The safe system approach is a means of managing and developing the road network so that, by design, it is forgiving of human error and mitigates serious collisions. In response to the upward trend in road deaths in recent years, we sought Government approval to publish the Road Traffic Bill in December, with the Bill subsequently published on 25 January and due to come before the House in the next couple of weeks. It is a concise Bill, focused on addressing key road safety issues. I aim to pass it into law as soon as possible. The Bill will implement the core recommendations of the speed limit review with regard to safer default speed limits. The default limits on national secondary roads will be reduced from 100 km/h to 80 km/h, on local rural roads from 80 km/h to 60 km/h, and on roads in highly urbanised areas from 50 km/h to 30 km/h.

Reducing speed has been fundamentally proven to significantly reduce the risk of death or serious injury in road collisions. The World Health Organization has estimated that a 5% reduction in average speed could result in a 30% reduction in fatal collisions. Furthermore, the evidence shows that 50% of pedestrians struck by a vehicle travelling at 60 km/h will be killed, compared with 29% of pedestrians struck by a vehicle travelling at 50 km/h and 5% of pedestrians struck by a vehicle travelling at 30 km/h.

In addition to the Bill, the Department has commenced work on updating the guidelines for managing speed limits in Ireland. The update will seek to address matters relating to the default speed limits in support of the Bill. Although transition arrangements will be required, significant work is under way in relation to the ongoing process for the local authority reviews to make sure the process will be consistent following publication of the guidance. Also, it is proposed to leave the speed limits on the motorway system at 120 km/h, on national primary roads at 100 km/h, and on regional roads at 80 km/h. The speed limit review leaves those limits as they are. The proposed changes relate to the other speed limits I referenced.

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