Horsham Society: Festina Lente

If you’ve ventured out along Forest Road of late towards Colgate, or left Horsham by the Hammerpond Road you will have noticed new speed restrictions. Stretches of both roads are now limited to 40mph or 30mph.

Hasten slowly said the Roman emperor Augustus, enjoining his military commanders to advance cautiously rather than recklessly endanger his troops.

Speed is a serious problem on our roads and the police are unable to summon sufficient resources to control it. Since the start of the millennium there has been increasing reliance upon the initiative termed Community Speed Watch. One of these CSW groups reportedly clocked a car in Colgate at 67mph, despite the 30 limit. So reducing the speed limit in the approach road is a sensible step. The Hammerpond road is also a rural road. There is three times the risk of being killed per mile travelled on a rural road rather than urban road.

CSW Online carries more information about their impressive work, dedicated as they are to cutting road deaths, improving communities’ lives and increasing awareness of the dangers of speed while encouraging drivers to stick to the speed limit. CSW can’t prosecute offenders, but they can report them to Operation Crackdown and the police can take legal action against repeat offenders using the CSW data as evidence.

The latest Highway Code starts off by listing road users by their vulnerability and enjoins all road users to act responsibly. Pedestrians are the most vulnerable and the consequences of being struck by a vehicle are sobering. While only 10% of collisions with pedestrians at 20mph are fatal, that number rises to 90% at twice that speed. When we recall that both the roads mentioned above are winding country roads, mostly without footpaths, the need for both caution and reduced speed is obvious.

Another recent curiosity on local roads is the roundabout at the junction of Forest Road, Elgar Way and Beech Road. The same installations feature at the two roundabouts in Southwater on Mill Straight as it joins the A24 bypass. These are added rings to the central disc of the roundabout, set in cobbles at Forest Road, and marked by thick white lines in Southwater.

Can you drive over them?

If you’re driving a car, or are on two wheels, then you should not; they are termed truck aprons and are there to allow larger vehicles to get around the roundabout which is otherwise too confined for them.

So, the conclusions are to restrain your speed and negotiate roundabouts carefully. A sensible rule is to leave a two second gap between you and the vehicle in front, and don’t drive faster than your ability to stop on the road ahead you can see to be clear.

Not everyone does. The fastest offender in Sussex, caught on a Gatso camera on the A 27 at Hammerpot was doing 157mph.

For more information see www.horshamsociety.org