London transport chiefs said they remain committed to bringing a 20mph speed limit to more of the capital’s roads, after newly-released data revealed it was already significantly reducing collisions.
By Noah Vickers, Local Democracy Reporter
Transport for London (TfL) is aiming to introduce the restriction on 137 miles of its own roads by 2024, which will cover both inner and outer London.
The latest wave of those 20mph speed reductions is set to take place next month – comprising a 17 miles of highway in Camden, Islington, Hackney, Tower Hamlets and Haringey.
Those roads include sections of the A503, A501, A41, A1, A10, A11 and A1203.
The changes are being made as part of London mayor Sadiq Khan’s Vision Zero goal to eliminate death and serious injury from the capital’s transport network and to enable more walking and cycling.
TfL introduced a 20mph speed limit on all of its roads within the central London Congestion Charging zone in March 2020.
Data released by TfL on Monday showed that since those schemes were introduced, the number of collisions has dropped by 25 per cent (from 406 to 304), and collisions resulting in death or serious injury have also reduced by 25 per cent (from 94 to 71).
It also showed that collisions involving vulnerable road users have decreased by 36 per cent (from 453 to 290), while collisions involving people walking have decreased by 63 per cent (from 124 to 46).
Will Norman, London’s Walking & Cycling Commissioner, said he was “delighted” to see the speed limits having a positive impact and that he looked forward to working with borough councils to introduce the limit on more roads.
“Sadly more than 4,000 people are killed and seriously injured on London’s roads every year,” said Mr Norman.
“Lowering speeds is one of the most important things we can do to reduce road danger and make it easier and safer for people to walk, cycle and use public transport, creating a safer, greener London for everyone.”
TfL said it was working with the Met Police to increase their capacity to take enforcement action against drivers and riders who speed.
It added that the Met is currently on target to be able to take action on a million speeding offences by 2024.
In 2021-22, the Met enforced 476,685 speeding offences, an increase of 72 per cent compared to the previous year.
