Commission says 30 km/h speed limits work as Bologna and Wales report progress
The European Commission has underlined the importance of 30 km/h speed limits for reducing injuries and deaths on the road, while also reducing pollution.
In a response to a parliamentary question Wopke Hoekstra, who has taken over as commissioner responsible for transport, since Adina Vălean was elected to the European Parliament in June, said: “the Commission acknowledges that speed is a major factor in road deaths and serious injuries, particularly in urban areas, where vulnerable road users such as pedestrians, cyclists or the users of e-scooters constitute 70% of fatalities.”
“Recent research on the impact of city-wide 30 km/h speed limits in 40 European cities points to significant benefits. On average, these speed limits led to a 23%, 37%, and 38% reduction in road crashes, fatalities, and injuries respectively.”
The Commissioner also noted that the impact on travel time is limited and the benefits in terms of improved safety and other factors “often outweigh any change in travel times.”
The Welsh government announced earlier this month that new data show that crashes and injuries in the three months from April-June 2024 declined by around a quarter compared to the same period in the previous year – suggesting that new 20 mph limits in urban areas are having an impact.
The City of Bologna in Italy has reported that in the first six months since implementing its Città 30 programme of city-wide 30 km/h speed limits, road collisions have decreased by almost 11% and injuries by over 10% when comparing to the average figures for the same period in 2022 and 2023. The most serious crashes have decreased sharply, by about -38%. Deaths have decreased by a third, reaching the lowest point since 2013 in ‘normal years’ and returning to the levels of the Covid period (where there was limited mobility). Vehicle traffic has also decreased modestly (-3%) while pollution related to urban traffic has gone down by more than a fifth. Bike sharing has almost doubled (+92%) while bicycle trips are increasing significantly (+12%).
In Germany, an update to road traffic law has made it somewhat easier for local authorities to implement 30 km/h speed limits – but a campaign group of hundreds of cities has said the changes don’t go far enough. The organisation has announced an online conference on 29 November for German municipalities looking to implement safer speed limits.