Let communities have their say on speed limits: Minister urged to remedy unfair and dangerous speed rule
Hero image supplied by Bike Auckland
"As locals we know our neighbourhoods and our streets best. We're asking the Minister of Transport Chris Bishop to make it easier to consider local views before raising speed limits where we live, work, shop and go to school," says Marie Guerreiro, Executive Director of All Aboard.
Ms Guerreiro is speaking on behalf of a group of leading road safety experts and transport advocates, who are calling on the Minister to allow local discretion on speed limit changes that will make streets across Auckland less safe.
There is growing alarm at the scale of unsafe speed limits about to be imposed on over 1,500 streets across the Auckland region. The costly change is set to happen on 1 July regardless of public support for safe speeds in neighbourhoods. The safe speed zones that have been rolled out across Auckland since 2020 have saved an estimated 80 people from serious injury or death. The evidence suggests safer speed areas also enable more children to walk, cycle or wheel to school.
The group, which includes All Aboard, Bike Auckland, Living Streets Aotearoa, Walk Auckland and Brake the road safety charity, welcomes the Minister of Transport's commonsense move to invite community views on some State Highway speed changes around the country, and urges him to apply the same reasonable and fair approach to our largest city.
"We welcome the sensible decision to give NZTA Waka Kotahi the discretion to take public feedback into account regarding speed reversals on some state highways," says Caroline Perry of Brake, the road safety charity. "The logical next step is to grant the same opportunity in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, before imposing widespread speed increases across our communities and around our schools.
“The Minister must recognise the depth of support from Aucklanders to keep our tamariki safe 24/7, and across their whole journey to school, not just a limited window around drop-off and pick-up right at the school gate. Primary-age children aren’t able to accurately determine the speed of vehicles travelling over 30km/h, so wider safe speed zones are vital to reducing the risk of someone being killed or seriously injured,” says Ms Perry. [1]
Freemans Bay School is a prime example of the potential confusion and danger for children and young people. Its primary-age students have led the way in promoting safe speeds on behalf of Auckland Transport, and the wider community welcomed a safe speed zone for the whole Freemans Bay suburb.
The new rule will lead to a bizarre situation in which drivers coming from neighbouring 30km/h zones will be encouraged to speed up to 50km/h as they approach the school. They will then encounter a very short stretch of 30 km/h at the school gate, but only for brief periods on weekdays.
The group of experts points out that as well as being nonsensical, the new arrangement will be dangerous. It creates uncertainty for drivers, and exposes children to danger in the places where they spend time, including after school and on weekends, which is when 85% of deaths and serious injuries happen around schools.
The group believes the Minister can help resolve ridiculous situations like these, by calling for a sensible pause to assess unintended consequences.
“Our children deserve to be able to travel safely to and from school at all times,” says Tim Jones of walking advocacy group Living Streets Aotearoa. “Knowing their children can walk safely to school and back will free up busy parents and caregivers to get on with the rest of their lives, reducing congestion and helping everyone to be more productive and healthier.”
The justification for the speed limit increases remains weak. In 2024 the National Technical University of Athens published a review of 30km/h speed limits across 40 different cities in Europe (including London, Brussels, Paris and Helsinki) which found that safe speed limits reduce the risk of crashes while also reducing traffic congestion by an average of 4% and fuel consumption by 7%.
The group reminds concerned Aucklanders that now is the time to speak up.
Karen Hormann of Bike Auckland says “We’ve heard from so many Aucklanders that they are incredibly worried about this. They have every right to be. We encourage everyone who is concerned about this to write to the Minister. Ask him to fix the speed rule, to give Aucklanders the same opportunity other New Zealanders have, to have our say before any move to raise local speeds.
“We all have the right to be heard, and we all deserve reassurance that our local authorities can and will consider the evidence on safe operating speeds, especially around schools.”
[1] Traffic at 30mph is too fast for children’s visual capabilities, University of Royal Holloway London, 2010
NOTES
Auckland Transport’s award winning Safe Speeds programme and Katoa, Ka Ora Auckland Speed Management Plan were developed based on evidence and following the Vision Zero principle that nobody should die or be seriously injured on our roads. Over the first 24 months of implementation, Auckland saw a remarkable 30% reduction in deaths and serious injuries (DSIs) on roads where speed limits were lowered, compared to a 9% increase in DSIs on roads where no changes were made. Moreover, 78 per cent of school leaders in Auckland supported permanent safe speed zones around schools in Auckland Transport’s speed management plan consultation.
The speed rule requires Auckland Transport to reverse speed limits for “specified roads” by 1 May 2025 and to set variable speed limit of 30 km/h outside school gates during “school travel periods” by 1 July. The evidence from research in Auckland shows that 85 per cent of DSI on streets outside schools occur outside those hours.
Bike Auckland, Brake, Living Streets Aotearoa and All Aboard Aotearoa wrote to Auckland Transport on 5 March in relation to the Land Transport Rule: Setting of Speed Limits 2024 (“the Rule”) and Auckland Transport’s assessment of the roads on which speed limit changes will be reversed.
We represent organisations that have all worked with Auckland Transport and Auckland Council to make our roads safer, and have supported Auckland’s award-winning world-class Safe Speeds Programme which has resulted in fewer deaths and serious injuries.
Attachments:
Letter to the Minister from Bike Auckland, Walk Auckland, Brake, the road safety charity, All Aboard Aotearoa and Living Streets Aotearoa dated 4 April
Letter to the Minister from Freemans Bay Principal Cindy Walsh (shared with permission)
Contacts:
Chair Karen Hormann, Bike Auckland ph 021 459 256
Chair, Walk Auckland Jenifer Silva ph 021 427835
Executive Director Marie Guerreiro, All Aboard Aotearoa ph 022 4586 353
Director Caroline Perry, Brake, the road safety charity ph 021 407 953
President Tim Jones, Living Streets Aotearoa ph 027 359 0293
