There are clearly many thousands of drivers who have been caught by the drastically reduced speed limit on the A20 near Sidcup. This was reduced from 70 to 40 because of flooding when there is heavy rain which caused at least one fatal accident due to aquaplaning. The new 40 limit has been enforced with a speed camera but based on posts to a Facebook group many people were unaware of the change and have received NIPs. Sometimes several in a few days and although some are eligible for speed awareness courses, many are not and risk losing their licence.
Why don’t people go to court to contest the fines? This is an easy thing to do and you can represent yourself. Signage is clearly inadequate and easy to miss if you are joining the road from the Crittalls Corner roundabout for example.
I have in the past represented myself in magistrate courts to defend against two alleged motoring offences and won both cases. You will find magistrates are sympathetic to well argued pleas from personal individuals. Magistrates have wide discretion to dismiss cases that appear unfair or unreasonable.
If enough people defended these cases in court, then the court system would become overloaded with trivial prosecutions and the authorities would think again about these cases.
Note: ignore the fact that someone put up a false 50 speed limit sign on that stretch of road. That’s irrelevant.
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To quote from it: “As a car owner and driver, do you feel put upon by rising insurance and running costs, the high prices of new cars, and taxation? Well, that’s nothing compared to what’s coming. The War on Motorists is real, it’s global and it’s coming for you and your car”.
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The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has ruled against TfL after complaints about misleading advertisements promoting the merits of expanding the ULEZ scheme in London. It said the Greater London Authority or TfL breached its rules on three occasions, including with the suggestion that “one of the most polluted places in London is inside your car”. TfL was also wrong to have said that “most air pollution related deaths actually occur in Outer London areas” and that the Ulez had resulted in “almost a halving of levels of nitrogen dioxide” in central London.
The merit or need for an expanded ULEZ has consistently been exaggerated by TfL and by Mayor Sadiq Khan, no doubt for financial reasons. There is in reality absolutely minimal health benefits from an expanded ULEZ but it is costing Londoners many millions of pounds to needlessly change their vehicles or pay penalties.
This ASA ruling is a good example of how Sadiq Khan frequently misleads the public for the sake of justifying more taxes to fill his coffers or win political points.
In summary it’s unreasonable to prosecute people for exceeding the new speed limit when the road is dry. It’s only dangerous when there is heavy rain so specific signage to cover that was more appropriate.
TfL are proposing to introduce an additional set of traffic lights and a reduction in the speed limit on the A21 where the right turn to Knockholt has been removed. This to my mind will create unnecessary delays when asking the few people who need to travel up to the roundabout is only a minor inconvenience and is safer.
What are the causes of this? The introduction of 20 mph speed limits on many roads does not help but it’s the general mismanagement of the road network by TfL, which causes traffic congestion, and which is the main cause.
Who is ultimately responsible? It’s Sadiq Khan of course who heads the TfL board and determines London’s Transport Strategy. That is simply an attack on private vehicles and there won’t be any change unless Sadiq is kicked out in May.
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It’s time to wrap up the year with some comments on the state of driving and transport in the UK. It’s been another year where the Government has been throwing billions of pounds at building railways despite the fact that they are old, inflexible and inefficient technology. But at least some of HS2 has been cancelled.
A singular example of how inflexible the rail network is was the closure of King’s Cross and Paddington stations this week due to engineering works. The closure of London Paddington meant no mainline trains serving Heathrow Airport. There has also been disruption of rail services due to overhead power cables being damaged by storms and of course by strikes of rail workers.
Just one example of why roads are better is that I have been spending a lot of time on trips to central London hospitals in the past year. But as the local station has no step-free access and I need to use a wheel-chair, rail travel is totally impractical. So I have been using Uber at lot. Generally it’s a very efficient service although one driver failed to pick up after an hour and another gave me a bad cold.
One problem is that they tend to drive electric cars now and to ensure a long range they turn the heating off. Not at all comfortable! I am still driving myself for most journeys though and have a wheel-chair that folds up and stores in the car boot.
Sadiq Khan has continued his attack on motorists but has seemingly relented over his decision to block non-compliant Chelsea tractors being sent to Ukraine. But it will require a change to the scrappage scheme regulations to permit this.
Local councils are some of the worst culprits for undermining the use of private cars with such measures as LTNs and impractical and unnecessary 20 mph speed limits. Central Government has indicated they will try to put a halt to this stupidity but it needs vigorous representation at the local level to make some councils see sense. You can all contribute to that!
Personally I am all in favour of discouraging larger/heavier vehicles on our roads. They are damaging the roads and hence the increase in potholes. They are simply unnecessary for most people, particularly in central London. I have owned some large cars in my lifetime (the biggest was an enormous Mark 9 Jaguar) but a mid-size or smaller vehicle is now adequate for most purposes. I have therefore downsized to a Jaguar XE in the last year – with a 2.0 litre petrol engine which gives adequate performance and is efficient.
I judged it was not yet time to switch to an electric vehicle due to excessive capital cost, high insurance cost and poor charging infrastructure. That seems to be the judgement many people are making. In November 2023, only 15.6% of all new car registrations were electric vehicles but the numbers are rising.
IC vehicles with small efficient petrol engines emit very low levels of air pollution and make economic sense so the Government should backtrack on the banning of their sales. If not there will be a big demand for second-hand IC vehicles.
It just remains to wish my readers a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Just remember to drive safely at this dangerous time of the year with snow being forecast at the time of writing.
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Greg Hands M.P. has launched a petition against a new bus lane on Chelsea Embankment. It is worth signing as this is totally unnecessary and will make traffic congestion worse.
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Transport for London (TfL) is a financial basket case. Its income is much less than its costs so it has a budget for 2023/2024 of income from passengers of £5.2 billion but costs of £10.5 billion. In other words, it is spending twice its income! The difference is mainly made up by Government subsidies of various kinds including regular bail-outs when it runs out of cash.
TfL is in essence a business that provides transportation to the public and it should be run like one. Some borrowing to finance capital expenditure may be justified but the approach by Sadiq Khan who chairs the TfL Board is simply financially reckless. Income from fares should cover operating costs.
Financial mismanagement is the key problem at TfL.
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To follow on from my previous blog post on a move to block ULEZ expansion in Parliament, it would help if everyone could sign the following Parliamentary petition.
Sadiq Khan’s support in London is predominantly in Inner London, Outer London largely does not vote for him and if the vote for the London Mayor could be extended to the home counties there is no doubt that it would be the end of this petty dictator.
The home counties rely on London boroughs for jobs, shopping and medical facilities so it is unfair that that they don’t have a say in who is Mayor and their policies.
The ULEZ scheme imposes high costs on drivers in outer London and surrounding counties when many of them do not even get a vote for the Mayor of London. It also impacts those with older vehicles who can least afford the charges. The ULEZ expansion will have negligible impact on air pollution in outer London. It’s simply an unjustified way of raising taxation to fund public transport and Sadiq Khan’s mismanagement of TfL.
Let us hope that MPs and the Government support this bill although it’s always difficult to get private members bills through Parliament as they are often “talked out” by opposers.
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