A correspondent in Welling has reported something that didn’t make the local
newspapers as far as I know. A quad-bike rider hit and demolished his neighbour’s
garden wall and may have demolished his own neck and spine too. The ambulance
crew said it was too dangerous to drive the seriously injured rider to hospital
because of all the speed humps and had to call out the air-ambulance from the
London Hospital in Whitechapel. What extra costs did Bexley cause the NHS? I’m
told that last July a near identical situation arose close by.
Do speed humps really save lives? There have been
reports that they damage tyres
and kill more people through high-speed
blow-outs than they can ever save by
encouraging slow speeds. More enlightened councils have removed speed humps.
Barnet council removed its speed humps and found the accident rate dropped by 14·9%.
But the words enlightened and Bexley council are not often seen in the same sentence.
The vice-chairman of their Traffic Scrutiny Committee no less, councillor John Davey,
used the word bonkers in connection with Bexley’s road planning, and it most certainly is.