Banner
any day today rss X

News and Comment May 2010

Index: 2009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024

15 May - Killer humps

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.

 

Return to the top of this page
Bonkers is a cookie free zone. Not a single one