Madam, - Kevin Myers is entirely right about speed limits and road safety (An Irishman's Diary, September 16th). A major reason why speed limits are so often inappropriate is that they are set for reasons other than road safety.
Local authorities set limits as much to facilitate "development" as to make roads safer. They act on the basis of so-called "representations" from people and politicians in an immediate locality, whose interest is often in having a low limit set so that planning permissions can be granted for new housing. This is often contrary to the interests of most road users and leads to the setting of ludicrously low limits.
The consequence is that there is often nothing in the character, appearance or quality of a road to indicate to a driver whether the limit is 40 m.p.h., 50m.p.h. or 60 m.p.h. When this factor is coupled with the parsimony of local authorities in erecting speed-limit signs, long stretches of our roads and dual carriageways become harvesting grounds for penalty points rather than safe highways. Drivers become absorbed either in keeping to irritatingly low speed limits on good roads, or in watching out hopefully for a rare speed-limit sign, rather than concentrating on driving safely. The entire mess leads to dangerous overtaking by drivers who might have spotted a half-hidden speed limit sign.
Local authority planning and road safety functions should be divorced, since it is clear that there is a tendency for one to influence the other. The National Roads Authority could be charged with doing the job properly instead, on the basis of road safety factors only. It might even introduce the novelty of visible speed limit signs at frequent intervals. - Yours, etc.,
HUGO BRADY BROWN, Stratford on Slaney, Co Wicklow.