Westmeath County Council this week adopted a set of bylaws to change the speed limits on several stretches of road across the county.
While each category of road has a default set of speed limits, these new bylaws refer to sections of road outside of the default limit, the council’s road safety officer Donal O’Donoghue told councillors.
Several involve the extension of speed limits of 50kph or 60kph along stretches of road where there are schools or which are prone to accidents, including at Ballinalack, the Delvin Road and Dublin Roads in Mullingar; and Killucan and Tubberclair villages.
The new limits were decided following proposals submitted by councillors for roads in their area, and in consultation with the Gardai and the National Roads Authority. No complaints or concerns were raised by members of the public, and the changes were widely welcomed by councillors.
“I would like to compliment Donal and his office on their diligence. This is about saving lives. A lot of these are around schools. Speed cameras can’t be everywhere, and we should run some kind of education programme to let people know these are coming in,” said Cllr Denis Leonard.
Cllr Paddy Hill picked up on the issue of speed cameras, arguing that the public shouldn’t be informed of their location.
“Speed limits are very important but unfortunately they are not always obeyed. The introduction of the new cameras is to be welcomed, and does have an impact on speed, but I think it is quite a bad idea to let it be known where they are placed. They should be mobile and be anywhere at any given time.”
Mr O’Donoghue said the reason the locations of cameras are highlighted is to encourage people to drive accordingly in locations with an accident history.
“It is a common misconception that these are the only locations for speed checks, but checks are not limited to these locations,” he added.
