Swedish cameras cut traffic speed

As Ireland prepares for the privatisation of its speed cameras, data from Sweden shows that average speeds on its roads fell by over 8 per cent after the introduction of 700 digital speed cameras there last year. The Swedish system is to be extended over the next few months with another 150 cameras being located at high risk locations. The cameras cost around €54,000 each.

Ingmar Skogö, director general of the Swedish Road Administration (SRA ) said signs often advertised the location of many of the cameras with many placed before junctions or roundabouts.

"The key is that we want to bring the public with us. So far the speed reduction has been better than we expected but we will need a longer period to evaluate whether this is a response, or a change in behaviour," he told The Irish Times.

Almost all the cameras were on major roads, which carry over 50 per cent of the country's traffic, and just 8 were in villages.

Mr Skogö said particular attention was being paid to speeding by heavy vehicles as four out of five trucks regularly exceed the limits.

To convince the companies of the need for change, the SRA used cameras and laser speed guns to measure the average speeds of heavy vehicles and then met managers at firms whose trucks were regularly observed speeding.

An Garda is tendering for a private company to install and operate up to 600 speed cameras on Irish roads. The Swedish camera network was installed and is operated by the Swedish police.

Sweden's approach to road safety is governed by "Vision Zero", a policy which states that fatalities on the road are ethically unacceptable. While in practice Swedish road safety officials accept that cutting road deaths from the current 430 a year to zero is almost impossible to achieve, the principle has informed almost all road safety decisions over the past 10 years.

However, in the event of a driver refusing to follow the rules by drinking or speeding, responsibility falls back on the designers to come up with a system to prevent injury and death. In essence this means reducing the opportunities for head-on collisions.

Sweden is also reviewing its national speed limits based on "biological tolerance" research, or the speeds at which crashes become fatal. According to Mr Skogö, research shows that while pedestrians and cyclists may survive crashes at 30km/h, few will survive 50km/h crash and none will survive being hit at 70km/h.

"Therefore the view we have taken is that pedestrians and cyclists should be kept totally separate from other vehicles. Where that is not possible, as in cities, the limit should be 30km/h."

The amount of roads in Sweden with this new limit has almost tripled in recent years to over 6,400km.

However, to counter driver frustration at restrictive speed limits the SRA is also testing interim and variable speed limits. The latter, using variable message signs will rise or fall depending on weather conditions, visibility and the time of day. It is hoped that greater compliance with limits will reduce fatalities by 30 to 40 a year.

Much of the SRA's work focuses on infrastructure and it has pioneered the use of "two plus one" roads, which have two lanes in one direction and one lane in the opposite direction separated with a steel wire barrier. The two-lane section alternates every two kilometres to allow safe overtaking.

A trial of the design on the N20 near Mallow was deemed a success in cutting out head-on and right turning crashes on roads and is to be used nationally where the traffic volume does not warrant a dual-carriageway.