A331 permanent 50mph speed limit introduced

A331 permanent 50mph speed limit introduced

Author
Discussion

FurryExocet

3,011 posts

180 months

Monday 27th July 2015
quotequote all
It was awesome down there today, took me 20 minutes to do the stretch from Sainsbury to the Meadows.
All because some bright spark decided to cone out the nearside lane, not because there was roadworks on at the meadows, oh no, the roadworks were the other side of the blackwater bridge!!

1 lane on the BVR, then left all the way over the bridge, caused absolute chaos

Mr Tidy

22,065 posts

126 months

Monday 27th July 2015
quotequote all
Quick update - I posted a comment on Streetlife on this same topic and got a pretty good response from a Surrey Heath Councillor who explained that it had been proposed for some time and had been reported in the media.

I thanked him and explained that I live the wrong side of the A30 so was being kept in the dark by the t***s at BFBC who didn't manage to tell me on Friday that they were completely closing the A3095 between the Golden Retriever and Birch Hill rondabouts on Saturday.

Anyway he said it is part of a plan to have a pedestrian and cycle route from Blackwater via Watchmoor Park all the way to Frimley station which is probably a better reason than air pollution.

And I remembered that when I was heading for the M3 from the Meadows last week I saw a guy walking up the verge on the A331 from the direction of Sainsburys towards the A30 and I thought at the time that seemed like a pretty bad idea (why not shop at Tesco FFS there is some pavement around there).

Someone else posted that Sainsburys staff would find it helpful to be able to walk or cycle to work - if I had to travel that way I would work in the one in Camberley rather than Watchmoor Park, kind of like I drive to shops so if I wanted a Sainsburys store I would go to Watchmoor not the one in town!

Sadly the councillor also said they were going to revise the junction at the Meadows (he reckons the busiest junction in Surrey, but that suggests he has never been to Tolworth or New Malden on the A3) so that will be another 6 months to a year of misery. Ideally I suppose they could do it simultaneous with the Camberley A30 closures and BFBC works at Rackstraws to optimise the chaos caused because the A30/A322 option to Bracknell is already getting screwed while they remove a roundabout to replace it with lights and add lights to other roundabouts!

Happy days ahead - NOTrolleyes

AlexRS2782

Original Poster:

8,025 posts

212 months

Tuesday 28th July 2015
quotequote all
FurryExocet said:
It was awesome down there today, took me 20 minutes to do the stretch from Sainsbury to the Meadows.
All because some bright spark decided to cone out the nearside lane, not because there was roadworks on at the meadows, oh no, the roadworks were the other side of the blackwater bridge!!

1 lane on the BVR, then left all the way over the bridge, caused absolute chaos
Same again today although the cones were only on the short stretch from the final lights before The Meadows banghead Thankfully I was only stuck for about 10 minutes before I got through the roundabout to Tesco. 25 minutes later around 3PM, heading in the opposite direction, and the queue was stretched all the way back past Sainsbury resulting in numerous people performing dodgy U-Turns at the traffic lights at Admiralty Way & Sainsbury banghead

The queue on the A30 was also way back to Knoll Road at one point too, although some of that was in part being caused by all the pillocks that refuse to use the Bus Lane outside of it's operating hours banghead

Edited by AlexRS2782 on Thursday 30th July 02:01

Frimley111R

15,538 posts

233 months

Wednesday 29th July 2015
quotequote all
With all those traffic lights this isn't much of an issue IMO and as long as there aren't cameras there....

Keith ctr

233 posts

173 months

Tuesday 22nd December 2015
quotequote all
Well looks like the 50 limit doesn't stop the accidents. Another biggy at the Watchmoor Point lights this morning, hope all involved are ok frown No doubt caused by the usual A331 speeders and red light chancers! smash

AlexRS2782

Original Poster:

8,025 posts

212 months

Thursday 24th December 2015
quotequote all
Keith ctr said:
Well looks like the 50 limit doesn't stop the accidents. Another biggy at the Watchmoor Point lights this morning, hope all involved are ok frown No doubt caused by the usual A331 speeders and red light chancers! smash
I narrowly avoided being hit by a speeding & red light jumping arsewipe of an E92 M3 driver there on Wednesday night banghead

I was waiting in the feeder lane to turn right into Sainsbury's and my light turned green. I went to move off and saw the headlights of the M3 banging along, at well over the new 50 limit, in the outside lane from the direction of The Meadows and decided to stop my turn as it certainly didn't look like he had any intention of stopping for his red light. As expected he blew through the red light without hesitation banghead

Maybe they should consider some red light cameras down there for 2016.

Edited by AlexRS2782 on Thursday 24th December 20:38

Keith ctr

233 posts

173 months

Wednesday 17th February 2016
quotequote all
And another smash at the same lights this morning. When will peeps learn it's 50 for a reason!! banghead

FurtiveFreddy

8,577 posts

236 months

Wednesday 17th February 2016
quotequote all
Keith ctr said:
And another smash at the same lights this morning. When will peeps learn it's 50 for a reason!! banghead
Were you there when it happened? Do you know what speed those involved were doing.

A week ago, I saw a Smart car exit the Sainsbury's junction a good 2-3 seconds after the lights in our direction had turned green. As others have said, I am pretty sure this behaviour accounts for the majority of these accidents.

You've got shoppers coming out of the supermarket wanting to save a few seconds, so they accelerate towards the lights and choose to ignore them turning red and at the same time you've got vehicles on the A331 who can see their lights a long way ahead and are trying to time their approach (at speed) to a red light so they get there just before they turn green. It's especially tricky if there are a few cars in lanes 1 & 2 blocking the view of the junction and the vehicle approaches in lane 3.

Someone jumping the lights from Sainsbury's or Watchmoor Park by just a couple of seconds can then be T-boned at a speed well below 50mph and it will turn into a very nasty accident.

What needs to change is the visibility of the lights on approach, or their phasing.

Keith ctr

233 posts

173 months

Wednesday 17th February 2016
quotequote all
Apart from the speeders/chancers the big issue is the phasing of the lights, the second the lights on the A331 turn red the Watchmoor lights change so anyone on the A331 deciding to run the lights is at very high risk. I don't know about the Sainbury's junction as don't use it enough.

I've worked in the Watchmoor estate for over 15 years, the majority of us here know that this is a very high risk junction, several colleagues have been involved in such accidents. I myself always count to three after the lights have turned green before pulling out of or across into the estate, even then people still shoot through.

I would say 8 out of 10 accidents at this junction I have witnessed or seen the aftermath of (there's a fair few!) have involved the vehicles travelling from the Meadows towards M3 jumping the lights and striking the vehicles turning into the estate from the M3 direction. Again due to the short phasing of the lights and funnily enough early morning when there's no ques at the lights to slow the traffic.


I'm just posting here every time I see an accident at the Watchmoor lights in the hope that it does make others more cautious around this junction so hopefully its not myself or one of my colleagues (again) that gets wiped out.

FurtiveFreddy

8,577 posts

236 months

Wednesday 17th February 2016
quotequote all
So we're agreed, the problem is the phasing of the lights, not the speed limit?

The real issue is why the council don't understand that.

Keith ctr

233 posts

173 months

Wednesday 17th February 2016
quotequote all
Phasing of the lights is an issue, the speed limit is not an issue, the speeders and light jumpers are an issue.

I guess the council have never sat there and checked the timing of the lights in any detail.

AlexRS2782

Original Poster:

8,025 posts

212 months

Wednesday 17th February 2016
quotequote all
Funny you should mention the timing of the lights as I've noticed since the start of this year that the phasing / delay on the Sainsbury's lights appears to have changed slightly this year.

Originally when the lights went green to allow people to turn right into Sainsbury's from the A331 the lights would also immediately turn green to allow people to turn left out of Sainsbury's onto the A331 heading towards the M3. Now when the lights go green for people to turn right into Sainsbury's, anyone waiting to turn left onto the A331 M3 bound is held on red which only turns green at the same time the lights allow traffic to turn right in the direction of The Meadows.

From what I've seen the last couple of weeks I've been shopping, all that phasing change seems to have done is encourage a few more idiots to perform illegal U-turns and head back towards the M3 frown

Edited by AlexRS2782 on Wednesday 17th February 18:08

PK42

250 posts

136 months

LHRFlightman

1,930 posts

169 months

Tuesday 18th June 2019
quotequote all
As of this morning, the A331 is now a 50mph road, from the A31 to the M3.

Speed cameras will no doubt follow shortly, and the Police camera van will be parked up on the bridge at North Camp imminently I suspect.

You have been warned.


krisdelta

4,566 posts

200 months

Tuesday 18th June 2019
quotequote all
LHRFlightman said:
As of this morning, the A331 is now a 50mph road, from the A31 to the M3.

Speed cameras will no doubt follow shortly, and the Police camera van will be parked up on the bridge at North Camp imminently I suspect.

You have been warned.
Jesus, REALLY?! 70 mph is usually the minimum speed along there! I know there have been a few accidents (like any major road), but it's well sighted with excellent slip roads. Does anyone have any background as to "why" ?

AlexRS2782

Original Poster:

8,025 posts

212 months

Tuesday 18th June 2019
quotequote all
LHRFlightman said:
As of this morning, the A331 is now a 50mph road, from the A31 to the M3.

Speed cameras will no doubt follow shortly, and the Police camera van will be parked up on the bridge at North Camp imminently I suspect.

You have been warned.
Yep. I think i posted on the A24 speed reduction / camera thread earlier this year about this.

It's something that's evidently been long in the planning and, when i'd been reading about it last year, the 50 limit was originally going to be introduced on a trial basis, at some point by this summer, but only as far as the Coleford Bridge / Mytchett junction. There was a consultation run late last year about environmental concerns and accidents on the stretch between Farnborough Gate & Coleford Bridge.

Earlier this year the various councils suggested an amendment to the consultation that said the original 50mph reduction should ideally be extended in the long term as far as the A31, and from what i could find out it also looks like the entire A31 from Guildford to Farnham will likely be dropped to 50 at some point too.

Looks like the reasons for the drop are the usual split between mainly reducing pollution but also reducing speeding & encouraging people to use the walking & cycle routes along the Blackwater Valley relief route. Any future reduction on the A31 appears to be due to Guildford council desperately still trying to force through planning permission to redevelop the countryside areas, along the Hogs Back, Wanborough, Puttenham, etc, and turn them into a massive out of town housing development frown

Edit - did a bit more searching and found this from the official report - seems like Surrey Police aren't particularly impressed about any reduction along the full length of the A31 and have even asked how exactly the relevant councils would expect to enforce the limit.

SurreyPolice said:
Whilst we [Surrey Police’s Road Safety & Traffic Management Team] have not indicated an official objection at this time, we reserve the right to submit such an objection at the formal consultation stage. At that time you may be in a better position to shown what the full proposals are by the government and yourselves on how it is envisaged that this 50mph limit will be enforced (which does not meet your Speed Limit Policy).

It must be remembered that all of the environmental benefits that are being suggested for this scheme comes not through just lowering the speed limit to 50mph, but ensuring that drivers actually drive at that speed. An unrealistic speed limit that cannot be enforced and that drivers do not conform to will not achieve any environmental improvement and will just lead to a general disregard for all speed limits
Based on the above, i assume the various councils that the 331 runs through will all be applying for government funding for average speed camera installation before the end of 2019 (just like the A24).

Edited by AlexRS2782 on Wednesday 19th June 19:29

FurtiveFreddy

8,577 posts

236 months

Tuesday 18th June 2019
quotequote all
So does that mean electric car drivers can carry on driving at a sensible speed?

No, I thought not.

LHRFlightman

1,930 posts

169 months

Tuesday 18th June 2019
quotequote all
Drove from M3 all the way to beyond Coleford Bridge Rd at the new 50 mph tonight. For some reason is still NSL beyond that. At least to Ash.

99% of everyone else on the road was doing 70+. There's going to be an almighty accident on that road.

Mark my words. censored

flimper

560 posts

182 months

Tuesday 18th June 2019
quotequote all
This is a disaster

Solocle

3,247 posts

83 months

Tuesday 18th June 2019
quotequote all
Given that this country is rapidly moving towards electric vehicles, in 30 years time, we're going to have a load of "environmental speed limits" on roads populated by electric cars. Utter nonsense.