Speeds may be raised to 130 on certain highways and expressways
18 - 11 - 2014
The DGT has announced this increase to 130 kilometers per hour in certain stretches.
The current Government has promoted a new Traffic Law that allows raising the speed on highways to 130 kilometers per hour. In the absence of the new General Traffic Regulation, which should reflect this measure, the DGT calculates that this new limit could be applied in about 1,500 kilometers of highway and freeway of the more than 600,000 kilometers of public roads in Spain.
This was indicated this Tuesday by the deputy director general of Mobility of the DGT, Jaime Moreno, who said that this assessment was made when the initiative was launched: “Therefore, when the regulatory development is made, we will go back to the owner of the road to know the exact figure”. A document that will be a reality in “very short months”, according to the head of Traffic, María Seguí, who explained that the new regulation “is already closed on our part”. “Now, everything depends on the decision taken by the Council of Ministers”, she added.
This new speed increase -depending on traffic density, weather conditions and the accident rate of the road- is part of a Traffic plan for “intelligent and variable speed management”.
There are different opinions about the suitability of such a measure. Mar Cogollos, director of the Association for the Study of Spinal Cord Injury (Aesleme), has rejected this order: “36% of fatal accidents or accidents with serious victims are caused by a run off the road. And the higher the speed, the more serious the consequences”. Jacobo Díaz, general director of the Spanish Road Association (AEC) states “There is not so much a problem of excessive speed as a problem of inadequate speed [to the external conditions of each moment]. That is where the accident rate problem lies”.
The increase of the speed limit to 130 has also found the support of the RACE, which has presented a study where, after surveying 876 motorists, it assures that 80% of Spanish drivers agree with raising the limit on highways and freeways. The report also states that 60% defend lowering the speed to 110 km/h depending on the weather or the level of traffic; and that 50% support lowering the limit to 90 km/h on secondary roads.
This was indicated this Tuesday by the deputy director general of Mobility of the DGT, Jaime Moreno, who said that this assessment was made when the initiative was launched: “Therefore, when the regulatory development is made, we will go back to the owner of the road to know the exact figure”. A document that will be a reality in “very short months”, according to the head of Traffic, María Seguí, who explained that the new regulation “is already closed on our part”. “Now, everything depends on the decision taken by the Council of Ministers”, she added.
This new speed increase -depending on traffic density, weather conditions and the accident rate of the road- is part of a Traffic plan for “intelligent and variable speed management”.
There are different opinions about the suitability of such a measure. Mar Cogollos, director of the Association for the Study of Spinal Cord Injury (Aesleme), has rejected this order: “36% of fatal accidents or accidents with serious victims are caused by a run off the road. And the higher the speed, the more serious the consequences”. Jacobo Díaz, general director of the Spanish Road Association (AEC) states “There is not so much a problem of excessive speed as a problem of inadequate speed [to the external conditions of each moment]. That is where the accident rate problem lies”.
The increase of the speed limit to 130 has also found the support of the RACE, which has presented a study where, after surveying 876 motorists, it assures that 80% of Spanish drivers agree with raising the limit on highways and freeways. The report also states that 60% defend lowering the speed to 110 km/h depending on the weather or the level of traffic; and that 50% support lowering the limit to 90 km/h on secondary roads.
