You dont see this often in the Eastern police States.

[Outbackjack]

SPEED limits on four major Sydney roads will increase to make speed zones more consistent, the New South Wales Government said today.

NSW Roads Minister Eric Roozendaal said a review by the RTA of speed limits had recommended that limits increase on the M4 Motorway at Emu Plains, the Great Western Highway in the Blue Mountains, Kissing Point Road from Parramatta to Ermington and the Bangor Bypass from Menai to Sutherland.
The M4 Motorway speed limit will increase from 90km/h to 110km/h, he said.

Mr Roozendaal said standardising speed limits would help improve safety on roads and the changes were in line with the recommendation of the government's Road User Summit held last year.

He said crash histories on the roads had been taken into account.

"This is a practical solution," Mr Roozendaal said in a statement.

"These are important local routes, travelled by millions of motorists each year."
The changes will take place within weeks.


Next thing they will bring un restricted speed zones on the open roads!!!

[Lukeyson]

Mate its not april fools yet !! lol

Very rare to see the limit upped

[whippet_zetec]

I agree, rare to see a limit upped but in all honesty those sections mentioned need to be consistent becuase the constant up and down just causes more problems as its supposed.

Then again a retarded camry driver will still go 30km/h under the limit anyway and stuff everyone up :P

[Crusin]

State election coming soon isnt there?

[WizBang]

Wil they lift the speed limit up to 110 for you guys there was talk of dropping the limit from 50 to 30 in build up areas and 90 on the country ,but 110 is a safe speed to do even on that part of the Motorway

[clontarf_x]

Originally Posted by Crusin

State election coming soon isnt there?

Nail on the head be it hitten

[Fairlane]

Bah there still dropping speed limits were i live.

Can you say ELECTION? and besides the RTA will probably find a way to lower the new limits after 18 months.

[merlin]

M4 at Emu Plains is already 110 eastbound, so must be westbound towards the mountains. I wonder if it will increase eastbound to 110 (currently it is 100 around the M7 interchange) then drops to 90 (around Parra).

[Ringo]

bring on the Victorian State election then.....it could cut serious travel time for me

[Keepleft]

Originally Posted by Outbackjack

Next thing they will bring un restricted speed zones on the open roads!!!

Gidday-
First, we need to get the signs name 'right'. (//)

Here in NSW the first stage of doing this was having "The RTA Road Users' Handbook" call the sign by its Australian Standard name, since it is this handbook that NSW driver's 'learn from and update'. This was first 'fixed' in the July 2005 edition.

You will see it is called the 'speed derestricted' sign once again, unlike in past issues where we referred to it as; "the sign showing a circle with a diagonal stripe means that there will be no more speed limit signs, - and that you may not exceed 100km/h.

Obviously, not on under AS1742.4 of 1999 (R4-2).

We (advocates and RTA staff) changed the NSW Road Design Guidlines around 2003, released mid 05 to PROHIBIT COUNCILS from using the signs, to effectively prevent the likes of Tweed Shire from mis-using them. ONLY RTA may now post these.

NOW, the only roads that would be derestricted could be certain 'lengths' of remote rural roads, a somewhat different application to NT's blanket geographical. To be decided, very political and academia is terrified.

We will not raise beyond 110km/h a freeway speed limit NOR derestrict it, yet. Certainly until two key items, and I am pushing this, are actioned:
* Median barrier is continous AND by standard; and
* U-Turn median bays are removed.

The latter point has issues in relation to certain emergency rescue services. Until this is resolved, and they have their way for now, these limits will not go up. I should point out that high-speed roads in median divided EU do NOT have such 'bays', its an Aussie/Yank 'thing', okay for low-speed conditions and vehiclular requirements such that we have in Australia.

ONE of the reasons why we have freeway 3-lane, lane-use text in driver education in NSW, IS to take into account future speed limit increases on such roads. The effect is, and will be, that people will be more lane disciplined than if we had just said 'keep left' as they currently say in VIC, QLD etc.

WA, NSW are looking at reducing the rural defaults, with WA looking at reducing the built-up area default too.

I have no real issue with this. It puts pressure on gov co then to increase allowances and has the trade off effect of reducing impact speeds to the crappy roads they serve.

[Dazza XLT]

The NT is funny, they have no limits on the smoothest widest roads, then they also have the same on the poxiest narrow 2 laned bush roads you've ever seen! Rough as guts!!
It is just not safe to travel over 110 IMHO.
But as i said, its no drama on the rest of the main highways, Alice to Darwin, Tennant to QLD etc, nice, smooth and wide!!! Nothing better!
But there will always be an in-experienced tourist in his van running off the road at 160kph.... thinking they are invincible!

[Keepleft]

[QUOTE=Darran]The NT is funny, they have no limits on the smoothest widest roads, then they also have the same on the poxiest narrow 2 laned bush roads you've ever seen! Rough as guts!!
It is just not safe to travel over 110 IMHO.

Exactly, that is the 'geographical' nature I refer above. Arrives because they do not accept (NT Trans Reg 77 from memory) the rural defualt as laid out at AUS Road Rule 25.

Now, the Australian Standard is clear - they could adopt a rural default to take into account the crappy rural roads, doing so for example could bring the existing 98% of geographical NT currently unrestricted, down to for example 8% by only using the speed derestriction signs on their highest-standard rural roads.

Called "LINNEAR" posting, basically the same on-road application as a speed restriction sign, and as applied for example on the autobahn.


Yup!

[Des]

I've found a stretch of road in NSW that's still (was recently anyway) derestricted....The road was in good knick so I had a ball!

[Outbackjack]

[QUOTE=Keepleft]

Originally Posted by Darran

The NT is funny, they have no limits on the smoothest widest roads, then they also have the same on the poxiest narrow 2 laned bush roads you've ever seen! Rough as guts!!
It is just not safe to travel over 110 IMHO.

Exactly, that is the 'geographical' nature I refer above. Arrives because they do not accept (NT Trans Reg 77 from memory) the rural defualt as laid out at AUS Road Rule 25.

Now, the Australian Standard is clear - they could adopt a rural default to take into account the crappy rural roads, doing so for example could bring the existing 98% of geographical NT currently unrestricted, down to for example 8% by only using the speed derestriction signs on their highest-standard rural roads.

Called "LINNEAR" posting, basically the same on-road application as a speed restriction sign, and as applied for example on the autobahn.


Yup!

Hey KEEPLEFT, how much driving have you done in the territory???? (Roughly how many kilometers??)

[Dazza XLT]

I have nothing against the open limit, its tops, but some of the country roads are too rough for the open limit.

[Outbackjack]

Most of the rough country roads that are being reffered to in the NT are gravel. It is just not possible to travel at much more than 100K at the best of times. Last time I drove across the plenty highway (in a 4X4) we could not get over 90k ph. The road that goes east from Daly waters (Carpentaria highway) is single lane bituman. We travel on this road during the day at 120 to 130 with absolutely no problems. The traffic so scarce that if you see 2 cars and 4 trucks in a 8 hour drive, you have had a bad day. It really erks me when people start to become road saftey experts for territorians who have never driven on our roads.

Rant over. :

[Dazza XLT]

Point Taken. And for the record, i have done plenty of miles on roads all across the Barkly and Top End.