6 February 2012

40 zones are back

6 February 2012 | By johnboy

ACT Policing is advising motorists that 40km/hr speed limits will be enforced in school zones for the start of the new school year which commences today (Monday, 6 February).

Superintendent Kylie Flower said the school zone restrictions are in place between 8am and 4pm and warns motorists there will be tough penalties for those who choose to ignore them.

“The 40km/hr speed limit is critical in school zones because it gives motorists extra time to stop in an unexpected situation, like when a child steps out on the road to cross without looking,” Superintendent Flower said.

“Being the first day of school for 2012, it is important to remember that children, especially the younger primary school children, may be a little more excited about getting to school, and don’t have the same road safety awareness they’d normally have. With that in mind drivers should take extra care when driving through a school zone.”

ACT Policing’s Traffic Operations and General Duties members will be paying special attention to school precincts throughout the week targeting speeding drivers and/or those parking illegally.

[Courtesy ACT Policing]

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Valleyboy10:27 pm 06 Feb 12

bigfeet said :

I never understood why it was required around colleges. If you can’t cross the road at that age there is really no hope for you. Most of them have drivers licenses anyway.

This is just what I’ve been saying for a long time, especially in the case of the students at Lake Tuggeranong College bitching about how they lost their free parking when pay parking was introduced to the town centre.

Good grief, kiddies — if, by the time you enter college, your road sense, distance perception and the rest of it aren’t sufficiently developed to allow you to cross Cowlishaw Street to school competently without the assistance of an all-day 40 km/h mollycoddle zone (like little primary school kids), then you’re certainly unfit to be behind the wheel of a car either as a licensed driver or as a learner — so the whole question of student parking should be moot.

College students ought to be embarrassed at being treated like developmental retards while kids who leave school before Year 12 and get a job can obviously cross the street to get to work without special assistance, just like grown-ups.

bigfeet7:56 pm 06 Feb 12

ThrowawayAccount said :

Except outside Canberra College today, where they seem to have forgotten to put the 40 km/h school zones signs back up….

I never understood why it was required around colleges. If you can’t cross the road at that age there is really no hope for you. Most of them have drivers licenses anyway.

It also seems odd why it is not required around Child Care Centres.

ThrowawayAccount5:47 pm 06 Feb 12

Except outside Canberra College today, where they seem to have forgotten to put the 40 km/h school zones signs back up….

Cantoangel2:39 pm 06 Feb 12

I was wondering why there were more bad drivers than usual today – people swerving in and out closely without indicating, tailgating and speeding. Then I drove past the 40 sign and realised school was in and it all made sense.