Daily motorbike news, views & reviews
Regional speed limits should be reduced up to 30km/h and riders slugged with a levy to fix rural roads, according to a new Austroads report. The worrying proposals are included in the Guide to Road Safety Part 5: Road Safety for Rural and Remote Areas. It points out that motorcyclist deaths have remained stable in major …
Melbourne plans to drop its CBD speed limit to 30km/h, the lowest of any capital city in Australia, following a Monash University report to council. The new speed limit will replace the 40km/h limit introduced seven years ago between Flinders, Spring, La Trobe and Spencer streets. The university research says the lower speed will protect vulnerable …
A road safety academic who advocates wire rope barriers, lower speed limits and mandatory hi-vis vests for riders, and alcohol interlocks and electronic rider aids on bikes has been honoured with a special award. UNSW Sydney Professor Raphael Grzebieta has been honoured with the 2019 Kenneth A Stonex award in recognition of his lifetime contribution to …
Future motorcycles and other vehicles may have sensors that read roadside speed limit signs and electronically intervene to limit the vehicle’s speed. Traffic Sign Recognition (TSR) is already included in some luxury cars and could soon be more widespread as automated cars, buses, trucks and even motorcycles become available. The technology uses sensors which “read” …
City speed limits used to be 60km/h, then they dropped to 50km/h, then 40km/h and now a Melbourne council wants to reduce speed limits in a special zone to 30km/h. Interestingly, the Yarra Council cites crashes involving “vulnerable road users” including motorcyclists as the reason for the speed drop. In fact, they point out that …
Queensland’s widest and best-engineered highway, the M1 from Brisbane to the Gold Coast, faces a “review” of speeds after the limit was reduced by 10km/h for the Commonwealth Games. If such a well-built road has its speed reduced, what will happen to the rest of the roads in the state? Already speeds have been reduced …
Businesses on the Oxley Highway have been impacted since the speed limit on 44km of the eastern mountain section was cut from 100km/h to 80km/h in December 2017. Save the Oxley protestor Ken Healey says business is down and there were “not many bikes” around over Easter. “Groups are not coming as they use to,” …
Rural roads without a median barrier should have a 70km/h speed limit, according to new report by the International Transport Forum that studied data from 10 countries including Australia. The report found in all 10 cases that crashes, injuries and fatalities decreased when speed limits were dropped and speed camera use increased. According to a …
Advocates of increasing the speed limits say motorists are safer because they focus more when they are driving faster, but now scientific evidence has been provided. Long-time motorcycle rider and flight instructor Peter Callil has provided relevant scientific information gained from years of safety research which started on a flight instructor course in 1988. He says it …
Motorists are being urged to slow down to 30km/h in urban areas in the fourth annual United Nations Global Road Safety Week from today (May 8, 2017). The UN “Save Lives #SlowDown” campaign (May 8-14, 2017) cites World Health Organisation (WHO) “research” that claims a 5% cut in average speed can result in a 30% …