Researching 70Km L-Plate restriction safety

[Tony]

Hi I am currently researching the issue of the 70Km restricted speed limit. I have some questions that I hope readers of this forum might be able to help with.

There is some debate but very few facts on the safety merits of the 70km restriction. Form reading this forum it appears that different traffic officers use their discretion when deciding when to apply this law.

I am keen to bring some clarity to this issue but first I need to gather some credible research.

For this project I need to stick to facts an avoid opinions and heresay - so any references to specific research, statements, news paper articles, etc would greatly help.

Many thanks in advance for any assistance with this project. I will be happy to keep this forum appraised of any progress I make on this issue by posting to this thread.

Here goes:

1. Does anyone know when the 70Km restriction for learner riders was first introduced. (Interested if it was in the time of the 80Km general open road speed limit)

2. Was the introduction based on any safety research or recommendations by a particular party

3. In March 2008 Transport Safety Minister Harry Duynhoven announced the government is proposing removing the 70km/h speed limit restriction - which applies to learner motorcycle licence holders; Does any one know the current state/progress of this proposal?

4. Can anyone advise why the government is proposing to change this law? s the initiative based on a study or recommendation by any body or group?

5. Can anyone advise if the 70km/h restriction applies to police/traffic officers gaining their motorcyle license?

6. Does anyone know of any other countries that have a similar learner speed restriction?

[Tony]

To kick things off:

From the office of Harry Duynhoven 28th March 08

"Motorcycle safety package aims to cut high crash rate"

"... Remove the 70km/h speed limit restriction which currently applies to learner motorcycle licence holders. This restriction is largely ignored. When this speed restriction is adhered to it creates a large difference in the speed of vehicles travelling on the open road, which is a known road safety problem. Road safety research indicates this speed difference issue outweighs any benefit of lower open road speed limits for novice motorcycle riders;"

http://beehive.govt.nz/release/motor...igh+crash+rate

[JMemonic]

I am keen to bring some clarity to this issue but first I need to gather some credible research.

For this project I need to stick to facts an avoid opinions and heresay - so any references to specific research, statements, news paper articles, etc would greatly help.

Simply put you are only going to get personal experience from here, thus it would be considered opinion and invalidate your requirements, as to considering newspaper articles a valid source if half what is written in a paper is not opinion and conjecture, if Harry Dunhoven made the statement that "Road safety research indicates this speed difference issue outweighs any benefit of lower open road speed limits for novice motorcycle riders", the research must be available.

How ever if you want real life examples and will take the word if people who have had issues then just look around the site plenty of folks have posted real life examples of the dangers involved.

[discotex]

The issue is the speed differential as the previous minister said.

I'd be looking for research that shows that is an issue regardless of cage or bike as there will be little evidence in the stats that the existing law causes accidents. I can just see accidents being filed away under "speed is a contributing factor" rather than "stupid law caused crash".

My understanding was the 70km/h rule is being scrapped in the next round of legislation so you could be trying to solve something that's already sorted.

[Tank]

What I can add is that LTNZ DO NOT believe that it is safe to ride at 70km on a motor way or the open road.

When discussing this with them - they offered me the ability to go directly to my full license from my learners (ie - not finishing last 3? months of L time or completing any restricted license period).

Just to point out - I didnt even know you could do this - they suggested and offered. It was not on my application for exemption, nor was I asked to fill in any paperwork.

There exact words were "we dont want people doing 70 in a 100km area - its a recipe for disaster"

[Tony]

What I can add is that LTNZ DO NOT believe that it is safe to ride at 70km on a motor way or the open road.

When discussing this with them - they offered me the ability to go directly to my full license from my learners (ie - not finishing last 3? months of L time or completing any restricted license period).

Just to point out - I didnt even know you could do this - they suggested and offered. It was not on my application for exemption, nor was I asked to fill in any paperwork.

There exact words were "we dont want people doing 70 in a 100km area - its a recipe for disaster"

Tank many thanks for your response. Can you point me in the cdirection of whom or which department of teh LTNZ you were talking to?

[Tank]

Tank many thanks for your response. Can you point me in the cdirection of whom or which department of teh LTNZ you were talking to?

The "license Exemption team" Its only a team of 4 people - so they should all be on the same page.

[Tony]

How ever if you want real life examples and will take the word if people who have had issues then just look around the site plenty of folks have posted real life examples of the dangers involved.

Good point I have already had a llok at the real life examples discussed here. There seems to be a surprisingly wide range of situations where the 70km restriction may adversly effect safety. (some of these are not immediately obvious) I have started compiling a list of these.

[Tony]

The "license Exemption team" Its only a team of 4 people - so they should all be on the same page.

Many thanks I will contact them on Monday.

[Tony]

The issue is the speed differential as the previous minister said.

I'd be looking for research that shows that is an issue regardless of cage or bike as there will be little evidence in the stats that the existing law causes accidents. I can just see accidents being filed away under "speed is a contributing factor" rather than "stupid law caused crash".

Excellent suggestion. I found some some stuff here (that doesn't differentiate between bikes and cars but references the increasing rates of accidents with increasing differential speeds of vehicles. I suspect it may be the research that Harry Duynhoven was referring to.

http://www.transport.govt.nz/assets/...with-speed.pdf on page 18 and 23.

My understanding was the 70km/h rule is being scrapped in the next round of legislation so you could be trying to solve something that's already sorted.[/QUOTE]

Discotex, I am not sure that the proposed legislation changes gained enough momentum to become law any time soon as with the change in government Harry Duynhoven is no longer the Minister of Transport safety. It may depend on who was driving the legislation changes the NZ police, LTNZ or Harry Duynhoven. As far as I know there is little evidence on any progress since the original announcement back in December 07. The propsed legislation changes were supposed to go out to public submission last year but I don't think it ever did? Can anyone confirm?

[Big Zappa]

I suggest writing to the new transport mininster to find out the progress/state of the changes proposed by Duynhoven.

By well established convention, ministers (or more accurately their relevant Government departments) have to answer every piece of mail (even email) that is addressed to their offices within 20 working days.

In fact you could ask most of the questions to the minister directly and see what they say in the reply.

[Tony]

Just found this:
(ref http://www.beehive.govt.nz/sites/all...t_BIM%20_0.pdf)

BRIEFING
TO
INCOMING MINISTER OF TRANSPORT
PREPARED BY
THE MINISTRY OF TRANSPORT
November 2008

(Ref page 19) Land Transport Amendment Bill (No 5)
This Bill is being drafted. It will include a range of changes aimed at improving road safety, including the final package of measures to implement the Road Safety Strategy to 2010.

(The provisions of this Bill complement the changes to the Graduated Driver Licence System under the Land Transport Amendment Bill (No. 5), as part of the Road Safety Strategy to 2010.)

...The Bill also deals with all remaining provisions in the Transport Act 1962, such as parking warden powers and bylaw-making powers. The provisions of the Transport Act are currently subject to a 1 July 2009 sunset clause, that is, they will expire on 1 July 2009.

The Bill was referred to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee but public submissions were not called for.

So they need to get this thru by 1st of July 2009.

[Tony]

I suggest writing to the new transport mininster to find out the progress/state of the changes proposed by Duynhoven.

By well established convention, ministers (or more accurately their relevant Government departments) have to answer every piece of mail (even email) that is addressed to their offices within 20 working days.

In fact you could ask most of the questions to the minister directly and see what they say in the reply.

Thanks for the excellent suggestion.

I made a quick phone call to the office of the Hon steven Joyce (then Misinster for Transport). Very friendly and helpful staff.

I learned that some parts of the bill require primary changes to legislation and some parts don't. (I am guessing this means there could be different time frames for different parts of the bill. It could mean that there is opportunity for more submissions on some parts of the bill - I understand that there has been some consultation with different industry groups and BRONZ on this issue already and I think that most people who are familar with the proposed changes are very keen on them being introduced as soon as possible.

They understandably couldn't advise me of the progress off hand and suggested that I send and email so that they can get back to me with the info.

I have forwarded a summary of the research information I have accumulated and previous statements from the Ministry of Transport, ACC, LTNZ, etc on this issue

I have also asked if they could advise on Steven Joyce's posistion is on this critical safey issue?

I will post when I have a response.

[Big Zappa]

Cool

[Bryan]

I enquired a couple of weeks go regarding changes to the 70km/hr limit etc and they came back with the following response :


"There are some proposed changes before parliament at the moment in relation to changes to the motor cycle licence. At the moment these changes are in the policy development stage and have not yet be finalised on what the exact changes are. When this policy development stage has concluded it will allow for public submissions on what the proposed changes are and their effects.

I have attached a link to our website if you would like further information "
http://www.landtransport.govt.nz/rules/progress.html

The actual rule is currently being drafted for public consultation.

http://www.landtransport.govt.nz/rul...er-licensing-6

The orginal proposal contains links to other sources of information,which maybe of interest.

http://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/m...igh+crash+rate

Rumour has it that it may become law by April.