What's your understanding of the National Speed Limit in the UK?

I’ve just realised. God I’m stupid – nobody will read my last post, and this bump of this will just start the arguments about the National Speed Limit signs again.

For this I can only apologise. I’ll get it closed asap.

The Book of Regulations 13:18

“Let him who hath understanding reckon the number of the speed, for it is a human number, its number is seventy or sixty on a single carriageway road with no streetlamps”

@DezB – I looked at it as refresher training when I did one a few years ago, it had been 35 years since I’d had any training, i.e. before I took my driving test. That’s 35 years of developing bad habits 🙁 Obviously a 4 hour course isn’t going to correct that overnight.

Thank you for that sensible post, whitestone 🙂  If the course helps me in any way, it can only be a good thing.

…this bump of this will just start the arguments about the National Speed Limit signs again.

🙂 I had the exact same confusion as the OP. When I attended a speed awareness course, they stated national speed limit is 30mph in built up areas with lamp posts, which would suggest anywhere of that description displaying an NSL sign…

Actually took me a long time and a bit of research to work out that what they were actually talking about is a default limit applied when no signs are present.

As far as the speed awareness course goes, I quite enjoyed it. You’ll get a couple of people huffing and puffing like school children, refusing to take anything in, because they obviously know better. And there will be the ones you’ll be amazed even had licences in the first place. But for the most part I think people come out a little more thoughtful about their driving. I did.

I did plan to ride there and sit through it in my cycling gear, but damaged ribs has put paid to that little scheme.

Drive there in cycle clothes, park elsewhere. Walk in.

😆 that’d be silly!

Drive there in cycle clothes, scream in to the car park at 50 mph, handbrake skid to a halt outside front  door,  abandon car. Walk in.

If only my car had a handbrake…

If only your car had a foot brake, this thread would not have been resurrected.

Bend over, take it like a Man.

If you think to ‘take it like a man’ means having to bend over, you’ve been misled by several officers.

If only your car had a foot brake

Ha! I wasn’t in MY car

Do any of the 5 previous pages apply to white van man?

Think you’re getting her up over nothing. Drive in Switzerland, the US, Germany, the speed limit is constantly changing. At least in the UK there’s a speed limit and its applied in a fairly straightforward manner.

What about roads where each side is separated by a barrier, marked as NSL, but is only a single lane on each side?  I think this is technically a dual-carriageway and a 70mph limit, uh, Your Honour.

What about roads where each side is separated by a barrier, marked as NSL, but is only a single lane on each side?  I think this is technically a dual-carriageway and a 70mph limit, uh, Your Honour.

Correct.

@Flaperon – yes it’s a dual carriageway. Dual is probably the wrong word really, “divided” would be better. As Martin says, if it’s marked as NSL then it’s 70mph limit. One of those edge cases where you have to apply several parts of the regulations.

5 pages confirms that the NSL sign is a bit confusing…

Back to the original post: I would suggest that the road you mentioned is incorrectly signposted. It should have had 60mph gateway signs & repeaters. As you pointed out, the NSL on that road would usually be 30moph unless otherwise stated. They were stating that the speed limit was the NSL (by using the NSL sign) which should be 30mph.

There should be no reason to use NSL repeaters, only gateway signs when exiting an area where NSL wasn’t applied (40 in an urban, 50 in a rural etc.).

 yes it’s a dual carriageway. Dual is probably the wrong word really, “divided” would be better.

Why? The “dual” refers to the number of separate carriageways (i.e. two, one going in each direction) not the number of lanes in each – you wouldn’t refer to one with three lanes in each direction as a “trial carriageway”

With regard to dual carriageways, dual carriageway does not mean 2 lanes in each direction, it means 2 divided carriageways separated by a barrier or a verge.

You could have 1, 2 3, or 10 lanes on each side and it would be a dual carriageway.

Ask a few too many questions and make the course over run by 10 minutes then sit back in amazement at how many people speed out of the car park on their phones.

OK, this seems like a place to ask, (was going to say sensible place, but…)

On the Deeside Industrial Park, (Welsh Deeside, not Scottish) there are at least 3 huge, but temporary 50MPH signs with a black border instead of red. The NSL repeaters on the lamp posts aren’t covered up.

Advisory speed limit, or a warning of a lower limit further on? By further on I mean about 3 miles, a couple of massive roundabouts and a major road bridge. This is way outside the limit that any traffic backing up to the speed restriction would reach.

I’d guess “mandatory limit which is technically unenforceable due to incorrect signage.”

@edlong – a lot of people mistakenly assume that the “dual” bit refers to there usually being two lanes in each direction rather than two separate carriageways (with unspecified number of lanes) that just happen to be going in opposite directions.

The OP is right though – if I saw the NSL sign I would assume that the speed limit is the national speed limit, and if I was in a built up area (<span class=”ILfuVd yZ8quc”>a settled area identified by the presence of <b>street lights</b></span>), then the NSL is 30.

From my speed awareness course:

Can you roll an orange across the road.? If no, it’s a dual carriageway.

My understanding is that there is never an unannounced change of speed limit.

it will always be marked by a large sign. But for a change to a 30 zone there will probably be no small repeater signs after the initial sign if there are street lights.

Not read past page 1 of the thread..

BUA, as indicated by the presence of streetlamps = always a 30 unless signed differently. If different, repeaters are required. Doesn’t matter if single or dual carriageway, the same rule applies.

Rural road with no streetlamps = always a NSL (white sign with black diagonal) unless signed differently. If different, repeaters are required.

NSL = 60 on single carriageway or 70 on dual for cars and motorcycles.

Umpteen variations based on vehicle class / towing.

Simples!

My understanding is that there is never an unannounced change of speed limit. it will always be marked by a large sign.

I agree if you mean a specific limit. But if the NSL applies, the effective limit will change from 70 to 60 if you go from dual to single carriageway, and there will be no speed sign, and possibly (?) no sign for the end of the dual a carriageway.

But for a change to a 30 zone there will probably be no small repeater signs after the initial sign if there are street lights.

I’ve never seen 30mph repeaters, nor a 30 limit with no street lights.

BUA, as indicated by the presence of streetlamps = always a 30 unless signed differently. If different, repeaters are required. Doesn’t matter if single or dual carriageway, the same rule applies.

Rural road with no streetlamps = always a NSL (white sign with black diagonal) unless signed differently. If different, repeaters are required.

There’s at least one village round here where the 30 limit extends a long way past the houses (doubt there are any street lamps in the village either). I’ve not measured it but its a lot more than the repeater distance for 20’s.

I did mean to query it at the time as its on one of the motorcycle test routes.

There is probably a good reason for it like a farm entrance, I just wondered what the technical requirements for 30mph repeaters were.

Well, the course was pretty good actually. Lots of stuff made me think! Especially the bit about how speed limits are only changed (reduced) on roads where stats show that the existing limits mean more accidents. I swore blind where I was caught wasn’t at all dangerous, but I guess it’s 30 for a reason.

also made me think about my passengers and how shit it is for them to be driven by such a **** (it’s not often cos, for good reason, I don’t drive much). So, hopefully, I can improve on that front.

and the dual carriageway/ national speed limit was very clearly explained- a lot of the people on the course saying they’d learned something useful in that regard.

Biggest surprise for me was the lack of arseholes in the room and (after what other people have said) the  absence of cyclist hatred.

//thread 😉