8 ms·

Japan halves speed limit to 30km/h on all narrow city streets

87 points by haunter 16d ago

world2vec 16d ago
Good. Everywhere in the cities the speed limit in residential areas should be 30km/h and 60km/h for everything else. No need for higher speeds in dense urban environments.
- vincnetas 16d ago
  Fun fact. In Lithuania there was a standat speed limit 60km/h. But we have this curiosity that if you exceed speed limit by less than 10km/h, there is no fine, just a warning. Basically "hey, could you please not" Because of that de facto speed limit in streets was 70km/h. So to combat this, currently we have speed limit 50km/h in cities, which translates to de facto 60km/h
  - svelle 16d ago
    It's been the same in Germany. Literally everyone drives over the speed limit all of the time. 30km/h is somewhat stuck to when it's near a school but everywhere else people just drive faster because the fines were ridiculously low for the longest time.
    - vincnetas 16d ago
      Meantime in Sweden +8kmh gets you 100€+ fine and a free lecture how speeding kills people.
- piva00 16d ago
  In Sweden it's commonly 30-50km/h for inner city streets, I think it's a good sweet spot, 60km/h has 44% more kinetic energy than 50km/h, and since most time lost in urban areas is due to stoppage (traffic lights, intersections, etc.) there's minimal change on travel times at the lower speed.
ghere 16d ago
The sign of an area run by old people
- happymellon 16d ago
  The sign of people that live in a city that understand how dangerous cars are in a shared space with people.
  - ndsipa_pomu 15d ago
    To be fair, the cars themselves aren't dangerous - it's the drivers.
    - happymellon 15d ago
      Someone running down the road shouting "broom broom" isn't that dangerous. I'm pretty sure the car plays a part.
      - ndsipa_pomu 15d ago
        Someone running down the road counts as a pedestrian though. But yes, someone driving creates the danger.
- cpursley 16d ago
  What? It’s the children who get run over by speeding assholes.
  - PunchyHamster 16d ago
    that might be news to you but those people don't give a shit about speed limits
    - cryptopian 16d ago
      Worse than that, driving can be a partially subconscious activity and people tend to drive at the speed that "feels" right. It's why the best approach to slowing motor vehicles in places with people walking is to physically design the road to feel uncomfortable driving too fast, rather than slap a 20mph sign on a wide straight road.
cucumber3732842 16d ago
>slashed from 60km/h (37mph) to 30km/h > applies to residential roads with no centre line or maximum speed signs, media report >The measures apply to about 870,000km of roads that are less than 5.5 metres wide and do not have centre lines or median strips, according to the Mainichi Shimbun. They account for about 70% of the country’s general roads, the newspaper said. So basically they went from no effective speed limit (since most people will probably not drive 60kmh on those kinds of roads if left to their own devices) to a specific speed limit on a bunch of tiny roads that the overwhelming majority of people were probably already going pretty darn slow on for the most part. I suspect this will just result in a bunch of roads that really were overdue for it getting center lines and specific posted limits getting them and not much change anywhere else.
- Firaxus 16d ago
  Anec-data, but I was in japan recently on my honeymoon, was in some big and small cities, and I was shocked at how fast people were driving on exactly these types of roads. I grew up in a neighborhood where the speedlimit is 20mph, which is slightly higher than this new regulation, so fwiw I think I can recognize when cars are going faster than that as they wiz by me. So I’m pretty optimistic about this change, better than they way things are now at least.
NalNezumi 16d ago
The article don't have a good picture of a small road. Here's an example https://kuruma-news.jp/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/20230214_gekisema_road_005.jpg?v=1676355519 https://kuruma-news.jp/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/20230214_g... Usually these roads are so small, you can barely fit a car and maybe one pedestrian on one / each side. And these streets are quite common in residential area. As in the picture, usually there are light poles along the pedestrian street. the pictures pole is pretty small but normally they're big enough you can only circumvent it by going in the path of the car, and that's a Hotspot when people get hit. I didn't even know you were allowed to drive 60km/h on those streets. Most people slowed down because the chance of damaging your car is quite high Edit: also why big American car are not that popular in Japan. You can't even reach your house for many, if you get an American car
- rwmj 16d ago
  The really big thing in Japan is you're not allowed to park ("litter") your car in the street. In fact you can't even buy a car unless you can prove you have somewhere on your own land where you can park it. It makes a big improvement to walkability and general attractiveness of neighbourhoods.
  - left-struck 16d ago
    There’s a hack though, just put on your hazards and you can park wherever you like! I’m kidding of course but I see many people do this and it’s super frustrating. Also fyi, you can buy a kei car without a parking certificate
- postepowanieadm 16d ago
  Even 30 seems a bit optimistic and 60 is insane.
  - motbus3 16d ago
    It is insane that 60 was ever considered a limit :P 20 seems much more than needed
idoubtit 16d ago
Maybe in Japan it will be effective. Since their "zone 30" creation was apparently a success, it seems probable that people will generally comply. My experience in France differs. I live in a French town where the default speed limit is 30 km/h instead of the national 50 km/h. In the street where I live, the drivers that willingly (sometimes they can't overtake bikes and slow cars) observe that limit are a tiny minority. Why would they, since there are no automated controls in the city, and police sets manual controls once in a blue moon. My street was already at 30 km/h in 2016 when the global speed limit was introduced by the city council. I'm pretty sure the mean speed has increased since then, though I don't have hard facts to prove it[^1]. At first I thought that, since all road signs were removed except on the city borders, the drivers needed a constant reminder of a limit that they'd prefer to ignore. Now I just think that people soon saw that there was almost no risk in breaking the law. [^1]: There was a study, but the methodology was so poor that it was inconclusive. They monitored the speed in a dozen streets before and after the change, but it was done for different lengths of time (one or two weeks), at different times of the year, and with explicitly no attention payed to potential popular events or roadworks. So the average speed was globally lower after the change, but in most streets it had increased!
- maratc 16d ago
  Street bumps are much more efficient in lowering speed than either "automated controls" or "manual controls". You (plus neighbours, probably) could petition your council to put one (or several) on your street.
  - sam_lowry_ 16d ago
    Street bumps damage cars, make noise and create even more pollution. I head of a neighborhood action were drivers were honking on newly installed speed bumps. Until they got removed.
  - buran77 16d ago
    The elegant way to implement such a speed limit is to have the driver do a "slalom" between things like trees or parking spots set alternatively between the two sides of the street, or green islands in the middle of the street. It forces a low driving speed without the discomfort and potential damage caused by speed bumps. Street bumps are a discomfort even for those who respect the speed limit, and sometimes for residents (more noise) so they don't have popular support unless it's a problematic area, with a low safety record. There are high tech bumps that incorporate a radar sped detector and instantly raise in front of speeding cars but there are costly and require more maintenance.
half_fish 16d ago
I remember reading a news story about how popular kei cars (compact cars) are in Japan. It feels like these traffic laws and the local conditions really go hand in hand with that.
schnitzelstoat 16d ago
In Spain it's 30km/hr in the city on most one-lane roads. Most people comply, maybe people will go 40 but I can't imagine people going 60 down them.
mcv 16d ago
Halved? So you could go 60 on narrow city streets? In Netherland, the speed limit in cities used to be 50, and even in the 1980s, people were complaining that that was too fast. Most residential streets have been 30 (or less; the street I grew up in had a limit of 5 or 10 km/h) for some time, and Amsterdam recently made it the default for all streets with only exceptions for the biggest thoroughfares. They've also experimented with closing some of those thoroughfares. Cars are bad for cities. It's a simple fact. The big advantage of cities is that everything is within walking or cycling distance, and the density is perfect for dense public transport. The only use for cars is to get out of the city. Low speed limits make cars safer, but they also encourage safer forms of transportation. It's great to see this insight take hold in more countries.
- tcp_handshaker 16d ago
  Its ironic, because the biggest danger in Amsterdam are cyclists doing well over 60 inside town narrow streets.
  - mmustapic 16d ago
    It’s not ironic. Once you remove the biggest danger (fast cars), fast bikes take the top spot.
  - kzrdude 16d ago
    You probably mean over 30-40 km/h, not 60.
    - boesboes 16d ago
      more like 15-20 km/h
    - tcp_handshaker 16d ago
      No I mean up to 60... km/h https://youtu.be/aEHIqqaPIqI https://youtu.be/aEHIqqaPIqI And you can see here "normal" bikes clocked at 36 Km: https://youtu.be/FdoViT8-s5I?t=47 https://youtu.be/FdoViT8-s5I?t=47 you get hit by one of these silent missiles, with an 80kg passenger on it, you spend weeks in hospital...you are older person, its life threatening... Amsterdam bikes are terrifying :-))
left-struck 16d ago
The headline is a bit misleading because it was already 30km/h on many narrow streets. Something about speed limits in Japan, almost no one follows them. I’ve seen police cars go past speeding cameras without their lights on while exceeding the speed limit by ~20% and everyone around them was doing the same. This sounds like it would be a super dangerous place to drive then, but the speed limits are pretty low on local roads, and instead of driving the speed limit, people drive at a speed more similar to what you’d find for a similar road in most countries. If you ever have the opportunity to drive in Japan, just drive at a speed you’re comfortable at and not faster than most of the traffic around you, and you’ll be fine. This isn’t legal advice though. The one place I wouldn’t recommend exceeding the speed limit are those very narrow roads, many accidents happen there, though they’re rarely fatal. Source: I’m working for a rental car company in Japan
- skhr0680 16d ago
  > Source: I’m working for a rental car company in Japan Then you should know the posted speed limit is low for enforcement reasons. And yes, the Japanese government and society decided to have a fake speed limit and a real speed limit, rather than change the threshold at which speeding is a prosecutable crime.
  - left-struck 15d ago
    I’m sorry, but I have no idea what you’re talking about.
    - skhr0680 14d ago
      The enforcement threshold is much lower in other countries, but the posted speed limit is more reasonable and matches a safe speed for driving. The Japanese law doesn't allow criminal enforcement until 30km/h over the posted speed limit, so the posted speed limit is very slow but enforcement for 10km over is non-existent and limited for 20km over (you'll only get a ticket if you are unlucky). There are many reasons for the gap between the posted limit and enforcement threshold in Japan, but the TL;DR is that the real-world speed that everyone drives at is generally 20km over the posted limit.
brucehoult 16d ago
Many rather wide streets in the centre of New Zealand cities have had 30 km/h speed limits since ... I think the 1990s. For example here, Willis St in Wellington: https://maps.app.goo.gl/8hHCLxCDK4C8U8Tz9 https://maps.app.goo.gl/8hHCLxCDK4C8U8Tz9 You can see it is already 30 km/h in the first streetview capture in 2008.
suzuki_yuya 14d ago
it's a huge change. it will probably cause traffic jams

87 points by haunter 16d ago

Good. Everywhere in the cities the speed limit in residential areas should be 30km/h and 60km/h for everything else. No need for higher speeds in dense urban environments.

vincnetas 16d ago
Fun fact. In Lithuania there was a standat speed limit 60km/h. But we have this curiosity that if you exceed speed limit by less than 10km/h, there is no fine, just a warning. Basically "hey, could you please not" Because of that de facto speed limit in streets was 70km/h. So to combat this, currently we have speed limit 50km/h in cities, which translates to de facto 60km/h
- svelle 16d ago
  It's been the same in Germany. Literally everyone drives over the speed limit all of the time. 30km/h is somewhat stuck to when it's near a school but everywhere else people just drive faster because the fines were ridiculously low for the longest time.
  - vincnetas 16d ago
    Meantime in Sweden +8kmh gets you 100€+ fine and a free lecture how speeding kills people.
piva00 16d ago
In Sweden it's commonly 30-50km/h for inner city streets, I think it's a good sweet spot, 60km/h has 44% more kinetic energy than 50km/h, and since most time lost in urban areas is due to stoppage (traffic lights, intersections, etc.) there's minimal change on travel times at the lower speed.

ghere 16d ago

The sign of an area run by old people

happymellon 16d ago
The sign of people that live in a city that understand how dangerous cars are in a shared space with people.
- ndsipa_pomu 15d ago
  To be fair, the cars themselves aren't dangerous - it's the drivers.
  - happymellon 15d ago
    Someone running down the road shouting "broom broom" isn't that dangerous. I'm pretty sure the car plays a part.
    - ndsipa_pomu 15d ago
      Someone running down the road counts as a pedestrian though. But yes, someone driving creates the danger.
cpursley 16d ago
What? It’s the children who get run over by speeding assholes.
- PunchyHamster 16d ago
  that might be news to you but those people don't give a shit about speed limits
  - cryptopian 16d ago
    Worse than that, driving can be a partially subconscious activity and people tend to drive at the speed that "feels" right. It's why the best approach to slowing motor vehicles in places with people walking is to physically design the road to feel uncomfortable driving too fast, rather than slap a 20mph sign on a wide straight road.

cucumber3732842 16d ago

>slashed from 60km/h (37mph) to 30km/h > applies to residential roads with no centre line or maximum speed signs, media report >The measures apply to about 870,000km of roads that are less than 5.5 metres wide and do not have centre lines or median strips, according to the Mainichi Shimbun. They account for about 70% of the country’s general roads, the newspaper said. So basically they went from no effective speed limit (since most people will probably not drive 60kmh on those kinds of roads if left to their own devices) to a specific speed limit on a bunch of tiny roads that the overwhelming majority of people were probably already going pretty darn slow on for the most part. I suspect this will just result in a bunch of roads that really were overdue for it getting center lines and specific posted limits getting them and not much change anywhere else.

Firaxus 16d ago
Anec-data, but I was in japan recently on my honeymoon, was in some big and small cities, and I was shocked at how fast people were driving on exactly these types of roads. I grew up in a neighborhood where the speedlimit is 20mph, which is slightly higher than this new regulation, so fwiw I think I can recognize when cars are going faster than that as they wiz by me. So I’m pretty optimistic about this change, better than they way things are now at least.

NalNezumi 16d ago

The article don't have a good picture of a small road. Here's an example https://kuruma-news.jp/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/20230214_gekisema_road_005.jpg?v=1676355519 https://kuruma-news.jp/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/20230214_g... Usually these roads are so small, you can barely fit a car and maybe one pedestrian on one / each side. And these streets are quite common in residential area. As in the picture, usually there are light poles along the pedestrian street. the pictures pole is pretty small but normally they're big enough you can only circumvent it by going in the path of the car, and that's a Hotspot when people get hit. I didn't even know you were allowed to drive 60km/h on those streets. Most people slowed down because the chance of damaging your car is quite high Edit: also why big American car are not that popular in Japan. You can't even reach your house for many, if you get an American car

rwmj 16d ago
The really big thing in Japan is you're not allowed to park ("litter") your car in the street. In fact you can't even buy a car unless you can prove you have somewhere on your own land where you can park it. It makes a big improvement to walkability and general attractiveness of neighbourhoods.
- left-struck 16d ago
  There’s a hack though, just put on your hazards and you can park wherever you like! I’m kidding of course but I see many people do this and it’s super frustrating. Also fyi, you can buy a kei car without a parking certificate
postepowanieadm 16d ago
Even 30 seems a bit optimistic and 60 is insane.
- motbus3 16d ago
  It is insane that 60 was ever considered a limit :P 20 seems much more than needed

idoubtit 16d ago

Maybe in Japan it will be effective. Since their "zone 30" creation was apparently a success, it seems probable that people will generally comply. My experience in France differs. I live in a French town where the default speed limit is 30 km/h instead of the national 50 km/h. In the street where I live, the drivers that willingly (sometimes they can't overtake bikes and slow cars) observe that limit are a tiny minority. Why would they, since there are no automated controls in the city, and police sets manual controls once in a blue moon. My street was already at 30 km/h in 2016 when the global speed limit was introduced by the city council. I'm pretty sure the mean speed has increased since then, though I don't have hard facts to prove it[^1]. At first I thought that, since all road signs were removed except on the city borders, the drivers needed a constant reminder of a limit that they'd prefer to ignore. Now I just think that people soon saw that there was almost no risk in breaking the law. [^1]: There was a study, but the methodology was so poor that it was inconclusive. They monitored the speed in a dozen streets before and after the change, but it was done for different lengths of time (one or two weeks), at different times of the year, and with explicitly no attention payed to potential popular events or roadworks. So the average speed was globally lower after the change, but in most streets it had increased!

maratc 16d ago
Street bumps are much more efficient in lowering speed than either "automated controls" or "manual controls". You (plus neighbours, probably) could petition your council to put one (or several) on your street.
- sam_lowry_ 16d ago
  Street bumps damage cars, make noise and create even more pollution. I head of a neighborhood action were drivers were honking on newly installed speed bumps. Until they got removed.
- buran77 16d ago
  The elegant way to implement such a speed limit is to have the driver do a "slalom" between things like trees or parking spots set alternatively between the two sides of the street, or green islands in the middle of the street. It forces a low driving speed without the discomfort and potential damage caused by speed bumps. Street bumps are a discomfort even for those who respect the speed limit, and sometimes for residents (more noise) so they don't have popular support unless it's a problematic area, with a low safety record. There are high tech bumps that incorporate a radar sped detector and instantly raise in front of speeding cars but there are costly and require more maintenance.

half_fish 16d ago

I remember reading a news story about how popular kei cars (compact cars) are in Japan. It feels like these traffic laws and the local conditions really go hand in hand with that.

schnitzelstoat 16d ago

In Spain it's 30km/hr in the city on most one-lane roads. Most people comply, maybe people will go 40 but I can't imagine people going 60 down them.

mcv 16d ago

Halved? So you could go 60 on narrow city streets? In Netherland, the speed limit in cities used to be 50, and even in the 1980s, people were complaining that that was too fast. Most residential streets have been 30 (or less; the street I grew up in had a limit of 5 or 10 km/h) for some time, and Amsterdam recently made it the default for all streets with only exceptions for the biggest thoroughfares. They've also experimented with closing some of those thoroughfares. Cars are bad for cities. It's a simple fact. The big advantage of cities is that everything is within walking or cycling distance, and the density is perfect for dense public transport. The only use for cars is to get out of the city. Low speed limits make cars safer, but they also encourage safer forms of transportation. It's great to see this insight take hold in more countries.

tcp_handshaker 16d ago
Its ironic, because the biggest danger in Amsterdam are cyclists doing well over 60 inside town narrow streets.
- mmustapic 16d ago
  It’s not ironic. Once you remove the biggest danger (fast cars), fast bikes take the top spot.
- kzrdude 16d ago
  You probably mean over 30-40 km/h, not 60.
  - boesboes 16d ago
    more like 15-20 km/h
  - tcp_handshaker 16d ago
    No I mean up to 60... km/h https://youtu.be/aEHIqqaPIqI https://youtu.be/aEHIqqaPIqI And you can see here "normal" bikes clocked at 36 Km: https://youtu.be/FdoViT8-s5I?t=47 https://youtu.be/FdoViT8-s5I?t=47 you get hit by one of these silent missiles, with an 80kg passenger on it, you spend weeks in hospital...you are older person, its life threatening... Amsterdam bikes are terrifying :-))

left-struck 16d ago

The headline is a bit misleading because it was already 30km/h on many narrow streets. Something about speed limits in Japan, almost no one follows them. I’ve seen police cars go past speeding cameras without their lights on while exceeding the speed limit by ~20% and everyone around them was doing the same. This sounds like it would be a super dangerous place to drive then, but the speed limits are pretty low on local roads, and instead of driving the speed limit, people drive at a speed more similar to what you’d find for a similar road in most countries. If you ever have the opportunity to drive in Japan, just drive at a speed you’re comfortable at and not faster than most of the traffic around you, and you’ll be fine. This isn’t legal advice though. The one place I wouldn’t recommend exceeding the speed limit are those very narrow roads, many accidents happen there, though they’re rarely fatal. Source: I’m working for a rental car company in Japan

skhr0680 16d ago
> Source: I’m working for a rental car company in Japan Then you should know the posted speed limit is low for enforcement reasons. And yes, the Japanese government and society decided to have a fake speed limit and a real speed limit, rather than change the threshold at which speeding is a prosecutable crime.
- left-struck 15d ago
  I’m sorry, but I have no idea what you’re talking about.
  - skhr0680 14d ago
    The enforcement threshold is much lower in other countries, but the posted speed limit is more reasonable and matches a safe speed for driving. The Japanese law doesn't allow criminal enforcement until 30km/h over the posted speed limit, so the posted speed limit is very slow but enforcement for 10km over is non-existent and limited for 20km over (you'll only get a ticket if you are unlucky). There are many reasons for the gap between the posted limit and enforcement threshold in Japan, but the TL;DR is that the real-world speed that everyone drives at is generally 20km over the posted limit.

brucehoult 16d ago

Many rather wide streets in the centre of New Zealand cities have had 30 km/h speed limits since ... I think the 1990s. For example here, Willis St in Wellington: https://maps.app.goo.gl/8hHCLxCDK4C8U8Tz9 https://maps.app.goo.gl/8hHCLxCDK4C8U8Tz9 You can see it is already 30 km/h in the first streetview capture in 2008.

suzuki_yuya 14d ago

it's a huge change. it will probably cause traffic jams