This is the best summary I could come up with:
When Bologna became the first major Italian city to impose a speed limit of 30 kilometers, or 20 miles, an hour, Luca Mazzoli, a local taxi driver, posted a sign in his cab warning passengers of the change.
Critics of the measure say that Bologna risks slowing to a standstill since it became the first major Italian city to join a growing group of municipalities, including Amsterdam; Bilbao, Spain; Brussels; and Lyon, France, that have lowered speed limits from 50 kilometers per hour, about 30 miles per hour, in the belief that the change will lead to safer, healthier and more livable cities.
To make things worse, he added, the enforcement of the speed limit has coincided with traffic delays from construction work on new tram lines around the city, as well as a detour downtown after one of Bologna’s distinctive towers had to be cordoned off.
A protest on Tuesday evening brought many dozens of cranky citizens and cabbies to the streets, where they drove at a snail’s pace in a makeshift parade, loudly honking horns and snarling traffic.
The discontent has been a windfall for the city’s center-right opposition, which has jumped on the protests ahead of European Union elections in June, and on Monday called for a referendum on the limit.
According to the city, traffic accidents were down 21 percent in the first two weeks of the new limit’s coming into force, compared with the same period last year, which included a fatality.
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20mph is School Zone speed. That’s unreasonable. I don’t know how other countries do it, but in the US that’s for a few blocks and it’s only active during the times when children are arriving/leaving school.
As someone who drives many places for their job, this would drive me insane. In fact, it’s so slow that many will probably start ignoring all speed limits, making roads more dangerous and enforcement difficult.
School Zone speed is 15km/h (9mph) in the Netherlands, which is totally reasonable considering all the kids that can and will run on the street. You can usually just avoid those streets and most 30km/h streets (standard speed in neighborhoods).
In Seattle, it’s25 MPH on most city roads, also for safety reasons.
It is called density. Bologna is five km wide and something like 13km long, although there is a motorway running along a site of the city. So you can be in any part of the city within less then half an hour by car. Bologna has a huge old town, which is not designed for cars at all and you are probably faster with a scooter.
Welcome to decent city planning.
I don’t know how other countries do it
We don’t coddle the auto industry and let them lobby competing transportation out of existence. We’re also not hostile to alternate transportation such as bicycles.
Here in the Netherlands I can bike to the coast in 20 minutes or I can take a 20 minute train to Amsterdam.
That’s unreasonable
Not in a European city.
it’s so slow that many will probably start ignoring all speed limits, making roads more dangerous and enforcement difficult.
That’s a nice slippery slope fallacy.
@Empricorn @silence7 In case you’re not being ironic I dare you to get hit by a car that’s moving at 32.19 km/h.
You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes a day, unless you are too busy; then you should sit for an hour.
@Empricorn @silence7 Also, “the murder limit of 0 is so low that many will probably start ignoring all manslaughter prohibitions, making society more dangerous and enforcement difficult.”
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