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A6 danger warning: Call to cut speed limit

8:01am Tuesday 6th May 2008

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AN accident plagued road should have its speed limit cut, a councillor has said.

Cllr John Barrow, who represents Horwich and Blackrod on Bolton Council, wants the 60mph hour limit on the Blackrod by-pass reduced to just 40mph.

His call comes days after a lorry driver had to be airlifted to Wythenshawe Hospital in Manchester when his truck smashed through a fence on the A6 after a crash with a BMW. He suffered serious internal injuries.

The A6 has proved to be an accident black spot in recent years. In February a lorry overturned at a roundabout close to the bypass. Days after that a pensioner was hit by a car while walking his dog. He later died.

In October 2005, mother-of-two Eileen Ruxton was killed when her car careered across the road.

Cllr Barrow, a Conservative councillor, said: "The situation has improved since traffic lights were installed at the junction with Manchester Road but there are still accidents.

"The only way to help the situation is to reduce the speed limit on the entire bypass to 40mph instead of the national speed limit, which is what it is at the moment.

"I will be raising the issue at a council meeting."

Cllr Nick Peel, Labour's executive member for highways, said: "I'm very sympathetic towards this issue. This is not the first time people have brought it up.

"If Cllr Barrow puts in a request with the highways department for the speed limit to be looked at, then officers will look into it.

"The number one priority for me in terms of highways is road safety and if anyone makes a request for a speed limit on a given road to be reduced we would consider it very seriously."

Anyone with any information about Friday's crash, at about 1.15pm, is asked to call the police on 0161 856 7201.

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BoltonDave, Tonge Moor says...
9:26am Tue 6 May 08

I wonder if either one of these was using their mobile phone?
I have had a few near misses, in particular with lorry drivers, using their mobile while driving.
The new laws don't seem to have made much, if any, difference.

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Dave, Westhoughton says...
9:49am Tue 6 May 08

The whole point of a by-pass is to get people from A to B quickly without going through Blackrod village .. Reduce it to 40 and you will have more accidents as the people who use it get frustrated by the slow speeds and overtake other people, thus meaning more accidents and then the need to install traffic islands, at the expense of the council tax payers, who then start going through Blackrod because it will be quicker than using th by-pass ..

Cllr Barrow .. This has nothing to do with the big new housing development thats being built, and their concerns about the safety of people trying to get out of the side road onto a 'deristricted' road, has it?

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Andy Jones, says...
10:05am Tue 6 May 08

The A6 has proved to be an accident black spot in recent years. In February a lorry overturned at a roundabout close to the bypass
Close to? I've just checked on Google Earth and it's three quarters of a mile away! And it's a 40mph limit at that point anyway, so what has that accident got to do with anything, other than to show that crashes happen at 40mph too?

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Andy Jones, says...
10:26am Tue 6 May 08

"The only way to help the situation is to reduce the speed limit on the entire bypass to 40mph instead of the national speed limit, which is what it is at the moment.
I'm amused that John Barrow is so sure that reducing the speed limit is "the only way". I'd like to know what evidence he has for this and what studies he has either comissioned or personally undertaken to come to this conclusion. Or perhaps, did he just make a crass assumtion based on nothing at all?

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Hagen, says...
10:27am Tue 6 May 08

Not sure how this accident happened no details have been given but the accident black spot there is the junction on the A6 where the lights are now where its splits off to Blackrod heading from Westhoughton, I'm sure accidents will reduce there now but there have still been accidents at the lights due to careless driving.

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OldBoltonian, says...
10:56am Tue 6 May 08

"Accidents" arre 99% the reuslt of bad driving - an d I'd suggest a great number of the "accidents" rteported here seem to involve lorries too. Why shoudl th rest of us be forced to creep along like slugs just because some fool halfwit lorry driver fancies a chat with his missus on his mobile? Typical knee-jerk populist councillor reaction too; guess what, numbnuts, bad drivers still manage to crash at 30 and 40mph. Taken to its logical extreme the only safe road is one with no traffic on it.....

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Horwich Allstars, Horwich says...
11:25am Tue 6 May 08

It'sa nice wide road with good visability. The speed of 60 is fine on that road. The problem that you have people who are not happy with going at 60mph and want to go faster, and make stupid overtaking manouvers, in order to get to the light at the Ridgeway quicker.
As you can tell, I have been overtaken a number of times on this road...whilst doing 60.
Stick a speed camera on it - legitimate drivers doing 60mph will be fine. Idiots doing 70mph will not.

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Howfenbornnbred, Westhoughton says...
11:27am Tue 6 May 08

60mph means 70/80mph to some people.

also, they overtake on stupid places and this causes accidents if there is a wide vehicle on the other sied (such as a lorry).

Idiots will always be idiots even if it's 40mph

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Andy, Horwich says...
1:00pm Tue 6 May 08

I think the idea to put a 40 mph speed limit is a misguided kneejerk reaction. As other people have said it is poor driving that causes accidents, not simply speed. Let's find out why the accident occured first. Like other readers I see people driving and talking on their mobiles on a daily basis. If this was the cause, maybe we need to be more serious about tackling this issue. Creating another area where drivers are legally obliged to stick to a slower speed limit than the speed that can be driven safely by most drivers will not solve the problem, it will simply move it to somewhee else!

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John, says...
4:00pm Tue 6 May 08

I've used this road for 50 years. There is nothing wrong with the road, it's the idiots and the "Sunday drivers" who cause the problems. St Peters Way (Farnworth bypass) was reduced from 60 to 50. What a "pigs ear" that is. People suddenly put their brakes on and drop to 40 when they come to the camera's, nearly causing accidents. Maybe they want to drop the limit at Blackrod, so they can call it a congestion and put a charge on, and a camera as well? I wonder.


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Boltonian, Bolton says...
5:05pm Tue 6 May 08

There is nothing wrong with the road, the speed limit or the vehicle. The truth of the matter is the idiots who drive beyond the cpabilities of themslves and the vehicle they are driving. We need education for drivers, and to have drivers regularly tested, say, every 5 years in order to keep their licence. This is especially true for drivers of HGV's. I endorse whta others have said about the use of mobile phones when driving. It has happened to me, including one lady who was texting whilst overtaking me on Snydal way. The councillor seems to forget that it is govenment who have taken away the traffic police (when did you last see one?) and replaced them with the "Highways Agency" drivers who close the motorways. We need to get back to sane sensible policing as soon as possible.

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notsurprised, BL says...
6:14pm Tue 6 May 08

So we have accidents on a wide, open stretch of road, with a number of entrances onto it, particularly at the Blackrod one.

Is it speed that causes the accidents - of course not, it's stupidity - speed IS the major causal factor in less than 3% of accidents (but they lie and tell you speed causes a third of all accidents). These accidents are caused by muppetry, not speeding.

I wonder whether someone worked out just how much hypothecated revenue could be gained from speed cameras on the A6 - mobile ones in the 40 zone to catch us overtaking on the wide open stretches with clear visibility.... - but no, we'll say speed kills and no doubt, "won't anybody think of the children" is next. Pathetic.

If you can't pull out onto a thoroughfare properly and safely, you should not be driving, most pedestrians hit by cars are in the road (save for the really unlucky ones) - and at night, more than half of those are too drunk to be allowed to drive.... but no, it's the drivers at fault, and it's all to do with speed. Rubbish.

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OldBoltonian, says...
8:35pm Tue 6 May 08

Hear hear Mr Not! An eloquent and thorough recapitulation of my own views. NOw let's ahve a proper debate on how to rid our roads of these inbred numpties - starting with WhiteVanMan I think.....

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nomis, westhoughton says...
10:47pm Tue 6 May 08

I agree with the earlier comment about the overturned HGV its nowhere near this.The problem here is bad driving and impatience. Obvioiusly no cause of this accident has been established but a lorry was involed and these are restricted of 40 mph on the bypass. Reducing the speed limit will make no difference to idiots on the road who have no respect for speed limits. Further along the A6 the limit has been reduced from 40 to 30 between slack lane and barnabys road. What difference has it made ? NONE. Accidents are still occuring on a weekly basis and hardly anyone keeps to 30. Only the other day a HGV came behind me flashing its lights coz i was doing 30. Why reduce a limit and not police it ? If a mobile camera was put in the 30 zone they would make a fortune. At night cars regulary got along the A6 at 70 - 80 MPH. They shake the windows as they pass

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notsurprised, BL says...
7:51am Wed 7 May 08

Nomis, that 'truck' is a 7.5tonner - it's not limited to 40 on A roads. 99 times in 100 the fault is not the van/truck driver - this was a head on crash - so someone was on the wrong side of the road - care to bet whether it was a 7.5 ton LGV that will take a long time to accelerate up to that limit in which the driver is acutely aware that he is sat in a tin can and has no protection or the 3 series ? I know where my money is.


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john, blackrod says...
2:48pm Wed 25 Jun 08

Most people who have made comment on this subject seem to agree,including myself, that the main cause of accident in this ,or any other area, is caused by human error.Speed restrictions can of course work but you cannot account for people hell bent on exceeding these limits.However another major contribution is the volume of traffic on local roads.I hope the Bolton councillors take this into account when considering a current planning application which will increase HGV vehicles on this road,and others, by at least 46 trips per day.In other words the chance of human error being increased by allowing at least 230 extra HGV trips per week.

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linz, little lever says...
4:36pm Mon 30 Jun 08

Dave wrote:
The whole point of a by-pass is to get people from A to B quickly without going through Blackrod village .. Reduce it to 40 and you will have more accidents as the people who use it get frustrated by the slow speeds and overtake other people, thus meaning more accidents and then the need to install traffic islands, at the expense of the council tax payers, who then start going through Blackrod because it will be quicker than using th by-pass .. Cllr Barrow .. This has nothing to do with the big new housing development thats being built, and their concerns about the safety of people trying to get out of the side road onto a 'deristricted' road, has it?
need to install traffic islands, at the expense of the council tax payers why would it have to be at the expense of the tax payer could the council not use the £1m it is getting for the development at Westhoughtons Cricket club or is Blackrod too far from Westhoughton for all of its tight fisted residents that want the money to be spent in Westhoughton Only? Share and Share Alike

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Pictures from The Bolton News on Saturday How The Bolton News reported the latest crash at the weekend

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