Speed limit applications will be made by Latrobe City Council in a state-wide bid to rollout more 40 kilometre per hour zones – both fixed and time sensitive.
Council is investigating requests for permanent 40km/h zones in Murray Road and Southwell Avenue in Newborough to be changed to school zone time-based 40km/h.
Speed limits are being lowered to improve safety for pedestrians around schools, shopping and entertainment zones under Victoria’s Speed Limit Review process.
Under the new guidelines, councils will get the option of replacing static 40km/h school speed signs with time-based 40km/h zones on their own roads.
Latrobe City Council has already made the successful VicRoads submission for a 40km/h zone in Commercial Road, Morwell as part of the review to introduce a 40km/h strip shopping zone in line with new guidelines.
Council recreation, culture and community infrastructure general manager Grantley Switzer said these roads (Murray Road and Southwell Avenue), as well as any speed zoning requests, would first be assessed by council in accordance with the new speed zoning guidelines before applications for any changes were made to VicRoads for evaluation and approval.
“As a result of these changes, Latrobe City Council will now be able to take into account the new speed zoning guidelines when assessing speed limits and making applications to VicRoads for any speed limit changes,” Mr Switzer said.
State Roads Minister Terry Mulder said 40km/h pedestrian speed limits could now be extended to major roads, where children cross despite being some distance from schools.
“At present, school 40km/h zones apply only where a school gate directly accesses a road,” Mr Mulder said.
“However, there are some areas where high numbers of pedestrians are crossing major roads to get to schools. These are the areas where lower speeds may be required during certain times of the day.”
Mr Mulder said he expected another 40 to 50 locations across Melbourne and wider Victoria would be eligible for 40km/h school speed zones.
“Councils should make applications to VicRoads for these speed limit reductions on arterial roads,” he said.
