Build roads ‘for people’

Transport Malta’s speed management report addresses the “real” speed problem on our roads but fails to tackle urban traffic calming despite the high number of accidents in built-up areas, according to environmentalist George Debono.

Adding trees and benches to roads – and not just popular areas – would invite people to travel on foot

On Friday, Transport Malta unveiled a consultation exercise on a speed management policy.

Dr Debono welcomed this policy but expressed concern about speed limits in urban areas.

He said the report made a good assessment of the real problem of speed on our roads but still gave the impression that traffic deaths were accepted as an inevitable fact of life.

“Such is our attachment to the car that suitably radical measures may have been omitted for fear of upsetting the car lobby,” he added.

Dr Debono said a 30 km per hour speed limit in residential areas has been shown to save lives and the “most worrying aspect” of this report was that the urban 50 km per hour speed might be retained.

There was also no mention of urban traffic calming, even though most pedestrian injuries and deaths occur in built-up areas, he added.

Dr Debono believes pedestrian-friendly roads could alleviate traffic congestion and the high number of traffic accidents.

Encouraging people to travel on foot would cut the number of cars on the roads and removing pavements and increasing street furniture would force car-owners to drive slower. However, this would require a change in the Maltese people’s car-dependency mentality, he said.

“Over the past 80 years, roads have been built only for cars and not for people. Our streets are ugly, bleak and soulless. Roads should be interactive social spaces but, unfortunately, in Malta they are only a driving space.

“There are three cars for every four people. The only way we know how to get somewhere is by car.

“Not only do we build roads that do not prompt people to walk but some pavements are even unsafe and impossible to access. Most of the time, parents pushing prams have to share the street with cars. This would only encourage parents to travel by car,” he said.

Although such car dependency appears to frustrate the environmentalist, Dr Debono has some feasible solutions.

He believes that adding trees and benches to roads – and not just popular areas – would invite people to travel on foot. Doing away with sidewalks and levelling out a street or paving it with cobblestones would instinctively force drivers to slow down.

An alternative way to calm traffic would be to increase the number of zebra crossings with a slightly raised pedestrian platform or add traffic islands or roundabouts that induce cars to go slower.

Sharper corners and winding narrow streets also discouraged cars from speeding and calm traffic, he insisted.

Traffic calming would also encourage more people to take up cycling, a topic close to Dr Debono’s heart.

“Cyclists in Malta are considered crazy and uncool while, abroad, it is the most natural thing to do. The Maltese, on the other hand, are obsessed with cars. The car is an extension of the owner,” Dr Debono, who has cycled to work for 25 years, adds in a disappointed tone.

“Until we change our car-dependency mentality and road infrastructure, we’ll remain a country of people happy with their little metal boxes on wheels,” he sighed.

However, Dr Debono believes education is “unlikely” to have much impact on young drivers, given their perception of “invulnerability” and Malta’s inbuilt car-fixation.

The only “sure-fire remedy” would be strict enforcement and heavy penalties, including a strong police presence on our roads. New drivers should also have to go through longer probationary periods with a zero blood-alcohol tolerance and be limited to one passenger or any one from the immediate family.