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19-21 Broad Street | St Helier Jersey | JE2 4WE
Connétable Mike Jackson
Chairman, Environment, Housing and Infrastructure Scrutiny Panel Scrutiny Office
States Greffe
Morier House
St Helier
Jersey
JE1 1DD
May 2019
Dear Chairman,
Rue des Sapins - Speeding
The Department has a programme in place to review speed limits across the whole of Jersey, on a parish by parish basis. The principles of this review were agreed at the Comité de Connétable in March 2017: Parishes would work with departmental officers to bring forward proposals covering the whole parish. These would then be consulted upon before a parish assembly approved the request. As setting speed limits is a Ministerial Decision regardless of the roads authority, the Minister for Infrastructure would then consider that request against the framework established by the Road Safety Action Plan before deciding whether to approve the Parishes proposals for implementation.
The Department has been corresponding with a resident of Rue de Sapins on speed limits since 2014 and the limit on the road has been reduced to 30mph. However, subsequently, the resident has asked for the speed limit to be further reduced to 20mph, amongst other requested road traffic restrictions. Officers have met with the resident and have written to explain that this will be considered when we review the whole parish, notwithstanding this advice we believe that a proposal for 20mph was taken in isolation by the resident to a parish assembly.
We understand that the parish assembly was held in September 2017 and that it approved the change, however we have not received any subsequent request from the Parish to reduce the speed limit. As things stand the proposal in isolation does not fit within the process agreed with the Comité de Connetable, nor does it fit within the framework set out in the Road Safety Action Plan, so I would not agree to this request by itself.
The programme for the speed limits reviews are in part set by the parishes, by nominating themselves to the Department for review, and in part by the availability of departmental resource to support the review. Since the St Peter Parish Assembly there have been offers by the Department to start the speed limit review process, however probably due to the election in 2018 the offer was not acted upon. The capacity that was then available has subsequently been reassigned to support reviews in other parishes.
At present the Department is working with St Lawrence, St Saviour and St Helier on their reviews. St Martin and St Ouen have carried out a review and are awaiting departmental resources to assist with the public consultation; St Mary have asked if they can start their review and so will be the then next parish to receive support. Therefore, at present, if St Peters wanted to start the review there would be some considerable delay before resources became available to support them and it is unlikely any changes could be effected before late 2020.
I hope this is helpful in answering your questions. Yours sincerely,
Deputy Kevin Lewis Minister for Infrastructure
D +44 (0)1534 448394 E k.lewis@gov.je