Guide

Low-Speed Zone Guide

Overview

Every year approximately 1.35 million people lose their lives due to road traffic crashes. In many road crashes, speed plays a key role. As a result, managing speed has taken on great importance in cities around the world.

An effective method for reducing speed and improving road safety, especially in high-risk areas, has been to establish low-speed zones. This Low-Speed Zone Guide presents strategies for planning, designing, building, and evaluating low-speed zones. The guide intends to equip communities and decision-makers with the tools to implement low-speed zones that will suit their specific context.

Highlights ⌵︎

  • Traffic crashes are a leading cause of death and serious injury worldwide; most notably, they are the leading cause of death and serious injury among young people aged 5–29. Higher motor vehicle speeds increase the likelihood and severity of crashes.

  • Low-speed zones have emerged as one of the most promising strategies for speed management. They can be appropriate in many different contexts and at various scales, as exemplified by case studies of successful projects around the world.

  • Low-speed zones in cities need to be well-planned, well-designed, and well-built, to maximize safety and other benefits.

  • Physical traffic-calming measures and target speeds of 30 kilometers/hour (km/h) or lower have the greatest proven safety benefits.

  • Key considerations for implementation include stakeholder engagement, site selection (including risk: pedestrian/vulnerable road user presence), enforcement, evaluation, and the adaptation of basic principles for low-speed zone design to the local context.

RESOURCES

Press release   Latest WRI blog

video ⌵︎

How to Design Effective Low-Speed Zones

Low-speed zones not only improve road safety by reducing fatalities and injuries, they improve active travel and promote greater economic development. Learn more in this new video:

graphic of the week ⌵︎

Vehicle and Pedestrian Collision Speed and Survival (Percentage)

Designing for target speeds is essential for maximizing the safety benefits of a lowspeed zone. The target speed for low-speed zones should be 30 km/h or less.

Vehicle and Pedestrian Collision Speed and Survival (Percentage)
Figure 5.2 from the Low-speed Zone Guide, pag. 51

Authors ⌵︎

Anna Bray Sharpin, Claudia Adriazola-Steil, Soames Job, Marta Obelheiro, Ben Welle, Celal Tolga Imamoglu, Amit Bhatt, Daizong Liu, Natalia Lleras and Nikita Luke.

This report was made possible through funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies.

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Guide Details

Low-Speed Zone Guide

Pages:112
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82% of Road Crash Fatalities and Injuries in the economically productive age groups (15 - 64 years.)

82% of Road Crash Fatalities and Injuries in the economically productive age groups (15 - 64 years.)