Speed limit on Preston Beach Road to be lowered

Dorset County Council's cabinet has agreed for the speed limit on a section of Preston Beach Road, between the entrance to Lodmoor country park and Overcombe Corner, to be reduced from 50mph to 40mph.

The lower limit was suggested after an increase in accidents, including two serious injury accidents and two fatalities, and was previously backed by the county’s regulatory committee.

It was first advertised for public consultation in March this year.

During the meeting, county councillors heard from Grace Dursley, whose husband died on the road in 2015 following a collision with a speeding motorcyclist.

Mrs Dursley said: "Whatever you decide it will be too late for my husband.

"It will be too late for me, as I was with my husband at the time. The memory of watching the man to whom I had been married for sixty-one years lying in the middle of the road, fighting for his life and dying an agonising death will go with me to my grave.

"But I hope that, if the speed limit is reduced, it may help to prevent another family having to suffer as we have done."

However David Penny objected to the plans saying that there was no detailed evidence to support the recommendation.

He said: "The speed limit on the beach road has been 50mph for nearly 30 years. No evidence has been presented that motorists driving at 50mph are causing an increased frequency of accidents.

The Preston Beach Road is identical in character with many of the 50mph roads leading into Weymouth where accidents have also happened but where no changes to the speed limits have been proposed."

Lodmoor councillor Tony Ferrari supported the idea and agreed that the current speed limit is too high.

He said: "It looks like a regular 50mph road but it's effectively within a built up area. I don't know any other 50mph roads with no pedestrian facilities to help with crossing.

"This is not a process about opinion it's a process about evidence."