Skip to main content

Promising results from latest German speed enforcement marathon

During the sixth German speed control operation North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony, police found that motorists generally obeyed speed limits. Around 3,500 police officers and 300 employees of local authorities measured the speeds of vehicles over a period of 24 hours at 2,610 locations. Despite publication of the speed check points and the extensive coverage in the media across the country, 21,600 of the approximately 788,000, or 2.7 per cent, of car drivers checked were driving too fast. On a nor
May 21, 2014 Read time: 2 mins
During the sixth German speed control operation North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony, police found that motorists generally obeyed speed limits.

Around 3,500 police officers and 300 employees of local authorities measured the speeds of vehicles over a period of 24 hours at 2,610 locations. Despite publication of the speed check points and the extensive coverage in the media across the country, 21,600 of the approximately 788,000, or 2.7 per cent, of car drivers checked were driving too fast. On a normal day, around eight per cent of drivers are speeding.

Some glaring violations emerged, including two 18-year-old friends who ran a race during the night, driving through the 60 km/h speed check at 82 and 92 km/h. Cologne police also detected a driver at 141km/h in a speed limit of 70 km/h. On the A57 road near Krefel, where maximum speed of 100 km/h exists, a vehicle was measured at 200 km/h.

The initiative is part of the overall strategy of the police to improve road safety. In 2013, the police found more than two million drivers speeding.

After the large-scale speed control actions in North Rhine-Westphalia and Lower Saxony, Interior Minister Ralf Jäger said: “Motorists have taken the ‘I have respect for life’ motto to heart and are driving responsibly. That is our goal. We are adhering to our strategy of more speed checks and more transparency.”

Related Content

  • November 27, 2013
    Extra enforcement key to cutting road casualties in The Netherlands
    While The Netherlands already has some of the safest roads in the world it has ambitious plans to make them safer still, as Jon Masters discovers. In virtually all periodical studies and comparisons of countries’ road safety performance, the Netherlands is consistently in the top three and often leads the world, depending on how casualty figures are compared. According to the International Traffic Safety Data & Analysis Group (IRTAD) of the International Transport Forum, road deaths per capita have falle
  • May 22, 2014
    ‘Risky tailgating and speeding rife on UK motorways’
    Six in ten UK drivers own up to risky tailgating (57 per cent) and a similar proportion break the limit by 10mph or more (60 per cent) on motorways and 70mph dual carriageways, with men by far the worst offenders, a survey by Brake and insurance company Direct Line reveals. Almost all drivers say they worry about other drivers tailgating on motorways: 95 per cent are at least occasionally concerned about vehicles too close behind them; more than four in ten (44 per cent) are concerned every, or most, tim
  • April 21, 2017
    Provisional results from latest TISPOL 24-hour speed enforcement marathon
    Police officers across Europe conducted their latest 24-hour ‘speed marathon’, from 0600 on Wednesday 19 April to 0600 on Thursday 20 April, as of TISPOL’s week-long speed enforcement operation. The operation involved 10,507 police officers and 16 countries provided results from 8,281 speed control sites. Adverse weather forced the cancellation of speed enforcement measures in Hungary and restricted enforcement activity in Croatia. 1,042,493 vehicles were checked during the initiative and 19,615 offences we
  • June 22, 2016
    Enforcement comes in many guises
    Colin Sowman looks at some enforcement case studies from around the world. It is a sad fact of life that unenforced laws are not adhered to by a sometimes sizable proportion of the public and once enforcement is seen to be lacking, some drivers can take this to extremes and authorities must decide how to regain control.