County council told Derbyshire villager 35mph was “safe and reasonable” amid speeding concerns

Brett Bentley, 56, wrote to Derbyshire County Council requesting a fixed speed camera following several car crashes during the last five weeks on Main Road in Renishaw.

One crash saw a driver cut out of their vehicle after smashing into a right-turning vehicle on the busy 30mph stretch of road, however Brett says the crash is the 20th vehicle collision to have happened in and around Main Road in the last five years.

Others include overturned vans, motorists crashing into lamp posts and barriers and a serious one three years ago during which a pedestrian was killed when a car lost control and careered onto the pavement.

Speaking about the situation, Brett said: “In a morning it’s a lottery to get out of the junction from where I live. There’s a bend to the right as I pull out which can be clear but by the time you start pulling out cars are nearly on top of you.

"You’re talking milliseconds, so they’re obviously going faster than 30. When I leave for work at 6am you see these vehicles tooling it towards the motorway.”

Renishaw used to have a fixed speed camera just after the limit decreases from 40mph to 30mph as drivers enter the village from the M1, however it was never replaced after being vandalised.

The village now has a light-up speed warning as drivers enter, which Brett says “obviously doesn’t work”.

After the latest spate of collisions Brett contacted the county council asking for preventative measures such as a fixed speed camera to be put into place.

In its response to Brett, a member of the council’s traffic and safety service said data collected from vehicles manufactured after 2016 and thus connected automatically to the global GPS system showed the “85th percentile” speed on Main Road was recorded as 35.5 mph, which was deemed “safe and reasonable”.

The council official added that there had been “a number” of reported injury collisions in the three-year period up to 31st April 2024 for a “variety of reasons” such as pursuit by a police vehicle, defective tyres and a pedestrian crossing without looking, however the collision record at the Main Road location did not “justify installing traffic calming at the present time” as there were “many other sites” to consider.

Speaking about the response, Brett said: “It felt like they were saying it doesn’t matter and was very dismissive. I know people speed. I know that if I’m doing 30mph and another car is doing 40mph, that’s an average of 35mph.

"He’s saying that’s alright because it counteracts itself – I know people who have had tickets from a camera doing 34mph. And there are so many vehicles that are older than 2016.”

A spokesperson for Derbyshire County Council said: “We were sorry to hear that Mr Bentley was not happy with the response he received from our highways team and we do understand resident concerns about road safety.

"They were trying to explain that we have a set amount of money to spend on road safety and that we have to prioritise what we do have to places where the highest numbers of serious accidents are. The accident rates on Main Road are not high enough to meet the criteria for a fixed traffic camera.

“Speeding traffic is sadly an issue on many of our roads and we know of concern to many of our residents but is an issue for the police to enforce and the mobile speed camera van does visit Main Road in Renishaw.

"While speed enforcement is the responsibility of the police we are trying to work to support this wherever we can – which includes our trial of the speed indicator device signs, which act as both a visible reminder to motorists of their speed but also logs vehicle speed data to then support enforcement measures and times.”