Slow down! France introduces new speed limits on secondary roads

Slow down! France introduces new speed limits on secondary roads
By Euronews
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Move is an attempt to reverse trend of rising mortality on French roads.

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Slow down if your travelling on the roads of France from next month.

After much wrangling, the French government has finally issued a decree reducing the maximum speed on secondary roads which don't have a central partition from 90 kilometres an hour to 80 kilometres an hour.

It hopes the measure will save between 300 and 400 lives each year. 

 In Europe countries such as Malta, Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands have a limit of 80 kilometres an hour on their secondary roads, and they are also the countries with the fewest number of death per million inhabitants per year, according to EU official statistics. 

France comes 12th in the comparative table, with 54 deaths per million, but mortality rates have risen in recent years and the government is anxious reverse the trend.

11,000 road signs will have to be replaced at a cost of around €12 million - the new rules come into force on July 1st.

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