Traffic calming - public attitude studies: a literature review

Traffic calming has proved to be an effective way of reducing vehicle speeds and accidents. The public generally approve of the concept of traffic calming and they often petition their local highway authority to have calming installed. This report reviews the published literature describing 45 studies (40 UK, 5 Non-UK) of public attitudes to traffic calming schemes after installation. It gives details of the survey techniques and the types of questions used, together with the results obtained. It also compares the measured effectiveness of the calming schemes with the public assessments of changes in vehicle speeds, traffic flow, accidents, noise, vibration and pollution, to determine to what extent there is agreement between them. (A)