'Pay attention' to your speed, police urge drivers in Thatcham

Speed op sees seven tickets issued in two hours on residential roads

DRIVERS are being urged to watch their speed in Thatcham after one motorist was clocked doing 42mph in a 30mph limit.

The driver was caught in Lower Way during a Thames Valley Police speeding operation last week, which saw four speeding tickets issued in one hour.

Another driver was caught doing 38mph during another operation in Harts Hill Road and was one of three tickets issued in a one-hour period.

Neighbourhood sergeant for Thatcham Llian Spinks said that she was not surprised by the high speeds,

She said: “Speeding is an issue on Lower Way and each time we do speed enforcement there, we end up issuing lots of tickets.

“It is a road that one can travel fast on and most of the motorists we pulled over were not speeding intentionally, but were not paying attention to the speed they were traveling.”

Sgt Spinks said that the locations were chosen following complaints from residents and data collected by West Berkshire Council suggesting that speeding was an issue.

“I would tell people to pay attention to the speed they are traveling and, if they have it, to consider using cruise control or a speed limiter to stop them accidently going over the speed limit,” Sgt Spinks said.

“The police and the council are not setting out to catch people.

“We would prefer to educate motorists about the dangers of speeding and we only use enforcement when other methods have failed.”

She said that it was hard to gauge the success of speeding operations.

However, she did add: “No matter how many tickets you issue, just by motorists seeing us out with the speed gun it makes them think about their speed and will have an impact on their driving, even if just for a short time.”