Why do car parks insist that you must drive at 5mph?
Well, on doing a little research it turns out that it’s not too unique a thought. Forums have been discussing it for ages, and broadly coming to the same conclusion: it’s a liability wheeze. But is it? There are some obvious questions to ask.
Are speed limits in car parks enforceable?
No. Well, probably no. A speed limit needs a “Road Traffic Order”, and most private land doesn’t have one of those. So while you can be caught drunk driving or driving carelessly in a supermarket car park, speed limit enforcement isn’t possible, and proactive enforcement seems seriously unlikely.
Which is a shame in one respect, because of how many times I’ve almost been taken out by people at my local Sainsbury’s supermarket (locally famous for the just-drive-and-hope approach), and a blessing in another, since I am not that keen on following the painted arrows to reach my favoured spaces on the roof.
So we know the signs, and the limit, isn’t there because it creates a legal obligation. But is it still a way of ensuring the car park owner can’t be found liable?
If it was about liability, there’d be evidence
And it seems like there isn’t any of that. Despite endless forum discussions about speed limits on private land, I couldn’t find a single post saying “I was found liable, and it was because I was doing more than 5mph!”. And surely there would be, because surely everyone who has an incident in a car park will be doing more than 5mph.
And even if that were the intent, would there be any point?
Much like a contract cannot make a serious criminal act legal, operators can’t put signs up to disclaim any liability they might have anyway.
Those “parked at own risk” type signs are effectively pointless, and have been since the late 70s[1]. Of course you’re responsible for what you do and say, and of course the operator of the car park is responsible if they’ve been negligent or done something that has caused something to be liable of.
So is it even possible to do 5mph?
I mentioned my pondering about this question to my husband Tim, and he immediately responded with “I can’t even do 5mph”. I drive an EV, and I definitely can. So I’m going to assume the answer is “maybe not”, and move on.
It’s probably more appropriate to ask whether you’d want to. 5mph is very slow, only just above the speed I can get up to with my trolley once I’m inside the supermarket if I’m particularly determined, and not very practical. It’s basically just above walking pace.
I struggle to believe, given just how slow 5mph is in reality, anyone is expecting this kind of speed limit to be adhered to.
It has to be a proxy for ‘slow’
Which is funny, since “slow” painted on a road in the UK is effectively a proxy for “caution”, painted on the road at bends or other areas where a little more caution – a bit of an abstract concept, I guess – wouldn’t go amiss.
The signs are, I assume, simply there to remind us all that there’s a lot more risk than we might presume. While the purpose of a car park is to park, the activities we do there are actually the higher risk ones.
Reversing manoeuvres, often with poor visibility, are common while in many car parks there are posts and sight-line obstacles aplenty – and that’s growing, as EVs like mine mean chargers being retrofitted alongside protective posts and bumpers to protect them.
But there’s also the other purpose of a car park to think about: leaving the car behind and walking to wherever it is you are going. And the pedestrians are, in fact, the only ones doing 5MPH.
So why 5mph, not 7?
Well, it doesn’t have to be 5mph, as it turns out. As the Horsley Estate in nearby Dorking, Surrey demonstrates. With this signage I found myself interested enough not only to act with more attention to my speed than normal – but also to take a photograph!
It’s an effect that probably wouldn’t really have much impact if everyone did it, but a quirky “country hotel” approach that – perhaps – worked. I even spoke about it with my colleagues when I got into the meeting I was there for.
It could, also, be an accident
But it’s fully possible, in fact, that I have put more thought into this than anyone who has actually set a speed limit in a car park. It’s possible that when someone first decided to set a speed limit in a car park they chose 5mph and it’s just stuck.
I mean why question it anyway?
