The North Wales speed trap that's caught nearly 300 drivers doing double the 20mph limit
The drivers were all handed a notice between April 6th 2024 and April 5th this year. Based on the basic fixed speeding penalty of £100 that would be a £4,940,300 in potential fines for offending road users, with the money going to the UK Treasury.
Many will have been pinged just over the limit with the new default 20mph introduced by Welsh Government in 2023 catching many out. But data gathered by Legal Expert reveals that 688 people were caught going at least double the speed limit on a 20mph road while the highest speed recorded in North Wales was 116mph on the A483.
Legal Expert's research shows that almost two-thirds of those 20mph offences were on just three roads.
In just one year, 298 people were caught going 40mph or over on the A5104 Pontybodkin. That includes one driver clocked at 85mph in September 2024. Earlier data found that between January 1 2024 and the end of the March this year the camera recorded a total of 8,991 offences on that 20mph stretch.
Another 74 went at least double the speed limit on the A548 Greenfield, as did 70 people on Gladstone Way when passing through Hawarden. In total, 655 drivers were caught going at least double the 20mph limit in Flintshire – 95 per cent of the total across North Wales.
Fourteen were in Conwy, while there were 20 such excessive speeds recorded in Gwynedd, Denbighshire and Anglesey combined.
Many 20mph roads are set to revert back to 30mph limits, particularly in Flintshire where there has been a huge number of fines issued, mainly due to the relatively high number of fixed cameras in the county. Sign up for the North Wales Live newsletter sent twice daily to your inbox
Legal Expert found that incidents involving drivers going well over the limit appear to be falling. An average of 67 drivers per month were recorded going over 39mph in a 20mph zone from April to September 2024, but that average fell to 46 in the following six-month period.
Top ten 20mph roads where drivers exceeded 39mph:
Road
Incidents
A5104 Pontybodkin
298
A548 Greenfield
74
Gladstone Way, Hawarden
70
Northop Road, Sychdyn
67
A548 Oakenholt
56
B5129 Pentre
49
A549 Mynydd Isa
34
Marine Drive, Penrhyn Bay
8
A548 Russell Road/Coast Road, Rhyl
7
A470 Llanrwst
4
The 'worst' driving offence in North Wales was on a 20mph road. In May last year, a person travelling on the B5129 in Pentre went 88mph, a full 68mph above the legal limit.
On the A483, North Wales Police recorded one driver going 116mph, the highest speed recorded across North Wales in the past year.
Nine drivers were seen travelling westbound on the A55 Rhuallt Hill at 100mph or over.
The top ten speeds recorded in North Wales:
Legal Expert is an expert firm of personal injury solicitors with years of experience in handling road traffic accident compensation claims.
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