A MONTH after almost halving the speed limit through Sofala, Transport for NSW has announced a reduction that is much closer to home for Bathurst.
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The NSW Government body says 80-kilometre-an-hour zones on two roads on the outskirts of Kelso will be cut to 50km/h due to the housing boom on the city's fringe.
Transport for NSW says it conducted speed zone reviews of Limekilns Road and Marsden Lane, which meet in Kelso's north-east corner, "due to concerns over the amount of traffic generated by new housing in the area".
The Sunnybright Estate, on the site of a former orchard, has contributed significantly to that new housing.
Stage one, 150 lots, was approved in December 2017 and a development application for stage two, 139 lots, was lodged in 2021.
Transport for NSW regional director west Alistair Lunn said the reviews of Limekilns Road and Marsden Lane assessed a number of factors including location, crash history, road environment, the number of access points, road usage, traffic mix and traffic volumes.
"The reviews found the high number of private accesses within the existing 80km/h speed zones on Limekilns Road and Marsden Lane, intersections with other roads and an increasing number of homes in the areas meant a speed limit reduction was appropriate to create a safer environment for all road users," he said.
"As a result, the existing 50km/h speed zone on Limekilns Road that ends just past Alluvial Place will be extended by 650 metres to the north-east to take in the intersections with Sunbright Road, Wheatfield Drive and Lawrence Drive.
"In addition, the existing 50km/h speed zone on Marsden Lane that ends 1250 metres west of the intersection with Limekilns Road will be extended to the east by 665 metres to take in the intersections with Sunbright Road and Clairvaux Lane.
"These speed zone changes will result in less than 20 seconds of additional travel time over the review areas but will make journeys along both roads safer for all."
Transport for NSW says the new speed zones on Limekilns Road and Marsden Lane have come into effect from Friday, September 22 and new signs have been installed to advise motorists of the changes.
Separately, Transport for NSW announced late last month that the 1.83-kilometre section of Sofala Road as it passes the village of Sofala and the intersections with Denison Street and Hill End Road had been reduced from 100km/h to 60km/h to make it safer.
The reduction in the speed limit on Sofala Road followed an increase to the speed limit in another part of the region - from 80km/h to 90km/h - on the Great Western Highway at Forty Bends, near Lithgow, that came into effect in 2021.
