Designation of a section of the A82 near Carr's Corner as a 30 MPH zone: EIR release

FOI reference: FOI/18/03586
Date received: 3 December 2018
Date responded: 18 December 2018

 

 

Thank you for your request of 11 October for a review of our failure to respond to your request under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs) for information in relation to the A82 near Carr's Corner, Fort William.

Further to my email of 4 December, I have now completed my review of our response to your request under the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs).

“Please will you supply background information relating to the designation of a section of the A82 near Carr's Corner, Fort William (specifically from the Mallaig roundabout northwards)  as a 30 MPH zone. I am seeking Committee reports and/or any determination to support this decision.

I am mindful of the national  guidance that requires consideration to be given to the underlying principles and key factors that should be taken into account in any decisions on local speed limits are:

• history of collisions, including frequency, severity, types and causes;
• road geometry and engineering (e.g. bends, junctions, barriers); 
• presence of vulnerable road users; road function; existing traffic speeds; and
• road environment, including level of road-side development and possible impacts on residents (e.g. severance, noise, or air quality).

I would like to see what assessment was made in relation to this section of highway.”

 

As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations.  We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA. 

 

This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

My review has concluded  that your original request was not properly handled as there was some confusion in the allocation of your case within the Directorate. Please accept our apologies for this and the delay in providing you with the information requested. I can now provide you with the information that you had originally requested.

Please refer to Annex A of this request which is an extract from the A82 Stoneymollan to Inverness Trunk Road Speed Limit Review.

An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies to some of the information requested because it is personal data of a third party and disclosing it would contravene the data protection principles in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and in section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018. This exception is not subject to the ‘public interest test’, so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception.

For information, the general speed limit review can be found at the link below. This link will give you a summary of the review and additional information in relation to the speed limit review process;

https://www.webarchive.org.uk/wayback/archive/20170327094907/http://www.transport.gov.scot/road/road-safety/speed-limit-review#Assessment