Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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110. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport if there are plans to legislate for mandatory speed reduced school zones or slow zones in residential estates and built-up areas for vulnerable users nationwide separate from local authority bye-laws; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [43910/21]

Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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While the Road Traffic Act 2004 sets default speed limits for various categories of roads, elected members of local authorities have statutory responsibility for making Special Speed Limit bye-laws for roads in their area - with, in the case of national roads, the consent of Transport Infrastructure Ireland (TII). The making of such bye-laws is a reserved function of elected members. 

The Road Traffic Act 2004 establishes default speed limits that apply to defined categories of roads and which can only be changed by county and city councils through the making of special speed limit bye-laws.  Section 9 of that Act sets out the range of special speed limits that may be set by local authorities through such bye-laws. To assist local authorities in the application of Special Speed Limits, my Department's Guidelines for Setting and Managing Speed Limits in Ireland provide detailed guidance on the application of Special Speed Limits outside of schools and is available to all local authorities.

Under the Road Traffic Acts, a Special Speed Limit may include a periodic speed limit which can be designed to apply and operate outside schools at specified periods, for example when children are arriving at, or leaving a school during term time.