Highway Code History

Peter Henshaw on Highway Codes past

The latest revisions to the Highway Code have caused quite a stir, but there's nothing new about this little booklet which we all read diligently before taking our bike test, and may or may not have looked at since. Anyway, here's a nostalgic look at Highway Codes past.

They emerged from a reaction to growing carnage on Britain's roads, and for once the hyperbole was true. Speed limits had been abolished in 1930, and the result, along with rapidly increasing numbers of cars, motorcycles, buses and trucks on the roads, was rocketing casualties, with 7000 people killed in 1931. A series of Acts of Parliament introduced a whole range of things, including a 30mph limit in urban areas, pedestrian crossings and driving licences. And it worked – casualties began to fall almost straight away.

The Highway Code was part of all this, and the first one appeared in 1935. The Ministry of Transport was actually beaten to it by the National Safety First Association (the forerunner of RoSPA) which printed something similar more than 10 years earlier. Priced at 1d, the first official Highway Code included a lot of the usual rules that generations of learners would become familiar with, though the hand signals included special ones for carriage drivers equipped with a whip.

A major update came in 1946, reminding road users what road signs looked like (direction signs had been taken down during World War II to bamboozle any invading Nazis) and included stopping distances for the first time. Surprisingly, despite far better ABS brakes on cars and bikes now, the latest Code quotes the same distances. On the other hand, mobile phones may have taken out any ABS benefit, so maybe it's best they still err on the safe side... Also new in '46 was a rule on pillion passengers (the law had actually come in with the 1930 Road Traffic Act) – no more than one per bike, and seated properly please, on a proper seat.

The Code was updated again in 1954, now with a snazzy colour cover showing stylised traffic lights. Still no mention of motorways of course, which didn't get a look in until a 1959 update after the Preston bypass (our first M-way) was opened. And still no overall speed limit – the 70-limit didn't appear until 1965, thanks in part to motorway pile-ups in fog. Until then, 100mph along the Hog's Back on your Bonneville was legal...

And so to 2022, with the latest Highway Code's new hierarchy of road users, putting the most vulnerable at the top, and maybe that's no bad thing. As for bikers, there are still only six rules which apply specifically to us, covering helmets, eye protection, the number of passengers (yes, it's still there), visibility and filtering.

And here's a final question – when did you last read the Highway Code?

Illustrations from The Original Highway Code, Michael O'Mara Books Limited, 2008.