The French government said on Tuesday (Jan 9) it would lower the speed limit on two-lane highways to 80 kilometres per hour from 90 kilometres (55 miles) per hour, hoping to reverse an alarming rise in road deaths in recent years, reports Channel News Asia.
Several previous governments had toyed with the idea as a means of reducing highway deaths, which reached nearly 3,500 in 2016, but backed off in the face of widespread public opposition.
About 55 per cent of those deaths - 1,911 victims - occurred on the 400,000 kilometres of so-called "secondary" roads across France, two-lane routes with no separating guardrail.
"Excessive or inappropriate" speed was involved in 32 percent of those fatal accidents, which far exceeded those in urban areas.
The government says the lower speed limit could save 350 to 400 lives a year.
"Unsafe roads are not inevitable," prime minister Édouard Philippe said after a meeting of the government's road safety council, adding that road accidents had killed 105 people in France over the recent year-end holidays.
"Lowering speeds reduces the number of accidents, as well as the severity of these accidents," he said.
The government has compared the 80 kmh limit, which goes into effect Jul 1, to the laws enacted since 1973 requiring the use of seat belts, and the installation of automatic speed radars in 2002.