Plans to impose 20mph speed limits on most of Croydon's roads got the green light last night.

Tightened restrictions on nearly all residential roads across the borough, in a bid to improve safety and reduce car use, were approved at a meeting of Croydon Council's cabinet.

The speed limits will be implemented in five stages over three years at an estimated cost of £1.5m, with only major A-roads exempt. 

The council has carved the borough up into five zones and will consult people who live and work in each if they want 20mph roads.

Croydon currently has 166 roads with 20mph speed limits.

From January 2014: Croydon Council to pilot 20mph speed limits near schools

Coun Kathy Bee, the council’s cabinet member for transport and the environment, said: "Safer roads mean safer residents, and we’re exploring 20mph limits so our borough is a better place to live and work.

"However, we’ll only do this if our residents want it to happen. This change could bring a huge improvement to the lives of thousands of our residents plagued by speeding drivers, but getting it right means consulting properly.

"We plan to assess demand one area at a time over the next three years, starting with residents in the north who already tell us speeding is a problem there."

The first consultation, covering Norbury, Upper Norwood, South Norwood and Thornton Heath, will launch on May 13 and close on June 24.

 But Vidhi Mohan, shadow cabinet member for transport, described the consultation process as “flawed” because residents and businesses could only answer the questionnaire online.

He said: “What you need to be doing here is writing to each and every resident to get their views.”

He also questioned whether the limits would be enforceable and said police would not site speed traps on 20mph roads.

But council leader Tony Newman said: “The people of Croydon, I have every faith, will respect the law like they do other laws.”

And Coun Bee said "big posters in strategic locations" would advertise the consultation to those who do not use the internet.

Campaign groups both for and against the reduced limits had lobbied the council over the plans.

In submissions to the Streets and Environment Scrutiny Sub-Committee in September, Roger Lawson, London co-ordinator for the Alliance of British Drivers, claimed it would be "rash" to spent money on tightening restrictions.

He said: "We are opposed to blanket wide area 20mph limits because they are not a cost effective road safety measure, are not likely to be complied with and needlessly slow traffic."

However, Austen Cooper, of the Croydon Cycling Campaign, argued it was "imperative that action be taken by Croydon Council to make it easier and safer for people of all ages and abilities to choose cycling as an everyday means of transport."

He added: "Making Croydon a 20mph borough will be a step in the right direction."

In Portsmouth, where 94 per cent of the city's roads have 20mph limits, police reported a 21 per cent fall in injuries caused by road collision in the two years after restrictions came into force.

Sixty-six per cent of respondents to a Croydon Guardian poll last week said they would not want 20mph limit on their street.