ed_m wrote:
Oh i don't know, i can think of several people who's driving has given me the willies; mostly through lack of awareness, occasionally inappropriate speed, rarely due to being over the limit. I was not surprised when they did get pinged by a camera and had to take points / pay a fine / go on a course.
I was also not surprised when the above did nothing to improve their driving, they still give me the willies, some even more so as their awareness (or lack of) is now also focussed on looking out for cameras.
I completely agree with you ed, and I think I may have not explained what I meant very well.
I’m glad the maniacs you have known got done. The odd maniac I have known, (numbers I can count on one hand thankfully), who deserved to have been done for speeding, to my knowledge, never have been done whereas the good guys I know with a lifetime of accident/incident free driving have. As you say, the bad ones just carry on as before and it’s not just about their speed. (Memories of a certain wannabe bully, come alpha-male, I had to work with and be driven by on occasion
).
If I had one wish regarding speed cameras it’s that if they
really had to erect them somewhere, that they did so on truly dangerous stretches, instead of where they just get numbers. At least then it would catch bad drivers and make them think that they deserve to be done because, let’s say, it’s in a 30 limit, there’s parked cars, the road is narrow etc. etc. Who could argue with that? Certainly not me. But they never did.
Maybe, just maybe, their thinking was that if you speed on a big road where it safer you must being doing so on small roads too and outside schools etc. It always comes across to me that they never considered that I may drive with alacrity on big roads like NSL, DC and motorways but actually drive very slowly and cautiously, as appropriate, down hazardous small roads.
The camera traps I always see are on wide open roads, usually with good visibility, no big pedestrian count, limit maybe dumbed down for no good reason etc. The whole agenda was rotten from the start and, IMHO, never intended to catch bad drivers but just to get the numbers so they can boast how they are seen to be doing something. The rest was just an exercise in massaging the numbers and statistics.
I don’t know any reasonable thinking guy, myself included, who would argue with being prosecuted if what you were doing was truly risky or dangerous. But when you get good drivers driving in a safe manner they are not exactly going to think “well I deserve it because it was speeding”. They would, however, think “well I deserve it because it was risky or dangerous” if that was indeed the case.
I’ve still got a clean licence, so it may seem odd that I feel so strongly about it. The reason though is precisely because of what I’ve just said and the iniquity or unfairness of it all. There, but for the grace of god, go any one of us...
"Cameras always have been targetting the wrong thing at the wrong time"