Safe Speed Forums

I did a pre-record piece on "careful driving" for their news broadcasts.

Based on this new PR:

PR158: What is a careful driver?

NEWS: For immediate release

Oversimplified messages damage road safety says Safe Speed.

The widely reported case of a lady eating an apple raises a very
serious road safety problem. It's not that eating apples is a real
cause of road danger - it isn't - but nationally we're fast losing
sight of what it means to be a careful driver.

Paul Smith, founder of the Safe Speed road safety campaign
(www.safespeed.org.uk) said: "If we take official road safety messages
at face value we'd probably conclude that a driver who keeps two hands
on the wheel and sticks to the speed limit is a careful driver. But
this is a dangerous oversimplification. There is so much more to
careful driving than this."

Careful drivers:

* Take responsibility for their actions
* Concentrate on the task
* Anticipate the actions of others
* Make conservative decisions and leave a margin for error
* Stay calm
* Never drive aggressively
* Take driving seriously
* Leave a margin for error
* Set appropriate speeds

Paul continues: "Driving is a complex task and a great responsibility.
It cannot safely be reduced to a few simple rules. Road safety policy
must concentrate on important factors - skills, attitudes and
responsibilities. That's what we had when we earned ourselves the
safest roads in the world, but for the last ten years we've had
nothing but oversimplification and the damage is clear. Road deaths
are up."

You can't measure safe driving in miles per hour.
===================================

This nonsense about apples is driving me nuts - we need real road safety messages and we need them now!

_________________
Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

If you have to always drive with both hands on the wheel what about disabled drivers with just the one arm? Are they all now dangerous? Are only people with automatics who never signal the safest of all?

Even if it was 'accidental', I like the use of 'leaving a margin for error' twice

Belt-and-braces!!!

It was accidental...

I rushed that out when I realised everyone was talking apples, when we should really have been talking safe driving.

_________________
Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Seemed a bit like the media attention was more along the lines of "it's only a bloody apple, big deal" or "she didn't have both hands on the wheel, she should be punished". They're not asking if her driving was impaired in any way, and what was she concetrating on - the road or not dropping the apple?

_________________
Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler - Einstein