Safe Speed Forums

Your argument fails, because : 2. By not creating casualties you are not creating new sites for more cameras only works if SPEED was responsible for ALL casualties.
Since some accidents take drivers by surprise well below posted limits, but still cause casualties/fatalities, the Government will always have justification to place cameras for more cash.
They already have abandoned the accident criteria for sites, to allow cameras to be placed anywhere to facilitate this.

When : 1. Preventing them from making any money occurs, they will simply reduce the prosecution thresholds, and/or speed limits until drivers stray over the limits once more.
Finally the managers of Safety Camera Partnerships derive a living from running them, and will deliberately mislead the public (and yourself) as to the true causes of accidents.
It would not do for the public to read and believe that an accident victim could have been saved by better driving standards - it has to be speed, and nothing else, or they are out of a job.

The road safety issue reads like the story of the Titanic.

The Government thinks Speed Cameras are infallible (unsinkable).

Speed is a factor (the Titanic WAS going too fast for the conditions).

The ice was further south than had been anticipated (lack of good statistics).

Bad luck played a part in the severity of the incident (had the Titanic RAMMED the ice head on, she would not have sunk).

There was a lack of safety features which could have saved lives (not enough lifeboats)

Finally, if you look carefully at a speed camera sign, it looks like a sinking ship on it's side!

...............................

Now the similarity in the answers to the problems!

Speed should be dictated by good observation of the view ahead and conditions, (Better Lookouts - not a committee sat around a desk).

You should anticipate the unexpected, and plan road safety on a sound basis (Ice CAN sometimes come further south, and you need a good reporting system!).

Bad luck can be planned for in better safety features (Bulkheads should go to the top!)

Don't make do with the minimum of safety measures to save money (Fit more lifeboats to cover ALL passengers).

Speed cameras dont provide the "lifeboats" of better training - they simply teach you to swim - and like in the cold waters of the Atlantic - or the rural roads away from speed cameras, drivers will die without better training and experience - especially young drivers. They need lifeboats, and good navigation!

We need Traffic Policemen to monitor a whole range of driving issues - AND the use of our roads as a conduit for drugs and smuggling!
"Pat & Carl" in Slough (Road Wars, Sky TV) have a nose for drivers who are banned, in possession, driving stolen cars, or dealing from cars - we need MORE, not less!

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Time to take responsibility for our actions.. and don't be afraid of speaking out!

Tom, I would love to hear your opinion on how to make our roads safer and remove the scourge of speed cameras, however, you must forgive me for being slightly sceptical when you continue to 'tease' with lines such as 'I would tell you, but you're not ready', whilst at the same time admitting that you have a book you are preparing for publication (presumably for sale rather than free) which will cover that same topic!

It does rather seem like hype marketing, and I must confess that I really don't appreciate the tactic, when pretty much everyone here has been discussing and dissecting road safety for some time, and has a genuine interest in making the roads safer, regardless of personal gain!

If you have some groundbreaking new ideas to bring to the discussion then of course we would welcome them. Many may poo-poo them, but if the ideas will stand for themselves then you have nothing to fear from that, and I genuinely believe that you will find many open minds willing to explore your concepts.

All you do by arrogantly proclaiming that you are the one prophet of the True Way, but that we mere infidels are not ready to accept The Truth, is to further close the minds that are already suspicious of your motivations.

Ach.. you admit they not to do with safety then

[quote-"Tom"]


That is my point also but unlike Paul I don't believe that we have the skills or are (on average) responsible enough to take total on that responsibility.
3201 people killed in 2005 only areound 5% of those were actual genuine accidents.[/quote]


Each time we pick up any local paper from Carlise to Chester - each day we read of some car crash.

Nearly each one ist down to drug/drink/hit&run/TWOC,driving whilst disqualified und on the run from the police.. handy phone use by all road users.. defective cars.. ill drivers.. sleepy drivers..

Over 3000 ist the norm for each year. It ist not decreasing. It seems to increase in the scam infested areas but national average brought down by those areas which remain constantly low und manage with very few cams or even none in some rarer cases.





But you have not offered any suggestion as to how to improve.


We have.

It called C O A S T.


It actually the criteria used to assess by the police DIS/Speed Aware courses We have the mark scheme on site. und I posted up the photocopy on PH in the past.

But fewer casualties will not stop the speed cams as nice little earner und human beings are unfortunately accident prone when a few of them get together in one place.

We already have the prats allowed to place cams or mobiles bases on 15% shunt reported to police rules.

They want the cash und you find that Lancs came under fire over the original set up of the COAST course because it startedto ping at 33/34 mph with cut off for course at 35 mph. (They did change for the better when complaints .. especially from 9 pointers who were safe und would not have been NIPPED elsewhere - even in Wales .. became overwhelming.


But they did this once. Given BRAKE have knickers in twist over the 10 mph woman with the daft - - asinine - comment that "she should not have been banned because she was not speeding" - one can well imagine that they will just alter the rules to ensure cash tinkles in to their tills.

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Nicht ganz im Lot!
Ich setze mich immer wieder in die Nesseln! Der Mad Doc ist mein Mann! Und ich benutzte seinen PC!

UND OUR SMILEYS? Smile ... und the the world smiles with you.
Smiley guy seen when you read
Fine me for Safe Speed
(& other good causes..)

Greatest love & Greatest Achievements Require Greatest Risk
But if you lose the driving plan - don't lose the COAST lesson.
Me?
Je ne regrette rien!

Point 3 contradict point 1. 100 lives out of millions of lives ist hardly a great success rate.


If my work achieve this poor outcome in trials .. it not get to licence und it certainly not get bought by NHS .. or any other medical care provider.



Germans/Swiss have it right .. even their prats as I find in news articles over there admit that the cams do not guarantee or make for safety und that drivers become accustomed to locations und "behave for the cam"

But .. still a nice little earner at a 35 € fine und no penalty points




So we agree then that they are not very effective really Und that education ist the key.. only BRAKE want revenge.. taken out on all drivers.



Nothing wrong with cycling ... (apart from miltitant muesli munchers )




The man made folk think... that why he needled them




Paulie always maintained we killing thousands by the cams in reality.


We also had our tragedy in our own family. My cousin Ferdl was killed when a lorry with defective everything hit him at 20 mph. It crash through central reserve .. he was in slow moving traffic but took full force of the hit.

I also had one nasty experience with driver taken poorly at wheel of car. He hit me at 80 mph. I live und still drive with much enthusiasm




No. Because EU has umpteen 20 mph roads. They still have accidents on these. Many fatal.

It ist about education.

As said .. we point the way with COAST. IG put up notes from his Police training to try to help folk learn something or try to work into driving styles und cycling styles at least.

Ian also try to educate.. as does Stephen.


SO what ist your education policy?


By the way .. und it nice to chat to someone who not so "scams bestest thing since slicey breads for toasters"

_________________
Nicht ganz im Lot!
Ich setze mich immer wieder in die Nesseln! Der Mad Doc ist mein Mann! Und ich benutzte seinen PC!

UND OUR SMILEYS? Smile ... und the the world smiles with you.
Smiley guy seen when you read
Fine me for Safe Speed
(& other good causes..)

Greatest love & Greatest Achievements Require Greatest Risk
But if you lose the driving plan - don't lose the COAST lesson.
Me?
Je ne regrette rien!

Hang on!

You can't switch out of stats mode into 'common sense' mode and retain any argumentative credibility!

Show me the graph correlating average vehicle speed and casualty rates please!

Road safety is no great secret. Reducing casualties is no great secret.
I wrote to the government some time ago to ask them about collision causation statistics and guess what....They dont have any.

How many get killed and injured due to errors in observation, awareness, braking, manoeuvreing, steering, dealing with junctions the list goes on..?
The answer is they don't know. No one does because its never been studied.

Take the major obvious causes of road traffic collisions which incidentally are the same errors that cause so many to go through a speed camera and the result can only be that you reduce your chance of going through a speed camera and reduce casualties at the same time. Fewer casualties and fewer speed camera activations and fewer new sites being created.

It starts by getting you to protect yourself on an individual basis from speed camera activations by using real, decades old driving methods.
The same skills also protect you from collision involvement.
Individually it would make no or very little difference to overall road casualty stats but collectively could create the largest drops in road casualty numbers seen in decades.

The biggest hurdle to achieving this goal is the motorist, I am not sure if you can accept it or believe it. I have also been debating this stuff for years but have largely approached it from an ADI's point of view as opposed to a scientific.
Scientists trying to direct road safety makes as much sence to me as a butcher trying to perform brain surgery.
I don't have a god complex, I just think I have a genuine casualty reduction plan that will benefit everyone from BRAKE to the ABD.

Scientists trying to direct road safety makes a damned sight more sense than politicians trying to direct road safety!

Apart from stuff like this...

http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/statistics/datatablespublications/accidents/casualtiesgbar/roadcasualtiesgreatbritain2006

On the contrary, I think you'll find that better driver education has been one of the "core values" of Safespeed for some considerable time! Certainly I (and I'm sure many others on this site) have always believed that it is the key to casualty reduction - the trouble is, it COSTS money and scameras MAKE money. The other problem is that it will take a very long time - pretty much half a generation of drivers will have to go through the system before we see new and better trained ones resulting from an improved training system. That's far too "long term" for any politician I can think of!

So anyway, are you going to tell us your great idea or what?!

Hi Tom.


OK .. just a few points for you to consider.




No and neither do the cam folk either.


Ironically, the police do as we actually record all the evidence. As do the hospitals as teh Mad Cats say and it's when you compare the other stats to the official stats that you start wondering and wondering about the logic here.


My ex guv decided against cams and developed a value for money RPU which also included ARV and dog/horse into one inter-active team.



Well .. sort of when we investigate each incident and analyses very clinically and forensically.

Another reason why we did not go the cam route wholesale. We have the cams in the vehicles.. the normal "tools of the trade" if you like and we have one cam van "doing the hot spot rounds".. but we also see and use professioanl judgement as to whehter or not the driver warrants furher action.. and I can tell you that not every careless driver is speeding when he or she is "CARELESS"



Does not work that way.

My ex guv was really a cynic. He had the opinion - shared by most of us - that folk manipulate and just behave for the second they pass the cam. We did prove and still prove this by moving our "monitored sites" around. A BIT No one knows wher o=UR OWN PC Gatso is.. only that we have just one "fixed one somewhere"

But we've charged just as many if not more -"at or below speed limit" with careless/undue" as we have speeders. The danger is HOW they drive and noticeably drive dangerously. We tend to target these drivers. It must work as we seem to have less problems overall - but we have not brought to the pipe dreamer "yearn for the moon" figure of zero incidents. People are sadly accident prone when they bunch together



The drive safe initiative of returning to past courtesy per Ted's post


Or COAST.. basically the Highway Code and RoadCraft condensed to one acronym


C = concentrate/consider/courtesy

O= Observe everything possible and

A=Anticipate and riskj assess each hazard


We had a problem wiht PLAN per Roadcraft so wwe extended to allowing and creating

Space .. gaps.. speed reducttion and two second minimum and thus

Time to react.


This is the short version I have written essays on here about in the past .. plus teh notes I made throughout my training to date. Note TO DATE.. we can never ever know enough really





BRAKE unfortunately seem to favour points in addition to DIS. We find it works far better motivationwise if we offer such as an alternative to the points.

But so far via Paul's forum - we seem to be getting the idea to COAST across. After all - this is one place pinged drivers will hit on when looking for solutions

You could say me and the Swiss are on a mission. Me to save lives and argue the case for "black rats" and the Swiss riff raff to save lives and nobble speed cams


One thing you do not do is make them feel worse about their "blip" - bit get them to look forwards and drive that bit more assuredly and without the scam fear .. if they COAST it all.

We're not poles apart Tom.. but I know cams cannot be the right way forward and we do not have forests of them, deploy staff properly and yet still manage to keep things fairly safe here.

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Take with a chuckle or a grain of salt
Drive without COAST and it's all your own fault!

A SMILE is a curve that sets everything straight (P Diller).

A Smiley Per post
FINES USfor our COAST!

Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon - but driving with a smile and a COAST calm mind.

Sorry Ernest but he's sort of right about this one. It makes no odds what the cause of the accident is-it'll be used as an excuse for a camera.

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Smokebelching,CO2 making,child murdering planet raping,granny mugging,politically incorrect globally warming (or is it climate changing now it's getting colder?)thug.
That's what the government want you to believe of me. If they get back in I'm emigrating.

I kinda said the same (I think)

So slowing down wont stop them creating sites for cameras.
Tom's assertion was that the casualties were caused by speed.

_________________
Time to take responsibility for our actions.. and don't be afraid of speaking out!

You're right. I think I'd been up too long.

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Smokebelching,CO2 making,child murdering planet raping,granny mugging,politically incorrect globally warming (or is it climate changing now it's getting colder?)thug.
That's what the government want you to believe of me. If they get back in I'm emigrating.

You mean failures of observation and risk assessment, right?
A speed camera is not a safety risk, but it is a risk to wallets and/or driving records. There's no such thing as infinite attention. Finite resources are being wasted by diverting attention from the road and what should really be the only important priority: SAFETY. Thus DISTRACTED.
Is ther any distraction that could possibly save 1,250 lives a year?
The fundamental ability to observe and assess SAFETY risk is being tampered with by greedy liars who are proximately responsible for 1,250 deaths every year.
Please read this if you haven't already
Subtract that number from the number of lives speed cameras supposedly save every year.
Why are you not furious yet?

In 1980, General Motors (Oldsmobile) figured the value of the average human life at $200,000. Even if I forget inflation, and just convert to the UK pound ... that's 100,000 pounds.
100,000 times 1,250 per year equals 125 million pounds per year.
You said in 2006 that speed cameras turned over 126 million pounds. If that number is for that year, then I understand what you meant when you saidbut if I were a UK citizen, I'd be doing the opposite of condoning or accepting it or dodging it.

However, if 126 million pounds turns out to be since 1992 or 1993, then it wasn't even worth it measured against the most disgusting metric ever used in a 'devil's advocate' argument.

Bottom line: If you merely accept speed cameras because you figure they won't go away, you give them lease to try such shenanigans with your money and your life at another time and place of their choosing.

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The Rules for ALL ROAD USERS:
1) No one gets hurt
2) Nothing gets hit, except to protect others; see Rule#1
3) The Laws of Physics are invincible and immutable - so-called 'laws' of men are not
4) You are always immediately and ultimately responsible for your safety first, then proximately responsible for everyone's
Do not let other road users' mistakes become yours, nor yours become others
5) The rest, including laws of the land, is thoughtful observation, prescience, etiquette, decorum, and cooperation

I have never asserted that collisions are caused by speed (in the past I may have).
Speed as I see it is a contributory factor.

For example
1. Bad observation + Excess Speed = Fatal collision.
2. Bad observation + Slow speed = Injury collision

The two examples are what is occurring now globally, however.
My assertions are as follows:

1. Good observation + Excess speed = no collision what so ever as the hazards were seen and dealt with.

2. Good observation + slow speed also = no collision as hazards are seen and dealt with.

The main point being that irrespective of how you use your speed if your observations are good then collisions will not happen.

The main problem is that most motorists are not observing properly and we end up with many collisions above and below the speed limit.

One of the main weaknesses with speed cameras is they can only address casualty reduction that occurs above the speed limit not below.

This is why now we see PACTs trying to lower speed limits, enforce them with speed cameras in an attempt to reduce casualties.

I told you the great idea a few posts ago...

Ok, on the contrary, there is no problem with driver education except maybe a little mway experience.
However education is exactly what i'm saying is the best way to reduce casualties. It is all I have concentrated on in my book.
But it is education in the right place. Extending the driving test or making it harder is not the answer. The current driving test is pretty much fit for purpose. The problem is preventing what occurs to virtualy everyones driving standard after the driving test has been passed.

Perhaps you need to spell the great idea out for us, since nothing in your past few posts has seemed that great!

You purport that the current driving test is fit for purpose, yet bemoan the shortfalls in driver skills. Does it not occur to you that the current test is sadly failing to equip young drivers for the road they will face? For example, a newly qualified driver can, within minutes of passing their test, take to the motorways, on which they have not even been allowed to be instructed as a learner!!

You are falling into the same trap as the Government, in making such an assumption.

Just using a busy tourist route a mile or so from my home, and an FoI from the Cumbria Police, I can show that speeding does not figure significantly in the many accidents along the A591 between Kendal and Windermere. Yet the County Council are soon to impose a 50 limit which will be pointless!

A Czech minibus driver clipped the kerb, and bounced out into the path of an oncoming motorcycle - the rider and pillion were killed. Both vehicles were in lines of slow moving traffic, 20 mph below the NSL which governs the road. The limit close by was reduced to.... FORTY mph!

Meanwhile numerous drivers have had offs at Bannerigg while travelling a lot nearer the NSL, without a fatality - mainly because they speed when they see the road is empty, and so far, nobody has hit anyone coming the other way!

This car survived hitting a roadsign, and a tree stump


Looking back the other way.... SEVEN vehicles had accidents here, punching holes in the wall in just 9 months. Not seriously fast, but too fast for their abilities.
An oncoming vehicle at the wrong time could have resulted in a fatal accident with any one of them.

At Ings, where the FORTY limit was imposed, an FoI to the Safety Camera Partnership, (which first qualified MOBILE cameras, were then able to qualify FIXED cameras because accidents went UP), showed that NONE of the accidents had speed as a cause OR a contributory factor.
When first asked by our local paper, they were so ashamed of their statistics, they refused the FoI! Finally they gave in and revealed that they were using speed to justify enforcement when SPEED was NOT involved.


SIX people died in this accident - again, below the speed limit. The inquest noted that a request for speed cameras at the sight had been refused - but that the driver would not have triggered the camera anyway!
Driver inexperience was given as the principle cause.
He lost it on a bend, but was struck by an oncoming Toyota Prius.
The speed limit has now been reduced - to the speed of the vehicles involved!

_________________
Time to take responsibility for our actions.. and don't be afraid of speaking out!

From the above statements it is perfectly clear that you know that compliance with speed limits has nothing to do with the causes of crashes, so why do you keep asserting that speed cameras work. Road safety should be aiming to prevents collisions, not just make them happen more slowly. What would you think if aircaft safety was based on making crashes happening more slowly?

You keep on dangling snippets that suggest that you have all the answers but you don't seem to want to tell us. If you expect us to buy your book to find out then you are as bad as all the other parasites that are trying to make money out of 'safety' these days.

But if the common factor to all accidents (in your view, possibly quite rightly) is bad observation, why not concentrate on that?