Safe Speed Forums

Forgive me for being harsh, but some could read that as you not being able to substantiate your "signs" that it is safe to progress (especially "after dark").
I have no particular interest of the speed of 18mph.

To repeat the part of S&B's post that started this sub-thread: "there is no safe driving-speed where ice is concerned".
To elaborate something I've already eluded to: you should be able to stop in the distance you can expect to be clear, that factoring in reasonably worst case stopping distances and expected actions of other road users. I would exceed 18mph if I reasonably knew I can safely stop in the distance I can expect to be clear; if I have reason to suspect I can't then I don't.
The hard part is knowing the actual stopping distance, which I said before: "which I think is the point of this thread".

I should say: I'm not in favour of everyone driving at really low speeds; I just feel your response towards those that do it in these kinds of conditions is a bit unfair.

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

Let's go back a lot of years to an article in an old electronics magazine ,I mentioned once - about a black ice detector .Most modern cars have an outside temperature sensor ,which gives the air temperature -if some attention paid ,it gives the driver an indication of chances of ice .But the black ice one detected the sudden RISE in temperature that accompanies the presenceof black ice ,and gives an alarm something that most car temperature sensors do not do .The sensors only give an alarm when the temperature drops below a set figure .Bit like the SCP and limits -at times the road is safe ,other times it's not -so you can't depend on the numerical figure .Wing mirrors can give a clue-sudden drop in temperature -they cloud over .

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lets bring sanity back to speed limits.
Drivers are like donkeys -they respond best to a carrot, not a stick .Road safety experts are like Asses - best kept covered up ,or sat on

While I agree that there is no safe stopping distance on ice and every type of ice in itself has different characteristics. I was not talking about people driving on ice.


"We had a couple of inches last night (the most we've had so far) and in all fairness to the local authorities they're doing a great job with the roads with only a few estate roads still ungritted. However i wish that some of the 18MPH crawlers would realise that the roads that they are doing these speeds on (usually 40MPH link roads) are actually no more than slightly damp and just because the verges might have an inch of snow on them the roads have actually been cleared...."


As you can see from the above quote, I was talking about people driving on damp/wet roads which had had a snow fall on them several hours previously, had been salted, had strong sunlight on them for maybe three hours,were in an ambient temperature of about three degrees and to my mind and countless dozens of others, were seemingly driveable at 35- 40MPH and probably more but they were mostly 40MPH limits (previously NSL) They were major arterial roads with traffic probably using them at a rate of a car ever 5-10 seconds.
Now to my mind , people using these roads at 20MPH or less, with long tailbacks behind them, were driving "overcautiously". Maybe if you had been there you would have agreed, maybe you wouldn't.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

To repeat some earlier factors: tolerance of temp measurement, temp measurement was of air not ground, ground has greater thermal inertia than air, damp/wet can include partially melted ice (the worst kind of ice), sunlight doesn't mean melted ice.
More factors: not everyone has an ambient temp display in their car (mine doesn't have one), not everyone will know the road has been gritted.
To finish: what you perceive as the belief of others isn't necessarily what they think; that is still your own perception.


I know that. I was talking about people who has reason to believe they could encounter ice; that was my point, and S&B's.

To be absolutely fair: you may well be right, maybe I did have to be there to appreciate it

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

If that were really true, and I don't think it is, then one should never venture out if there is any possibility of encountering ice - i.e any time it is below freezing and not completely dry.

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

Some may well see that as an overkill statement; others wouldn't.

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

I was stuck on the M27 in the snow on Tuesday night. The recipe for automotive disaster seemed to be cars with RWD and fat tyres, so mainly big Mercs/BMWs etc.

The M27 problems, by the way, were due to the sliproads being impassable rather than the motorway itself.

If you're not sure if you're driving on ice, surely the best thing to do is to try braking at a low speed and see what happens? That's what I've been doing. Obviously not with anyone else around though.

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Andrew.

I haven't read this complete thread, but IMHO the answer is to learn as much as you can from your experiences of driving in winter conditions. Learn to observe and evaluate the conditions in as much detail as you can, try a bit of experimenting with acceleration, braking, steering inputs etc.; get the feel of things, but beware that the state of the road surface fifty yards further on may be somewhat different from what you're driving on at the moment.

To be honest I agree with what graball has been saying. Make the best use you can of your experience.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

TBH, the pragmatic part of my is trying to agree with graball, but this really doesn’t sit right with the rest of me, especially the comments regarding those who did go slow, so I purposely suppressed that pragmatism to see where the debate would lead. I reckon this has been somewhat of an eye-opener. I believe I can cope with ice better than the median of the population (don’t we all), but looking back I do wonder if there have been times when a level of complacency set in.


Remember, not everyone has the necessary experience of winter driving, or any at all!
It’s quite possible that those described as going "ridiculously" slow didn’t have this experience. An inexperienced person can’t be disrespected simply because there wasn’t an opportunity for them to gain that experience. This is mostly why I believe this thread is valid – to compensate for that shortfall.

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

Steve, I'm inclined to agree with graball.

I've recently followed people on ice-free A-roads today at utter crawls, with a line of frustrated motorists up their chuff. I've assumed they couldn't read the conditions, not that they were more aware of them than everyone else (backed up by the circumstantial evidence that I recall them including a Zafira and a Mini cabriolet; we're in Numpty Country, people).

In any situation there is a speed that is unnecessarily slow. That's not to say that people can't travel at the speed they wish to, but it is wrong in any situation to apply the blanket rule "the slower the better".

In fact I can think of an occasion today when I would've been in much more trouble if I'd slowed down more!

My overriding impression of driving skill over the last few days has been despair at the thoughtlessness and stupidity of people. A few examples:

- A van parked on the left opposite a side road which is an ice covered hill. This forces cars wishing to turn right down the hill onto the wrong side of the road and directly into the path of drivers coming up who don't want to give way and lose momentum. Of course, this is also the spot where you will slide off to if you can't turn at the top of the hill after getting to the top.

- Cars just a few feet apart approaching up the stem of an uphill ice-covered T junction. Doesn't anyone think that the cars at the front may slide backwards?

- Two cars parked diagonally opposite each other on a narrow ice covered downhill road forcing drivers to zig-zag through them.

Just thoughtless.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

It doesn't really matter what the weather is, driving so slowly that you are causing a queue is wrong and inconsiderate. Pull over and let people past. Pissing people off is never going to make them drive safer.

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Andrew.

Funny enough the opposite happened to me this morning. I was driving on a 40MPH road that would have been ok for 40MPH at midday yesterday but at 8.30 this morning it looked a little "suspect" and as it was closed at 9am a couple of mornings ago for an icy crash I decided to treat it with caution and drive it at 30-35MPH. Suddenly up behind me came a young girl of about 20ish doing about 40MPH until she was right up behind me. Now i don't like to feel that I would be holding anyone back but decided that 35MPH was about the safe limit I would want to travel in the conditions this morning so stayed at 35MPH with her on my bumper and me " feeling" the road gingerly through the steering wheel.

A few hundred yards later we came to a stretch that was more or less frozen slush, she soon dropped back and I wondered how we would have coped had we hit it any faster than 35MPH...soooo the moral of the story is...you don't have to travel at the speed of the fastest driver on the road...BUT if the majority are travelling safely at 40MPH then you are probably safe but just because the odd person comes tearing up behind you at 40 mph doesn't ALWAYS mean that it is safe to speed up.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

I think it's so smart, that I'm willing to risk this becoming a branched thread.
The break it down ...

1) Why do these people drive so slowly on well treated surfaces?
They fear the conditions changing faster than they can adjust for those changes. They also prefer not to have to make that many adjustments, even if they are more than capable of responding to changes in the environment ahead of time. By driving at a very slow speed, they
a) reduce their mental load
b) may only have to make the most minute adjustments if/when situations turn for the worse
c) can do much less shifting
d) can gain some comfort by making less demands on their reaction times

2) Why do they do it in tight little convoys, with only one or two lengths separation?
Near the front of such an abominably slow snowtrain, eventually, a driver will find themselves up front, and will keep themselves as 'pointman' by preventing all passing through passive and active positioning/lane hogging. (In some instances, the drivers immediately behind the 'pointman' may be assisting in his nomination as Coxswain, by also preventing others from passing them.)
The pointman not only bears the responsibility of responding to any potential hazards well in advance, but also of mitigating the consequences of unforeseen hazards by limiting the collective's velocity.
The other drivers second this behavior by becoming lemmings who:
a) placed their trust in the pointman to the point where they will simply respond as he does, thus acting as a train and further reducing their mental workload
b) not only defend the pointman's tenure, but also impose their collective will upon those behind them by making progress toward the front of the train riskier than simply 'getting in line' (meant as a double entendre')

I have to think of a better name for such an Aggregate Traffic Animal ...

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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

But by travelling so close to the vehicle in front they negate all those advantages. They conclude that the conditions are sufficiently slippery to require a slow speed but do not conclude that those slippery conditions impose a greatly increased stopping distance. That is the paradox that inspired my not particularly smart question.

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

I see it a lot in fog round here, people realise it's foggy enough to slow right down and even put sidelights on in some cases but don't have the intelligence to realise that, if it's foggy enough to slow right down and put sidelights on, that they really should have dipped headlights on.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

What they are counting on, erroneously or not, is that the Coxswain will react soon enough, and properly. Then those that follow, simply follow the leader's behavior.

What is the [numerical] speed [range] we're talking about here? If the only available reaction is to brake - or use engine braking to the same effect - then perhaps two car lengths wouldn't be enough spacetime to react.
If, however, one was watching a vehicle at least one position ahead of the vehicle in front of them - 3rd car watching the 1st, 4th watching the 2nd, and so on - they buy themselves extra spacetime to react.

Keep in mind that these lemmings are more afraid of being overtaken, than what they actually should be afraid of: doing an impression of a compressing accordion.

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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

[quote]If, however, one was watching a vehicle at least one position ahead of the vehicle in front of them - 3rd car watching the 1st, 4th watching the 2nd, and so on - they buy themselves extra spacetime to react./quote]

Apaceime that would be free gift rather than a purchase if they maintained a sensible separation

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

Today, a Mercedes CLK convertible came into our (very icy) industrial estate and accellerated down the slope to a ludicrous speed. It then proceeded to understeer into the kerb on the bend at the bottom of the hill and break its front and rear suspension.

One of my colleagues opened the office window and gave the driver a few words about his level of skill in bad conditions and the fact that he could have killed someone by these actions.

A bit later a RAC flatback transporter turned up to take it away. One of our staff was talking to the RAC man who told him that the car was a courtesy car on loan as the driver had written off his own Merc the day before.

Very comforting to know that people really are too stupid to learn by their mistakes isn't it.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.