Safe Speed Forums

The clue is in the world "reactive". Your scheme, I suspect from the use of that word, would have involved rather more than just observing and photographing the "yoofs" from a distance.

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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

We are not doing the same to "motorists", we are engaged in an education program for those behaving anti-socially in residential communities with the most common violent killer – a motor vehicle

As I have stated, our group of maybe forty plus people carry out sessions where there are safety issues with speed at the appropriate times. Another point is, I resent these anti-social bullies forcing on the rest of us speed humps and cameras. Those that speed at school time in residential communities, or near blind junctions that are common in rural areas, present a danger to other road users. Rural communities lack traffic light controlled junctions, roundabouts, pedestrian crossings, pavements and traffic density to reduce speed. Yet it is precisely these features that are found in the driving test which is held in urban, not rural communities. Those who object to Speedwatch should promote a viable alternative Driving requires social interaction with others, there are times for drivers to reduce speed, there are other times rapid progress can be made safely


Few years ago we had problems with feral yoofs causing a lot of damage - fences kicked down /eggs , sausage thrown at houses /cars targeted for damage ,tyres damaged. Failing attendance from Police, we suggested a reactive team to respond to these invasions, and "persuade " the yoofs to go elsewhere. Police response was that this might be construed as "vigilante tactics " .
But then we get another lot , doing the same to motorists . It's called "community speedwatch " . Anyone get the similarity, and why is one " vigilante tactics" , when another is police approved .

hi again

do you find from your experience that only one letter sent to the motorist will suffice, are there any cases where you have had multiple repeat motorists disobeying the limit, a few more questions if you dont mind

1. What do you feel is the deterrant the VAS or the speedwatch volunteers with the clipboard?
2. Have you ever observed traffic flow with just the VAS or just the speedwatch volunteers
3. Who conducts the checks on the vehicle registration you have obtained
4. As someone else mentioned what happens if the letter is sent to the RK, but the RK is not the driver i would imagine there is no S172 obligation to fulfill, so if we imagine its three strikes and you are out

1+2/ From experience many drivers just like to see people out there making sense out of chaos. The vast majority of drivers seem happy to oblige when they understand what is going on. We experiment and will continue to trial ideas to see what works.

3/ At the moment the police use their own paid staff to carry out checks, this may change in the future. What would be unacceptable is for those on checks to carry out PCN checks.

4/ The letters are advisory, it may be we pick up a cloned plate when the police may watch out for that vehicle. Drives that ignore us constantly will find themselves dealing with the police at some point.


1. What do you feel is the deterrant the VAS or the speedwatch volunteers with the clipboard?
2. Have you ever observed traffic flow with just the VAS or just the speedwatch volunteers
3. Who conducts the checks on the vehicle registration you have obtained
4. As someone else mentioned what happens if the letter is sent to the RK, but the RK is not the driver i would imagine there is no S172 obligation to fulfill, so if we imagine its three strikes and you are out

Hmmm...

This is quite an interesting way for you to describe your activities. Do you really think that there is chaos on our roads due to a very few people exceeding a posted limit? I don't.

The vast majority of drivers use safe speeds irrespective of signage.

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

In which case Soeedwatch can be classified as "Mainly Harmless". If people choose to spend their leisure time out in the rain clutching a clipboard and speed gun it is no concern of mine.

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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

No, I do not think this, as an advanced driving instructor working with drivers who have problems with posted speed limits, time and again the problem comes down to pressure to speed by tailgaters. When this gives the desired result, drivers speed. When one driver pressures another you start to create chaos and maybe feelings of giult. The most common type of collision is being rear ended. Modern vehicles driven properly should not be colliding with other road users


This is quite an interesting way for you to describe your activities. Do you really think that there is chaos on our roads due to a very few people exceeding a posted limit? I don't.

I don't think anyone would disagree with that dcb, except GS and his BS. What I wonder though is whether the police would endorse members of the public donning vizi-vests and videoing the antisocial behaviour of the aforementioned yobs. If not it's probably due to the difficulty that would be experienced in parting camera from rectum, which further points to the view that motorists are simply a soft target.

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Regulation without education merely creates more criminals.

So you're saying that the problem is failing to leave sufficient gap, rather than speeding? How many letters do CSW send out about that? What is the advice for drivers who are being tailgated, and how is that altered by CSW activities? Are you essentially saying that you are in the business of sending snot-o-grams to people who have been bullied into exceeding the limit by aggressive tailgaters?

If it's not too much trouble could you please cite your source for the "most common type of collision" statistic, and if possible the causal factors recorded for them. I would have thought it quite hard to exceed the speed limit when there is someone right in front of you obeying it and no opportunity to overtake!

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Regulation without education merely creates more criminals.

I'm not so sure. I regularly see tailgaiting in middle lanes of motorways - that can't be due to 'pressure to speed'. Besides, such tactics usually result with the opposite effect: the lead drivers slow down to compensate for that reduced gap - or to drop a hint to the following driver.
Closer gaps could be merely an artifact of being ready for an overtake.

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

there are two avenues of discussion relevant here, say for instance your village is a 40mph road,

driver 1 thinks its safe to drive at say 50mph according to the conditions, driver 2 is keeping pace with driver1, driver 1 enters your VAS and gets logged and subsequently a warning letter sent out, driver 2 is too close behind driver 1 to get logged by the VAS

or

driver 1 is driving at 40mph, driver 2 is tailgating "pressures" driver1, to increase speed driver 1 enters the realms of the VAS and gets logged, but again driver 2 is too close to trigger the VAS,

so in both cases driver 1 gets the warning but driver 2 the aggressor gets off scott free, or can you physically amend the sheets to say driver 1 was being tailgated by driver2, the speed must be the same and driver 2 gets the letter

There is nothing wrong with filming yobs, it is quite legal using a camera in public, but you may need witnesses to add support and qualify what you are doing. The police should uphold the law, not make new ones


I don't think anyone would disagree with that dcb, except GS and his BS. What I wonder though is whether the police would endorse members of the public donning vizi-vests and videoing the antisocial behaviour of the aforementioned yobs. If not it's probably due to the difficulty that would be experienced in parting camera from rectum, which further points to the view that motorists are simply a soft target.

Except I wasn't questioning the legality, but the chances of the police endorsing that course of action in the same way that they do the CSW schemes.

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Regulation without education merely creates more criminals.

I would suggest that it's far easier, and far more commonplace, to 'pressure', or more accurately 'force' not just one driver, but a long line of traffic, into going slower than they would want to - all you have to do is be in front.

Another way of putting it: is the car behind too close to your rear, or is your rear too close to the car behind?

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Only when ideology, prejudice and dogma are set aside does the truth emerge - Kepler

Thanks for that. It all seems reasonable enough - although it's just a question of building up trust now. I guess that most motorists will be instantly suspicious of anything in a high-vis vest, pointing some sort of device at traffic! I'm a little disappointed that the only discretion appears to come from the decision as to whether or not to operate at a particular location / time, though. One of the key principles espoused by many on here is that the safe speed for the conditions is almost constantly changing with a huge variety of factors. As such, you could end up with one vehicle exceeding the speed limit quite safely one minute, but another in the same location causing a hazard the next. Choosing to operate at particular times of day is an improvement on a fixed camera, but still not the whole solution, I think.

We are looking at permanent signs, notifying GPS camera detector manufacturers so their data bases can be updated and the media when we will be out. Agreed, this is not perfect, but it’s far superior to speed humps and speeding tickets. There are areas we will not operate in at any time if there is no purpose, at least this uses common sense.



Thanks for that. It all seems reasonable enough - although it's just a question of building up trust now. I guess that most motorists will be instantly suspicious of anything in a high-vis vest, pointing some sort of device at traffic! I'm a little disappointed that the only discretion appears to come from the decision as to whether or not to operate at a particular location / time, though. One of the key principles espoused by many on here is that the safe speed for the conditions is almost constantly changing with a huge variety of factors. As such, you could end up with one vehicle exceeding the speed limit quite safely one minute, but another in the same location causing a hazard the next. Choosing to operate at particular times of day is an improvement on a fixed camera, but still not the whole solution, I think.

i was driving along today and saw an advert on a bus advertising the olympics in 2012, i also recall a while back a thread on the 2012 organisers advertising for vounteers to work unpaid during the event, maybe we should all volunteer

I've finally had a response from Wilts Police to my FoI request relating to this (I can email the letter to anyone that wants proof, just PM me). I asked them the following:


Their reply:


So the BBC story is rubbish.

Might I add that this FoI pre-dates Speedwatcher's posts, and was no attempt to undermine his comments?

I've followed this up with an email to the BBC:

Not so far away we had a "reactive force " - which went out with only video cameras as their sole protection - they had a very substantial influence on drug dealers et all .


OUR "reactive force " , only used the threat of a direct link to a police reactive force - with possibly observation - it worked .

BUT- I suspect that some country folks might like to spend some time in an urban situation to see how threatened they might feel in a similar situation -where the problem was whether Fox might take a chook or two .

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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