Safe Speed Forums

Cameras in Malta

http://www.ciltmalta.org/UserFiles/Imag ... amera2.jpg

Cameras in Sweden

http://www.sxc.hu/pic/m/s/su/sundstrom/ ... camera.jpg

Cameras in Holland

http://www.thenewspaper.com/rlc/pix/nlgantry.jpg

Should I go on?

Ah, so do you accept the UK aren’t the champs as you so gleefully put it?

What about:

Cameras in Poland

http://www.thenewspaper.com/rlc/pix/plspeedcam.jpg

Cameras in Italy

http://69.65.60.112/~blogital/wp-conten ... eedcam.jpg

Cameras in Luxembourg

http://hello.news352.lu/images/divers/L ... _thumb.jpg

These other European countries have cameras too yet have a worse record than the UK ..... so what was your point?

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

... was that we now know that you can have an excellent safety record with
cameras. Which rather undermines the central plank of your campaign.
As for the newest numbers, how many of those countries had a 7 per cent drop
in 2007 alone?

Not at all.
We know countries can have a worse safety record with cameras. We also know we can have an excellent safety record without cameras (indeed we did).
We also know we have had a far better drop of casualty rate, even though traffic had been increasing at a significantly faster rate than today.
We also know we can have a better and more predictable driving environment by having fair limits and proportional penalties.
We also know we can have a better safety record than we have today by reversing the pseudo-science based policy of displacing trafpol with cameras.


You tell us.
Anyway, that's a clear deviation from the decade long trend for no apparent reason. I hardly think it likely to be as a result of the camera/speed kills policy when it hasn’t had any such effect in any earlier years; that year is much more likely to be an outlier.

Let’s explore other possible reasons:
We know we were stung pretty hard with fuel duty, then the recession bit us. The high rate of UK pubs closing could go some way to explaining the casualty falls.
Also, in 2007 and 2008 there's a lot of anecdotal evidence that the intensity of speed enforcement activity has been considerably reduced compared with earlier in the decade when the notorious hypothecation scheme was in operation. [PeterE] and thus the historic downward trend from safer cars, better medical care etc has now surfaced/resumed. [hairyben]

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

Or you could say you can have an excellent safety record despite cameras. And the years between about 1998 and 2004 when automated enforcement was really being ratcheted up saw some of the smallest falls in casualties.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

Your opinion is slightly undermined by the fact that there has been little reduction in camera use since 2004, yet the biggest fall has occurred since. Isn't it?

Bill Clinton (in another context) got it right
"Its the economy, stupid."

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The only thing that should be prohibited is prohibition.

Thanks for the reminder. The fall is even more impressive than we thought because the 2007 figures predate the
current recession. So "it ain't the economy, stupid", as Bill might have said.

Hello,


Very interesting post, it was delight to read such rich experienced post it was almost like traveling in different countries ,tell us more about your journey it sounds very interesting.


Regards,
sarah_9

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DMV Approved Traffic School

Yes, tell us more, and let's quit harping on about speed etc. What's the price of a pint in Oslo?
There's a good English pub off Karl Johans gate, but I forget the name now. It's too dear to
drink at (say) the Grand Hotel - only the toffs got there...

Actually, it supports his view. I say again: in 2007 and 2008 there's a lot of anecdotal evidence that the intensity of speed enforcement activity has been considerably reduced compared with earlier in the decade when the notorious hypothecation scheme was in operation ... and thus the historic downward trend from safer cars, better medical care etc has now surfaced/resumed.
Don't forget, the camera policy hasn't had much of an effect for many years beforehand, so why should it have such an unusual effect in 2007?


Actually it is. Fuel prices rose to £1 per litre at the end of 2006, this was when fuel started becoming expensive enough to more or less end the trend of the rate of rise of travel.

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

Surely it was 2008, when we had first sky-high fuel prices, and then a sudden sharp recession, when we saw the really significant drop in casualties in Britain.

_________________
"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

We had the first spike in 2006 when prices reached the psychologically significant pound per litre mark; it rose sharply again in 2008.

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

Thank you. I will put up a link to another forum where I will be posting about the trip,

And beer is way too expensive as is almost everything else

As abercrombie spouted on some derailed thread or other about the effect of comprehensive insurance on drivers' attitudes, perhaps we need figures on the relative price of insurance in various European countries vs. accident rates; maybe there's a correlation!

Or maybe not...

Good question. Most of the cars I saw were of the larger variety family saloons and estates or 4x4's and pickups. That maybe because I was for the most of the time outside cities. However even in cities I did not see too many small cars. because every thing is so expensive.

No. The figures relate to the period before that, 2007.

In general, big cars are safer for the occupants than small ones, but they carry more momentum,
which would cause more damage to the things they hit. You end up in a "big car arms race".

Talking of which - a fat women in a gigantic chevy pickup pulled up next to my 206 at a hamburger place.
She could only open her door 8 inches! As she was getting down, she was moaning about the size of the
parking spaces. The side of her car was all keyed, presumably by other drivers who were fed up with
her "truck".

It's not the relative price that is at issue. The issue is that drivers are compensated for bad driving. No claims bonus protection schemes, in particular, isolate drivers from the consequences of their actions - without isolating their victims, of course.

As those modestly skilled in the art know the road crash rate is a leading indicator of the state of the economy i.e. changes in the recorded crash rate precede recorded changes in the economy. This is because reduced activity shows up as a reduction in economic activity which is delayed due to the methods of measuring.

Bill Clinton's desk motto was correct. "It IS the economy, stupid"

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The only thing that should be prohibited is prohibition.