Safe Speed Forums

The sight of a police car pulling anyone over is rare nowadays, with the mass explosion in the camera population and all the police counting cash in their offices...

Maybe there should be a new camera that can scan for dilated pupils, they could call it a safety camera!

hmmm.. i saw 3 cars pulled over on my (limited) travels yesterday.
been breathalysed once in the last 6 months...
and exchanged hand gestures with a motorcycle ociffer.

I do about 40-50K a year. been stopped three times in the last 20 years. Breath tested once. 1 for overtaking a police car, 1 for speeding (no action taken) and 1 for a broken tail light bulb.

The It looks like police are too busy talking to crowds out side the pubs to be bothered who is driving. I don't drink at all so it is not an issue with me bue I NEVER see a police car parked up keeping an eye on the passing traffic in town like I used to in the good old days. You only chance of getting caught is if you have a prang and don't do a runner.

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Speed camera policy Kills

I got pulled on a tractor once. It was 4:30 am and he probably thought I'd nicked it, but if I was going to nick a tractor it wouldn't be a Deere! It was 8 years ago too.

Never been stopped in the car. They don't pull clean Honda Civic's over, or something...

EnoughsEnough,

I have nothing to do with scameras or anything else. I work long hard shifts trying to protecting the public, and i don't work in any 'office' collecting cash. I get paid the same whether i do sweet F A (which i'm tempted by more and more), or work hard trying to get slag off the streets (which i do).

I know you were having a general pop at 'the system'. Just give a moments thought to the HUGE majority of us out there, the REAL coppers trying to do the right thing......

I guess it depends on where you are - here in Cumbria, I have not been stopped for..... I cannot remember! I rarely see traffic cars out and about for ages, then see half a dozen in a day!
When at college in Blackpool, I got stopped on my motorbike regularly - three times in one night, when I gave a girl a lift home at 3.00 am! Third time I was breathalised. I suspect they were looking for a bike like mine in connection with something else.
When my bike got stolen though, I got little help at all - apparently I should have put the bike under my bed at nights, instead of leaving it locked up on the street!
Actually I just remembered, I got stopped last year on our way to ASDA with the family in the pouring rain, because I had green LED's on the front grill. They are still there, and I have not been stopped since. I even turn them on when I see a police car in the daytime, and have a copy of the UK lighting regulations in the glovebox just in case!

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

Hi The Man,
well done on your job and keep up the good work I live in the South East and have a very safe neighbourhood.
Seeing that you yourself, being a police officer, disagree with the (s)camera system, why do you still let the council put them up? Who actually gets to decide which camera goes where? Or do they just stick em where theres a lot of cars going by on an open road?

Hiya delmontebanana (is that really the name you chose?!! )

In answer to your question 'why do you let the Council put them up', my answer is, what can i do about it? Resign in disgust? I should imagine the ramifications of me leaving the job would last, ohhh, about 2 minutes!

You're right though, i don't agree with camera's, never have. I think you would find that most non traffic old bill tend to 'make progress' when conditions allow. There's nothing i enjoy more than my journey home after a late-turn. Let's just say that the brakes have been known to literally smoke upon my arrival home (and the journey is only 8 miles...)

How do they decide where to place the blasted things? Again, i honestly don't know. Unfortunately they are here to stay, at least until the huge majority of drivers learn to drive as conditions allow, and not just as they choose to drive in their little air-bag-wrapped world.....

"I never see a car parked up in town these days"

Probably not. That doesn't fulfill the latest targets these days. Either that or the very few traffic cars around are usually picking up bits of people who can't drive in a straight line without hitting something !

Like most of the coppers on here, I can't stand speed cameras. Typical reason why today - MVA on a roundabout at the end of a dual carriageway, 4 vehicles involved - one driver uninsured, one over the limit from last night, one vehicle no MOT and tyres so bald you could call them an eagle.

All had safely passed the camera half a mile earlier without any danger of any offences coming to light.

Having swept up after that one, carried on with the usual mix of being overtaken by people on the phone or drinking coffee, or driving at 40 in the right hand lane with nothing on the inside on dual carriageways - none of which were alert enough of their surroundings to notice an unmarked car but driven by someone in a dayglo jacket with an unusual amount of kit on the dash. Only a couple of people were observant enough to twig this from behind the car.

There is only one way to get some sanity (and safety) back on the roads of this country - teach people to drive properly and get high visibility road policing back stopping the idiots not the safe but fast drivers.

Rant over !!

How many are we talking about here?
If just one percent to drivers are like you describe, you'll see an awful lot of bad driving in the space of a typical day on the roads. That's one in every hundred, and how many hundreds of drivers do you encounter in a day?
Ten numpties are likely to be noticed far more than the other 990 who drive reasonably.

But, what are cameras going to help with that lot? they'll still drive badly, just a bit slower.

Cheers
Peter

A big to cotswold, it's great to see more police getting into the act.

And even better when they agree that the current policies are daft.

And I don't even live in the UK

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Ross

Yes I'm a hoon, but only on the track!!!!

Very Very Very good point, Pete. Reflects my experience exactly, the vast majority of drivers are fine, no problems, but now and again a bad one turns up, and that's the one that everyone uses to justify persecuting the other safe road users. And the bad one is probably not even "improved" by speed camaeras if he's drunk/drugged/on false plates/stubbornly arrogant/etc.

In other words enormous sledgehammer, tiny nut.

[oh and I'll second m3r's "welcome". I was born in the Cotswolds, nice area.]

I desperatly hope the move to more cameras less police stops, i as i've said in another post am a law abiding citizen who is starting to think all coppers are out to get me because i dare to drive on the roads i pay for.

My view on cameras, is dig them all up and replant them outside every school, and stick the limit down to 20mph at school times.

I didn't realise untill the other day how much i am starting to resent the police and this is purely down to feeling persecuted every time i get behind the wheel, i am an average Joe but would not go out of my way anymore to help the police.

And i'm sure the numbers of people who feel this way is growing every day another xxx,xxx tickets are dropped through peoples letterbox.

I'll stop now because the rage is building!

Hot topic of conversation in the office this morning - declining standard of driving in the UK reflecting our modern selfish, impatient and unco-operative society. In no particular order, acts witnessed include, (many multiple instances thereof):

Tailgating
Impatience
Aggression
Ignoring statutory regulations (mobile phones for example)
Exiting/joining the motorway irresponsibly
Inattention
Trying to drive much faster than the prevailing traffic will obviously permit
Lane indiscipline
Failure to use indicators
Jumping red traffic lights
Making no real attempt to obey the urban speed limit or correctly modify their speed even when obvious hazrads such as schoolkids waiting to cross the road are present
Deliberate encroachment upon another drivers right of way
Use of ghost island to overtake in the face of waiting traffic
Road Rage
Use of vehicle with failed head/tail/brake lights
[Added after edit] Failure to adjust speed and safe distances to accomodate prevailing weather (patchy but very thick fog)

And that was just on my journey to work this morning.

Fortunately, our road network is still largely tolerant of this decline in standards, and accident rates remain as they are in spite of, not because of, the drivers who use the system.

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'The normally careful and competent actions of a reasonable person should be considered legal, regardless of the letter of statute'

Rioman, Herts

See this: http://www.safespeed.org.uk/speedo.html

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

Seconded!

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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.

Where you from then?

Cannot be my patch... we are old fashioned here and believe in tried and tested methods.

If you are in our area and your driving is a bit dodgy.... you will be checked as routine

PS... we have allegedly one scamera...but lots of fast cars and bikes larking around..

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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.

Should be mile each side of school as kids walk home in either direction. They seldom run straight out through gates into road. They cross at any time on walk home .. thus series of amber lights and one s/cam for mile - say - each way. This should be switched off at night and during holidays - of course.



But most BiBs hate them too. Some career peeved -ceee CCs cannot see speedos for gatsos...but your average bobby on the beat has nowt to do with this daft decisions taken by the tin pots on high. Besides ... how esles does the bobby stop the baddy on your behalf if you don't help him?

Or -g-g-gulp - ... are you meaning you would stand by and let some thug beat the c****p out of me?

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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.

[/quote]


The scamera partnerships in UK are responsible for creating a certain amount of resentment in millions of otherwise hard working, law-abiding drivers who feel they are (justifiably or not) being persecuted. It seems the relationship between the police and the public is being put under some strain (evidence many of the contributions in these forums). They contrast the missionary zeal with which they are pursued for miniscule technical violations of posted limits, when no crime has been committed, and no victim, with apparent lack of attention to what they perceive as much more serious criminally-intentioned activities such as theft.

There is a perception (rightly or wrongly) that motorists are soft targets, who generally pay up and co-operate so are easy sources of revenue, whereas pursuing real criminals takes some effort, so it's not done. If the 'speed kills' thing were reducing accidents or casualties at all, then the mood might be a bit more sympathetic, but it's quite obvious to everyone that the opposite is the case and at best all these cameras are totally ineffective as accident-reducers.

The consequences of all this are potentially very serious for the relationship between the public and the police - especially for obviously decent, hardworking blokes like you who need and absolutely deserve strong public support. This outcome is not something you are in any way responsible for, but you have to live with it. This is Not a Good Thing at all.

Most of us support the forces of law enforcement in general (if we don't, the alternative doesn't bear thinking about) but we can't get away from the fact that this misguided policy is misdirecting road safety resources, criminalising millions of otherwise law-abiding citizens and causing a lot of cynicism and hostility to law enforcement in general. These side-effects are very, very serious. If I were in the force, I honestly don't know how I would feel. I can assure you, however, that I would not stand by if some thug were beating the c**p out of you. You don't make the policy, you just have to live with its disastrous consequences.

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'The normally careful and competent actions of a reasonable person should be considered legal, regardless of the letter of statute'

Rioman, Herts