Safe Speed Forums

When Cameras were thought of they were and still are I believe there simply to enforce the speed Limits not to have a prime function of cutting accidents - the mere fact that they are installed, it slows dirvers down to the speed limt for that particl;uer road; if it helps to prevent accidents then that is a bonus.

Because for past decades the enforcement of the speed lkimits has been very peacemeal and has never been equated to the amount of speeding that takes place. (consider the ratio of Police traffic officers to the numbers of vehicles on the road) and that will show that no way can Police have the slightest effect on enforcing the law and the reason is, there are not enough of them. They just have a token showing of a few officers out on patrol.

To show a comparision with cameras, there would have to be literally thousands of Police traffic patrols to have any impression.
Now this is where cameras show out; because their only function is to detect speed and can check every vehicle that passes by. Now that results in tens of thousands of mnotrists being checked and as a result of that, thousands who are breaking the speed limts, and it is thousands ( borne out by the revenue returns we are told is being made) are defying speed limits. What the public can now see is just how much the drivers are paying out (whose fault is that - not the people who put up camers) but the dsrivers who seem helL bent on shelling out their hard earned cash .

When cameras were first mooted a senior said they would set to only catch the nutters (or words to that effect).

If they'd stuck to that then cameras would still have some kind of public approval.

Ditto the assertion that they would be used at blackspots, i.e. you'd have to be mad to exceed the limit. But no, we see them on overtaking lanes (A303 Chicklade), 30 limited dual carriageways with fences down the side (Southampton), and the only passing place for miles on an otherwise bendy road (A352 Wool-Wareham road in Dorset).

So you end up in a situation where every other person you meet has 3 points for speeding, so that the insurance companies consider one instance of SP30 on your licence to be of no bearing to your insurance risk. What have they achieved? Points for speeding is now as antisocial as getting a parking ticket, which means people don't care how they drive any more because justice is random, arbitrary, and crucially doesn't catch the real bad guys who probably don't have licences, MOTs, insurance or tax.

But if they don't cut accidents, then all you are doing is enforcing the law for its own sake. Surely, given limited resources, all law enforcement activity has to demonstrate a public benefit.

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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

Actually that's an extremely good point. If speed limits aren't about road safety, what are they about?

And what has been the watchword of the Scamera Propaganda"Accidents HAVE been reduced by (insert own figure) at camera sites " - so all counties rushed out to buy cameras in the belief that accidents would miraculously stop/reduce (and up to the end of hiving off -increase the County's bank balance) .Something that was suggested to prove that the was no financial incentive was to remove the fee - but having already spent it ( as good labour politicians almost always do) -there was no way they were going to do that .

Now one last point - I notice that although we do not share your point of view ,nobody has been polite enough to offer you the customary ,accorded to all new posters .

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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

Control of the public by the Government. Know your place. We are watching.

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

Utter Pap!
How many times have you heard the one third lie being used as the prime reason?
One third of accident caused by speed they said, we must have cameras to slow down these errant bastards and make them pay us for the privelige.
Arrive Alive- "we dont want to catch you, we only want to slow you down"...why? If its not creating accidents then whats the big fat problem?



"If"???? "If"??? hells bells man! I thought it was steaming FACT that speed KILLS!??And you give us an "IF"???



Ever heard the phrase; "Policing by consent"??? It means that we, the public, pay you the police to enforece the laws we want to see enforced. When we dont want a law enforced then you bloody well dont enforce it, cos thats what the majority want. Seeemples!



This ^^^^smells of troll fodder to me.

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"Safety" Scamera Partnerships;
Profitting from death and misery since 1993.

Believe nothing- Question everything.

Did to me - though I did offer the customary greeting ,out of courtesy .Though as a sea angler ,I wait to see if the fish is several mackerel, or a large conger before getting out of water .You never do know what is lurking beneath those waves - might be an idea for those with facilities to check out OP/IP address -it might hail from a submerged address in the lakes .

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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

Speed cameras have not been proven to give any benefit whatsoever. Sure they may distract drivers and force adverse behaviour, but no positive effect has been demonstrated when accounting for the obvious confounding factors of Regression To the Mean (link) and 'Bias On Selection' (other safety measures applied at camera sites).


Like we had before cameras, when the year-on-year fatality rate was falling much quicker?


So do you prefer a speed camera that gathers evidence of one mere technical infringement and allows the determined criminal evade justice, or a trafpol that detects any tell-tale sign of anti-social bad/careless/reckless/dangerous driving, for all road offences, and halt it there and then and not let the determined criminal get away with it?

That's a tricky one!

Remember, contrary to misguided opinion: this campaign calls for speed limits and enforcement of them where exceeding them causes danger.
We also want to stop the nutters, but unlike others we don't have a conflict of interest and haven't been hoodwinked by the technology suppliers.

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

ADD -we DON'T promote speeding( WE ABHOR THE IDEA OF DRIVING ABOVE THE SAFE LIMIT FOR THE CONDITIONS) ,but a return to the choosing of speed limits based on the 85th percentile as opposed to the other criteria of lobbying of local politicians by pressure groups . We also call for the return of road safety to road safety professionals and the resurrection of dedicated road policing units .
We suggest you read the founders definition of what is proposed as as "SAFESPEED" - and we look forward to a day when drivers are educated to drive to prevailing conditions ,rather than a limit . In this case ,if the limit was set correctly ,the driver would ALWAYS be below ,or not exceeding it ,and be able to stop ,in control, on their side of the road ,IN THE DISTANCE THEY COULD SEE TO BE CLEAR .

eeldu1 -perhaps you might also like to look at the pearls of wisdom of a senior officer -another Hendon Graduate - try searching for posts by IG .

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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

Yes it all very well saying let the coppers get amongst the dangerous careless etc but they just do not do that these days; there are no old sweats in the Police anymore to show the young how to detect a speed dangerous - ask any copper when was the last time he booked anyone for a 'witness' dangerous or careless offence and the returnI I guarantee would be 'NIL' return . I cannot remember in the last 20 years when there was a time I saw a traffic patrol car or motorcyclist cop of present day ever pulling anyone .
I would just like to ask any of then to show me their personal records of their 'Bookings' the only time anyone gets a summons these days for 'dangerous driving or careless driving' is the result of an accident and I can assure you as an active old time trafpol the modern traf pols just do not report drivers for anything anymore. put a challenge out to any trafpol you see! (If there are any about)

If by "pulling" someone, you mean stopping them, then you really must get out more. I saw a marked car "pulling" someone only the other day and have seen several unmarked cars "pulling " motorists over the last few years. I probably see an average of one a month round our way.

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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.

Ah so I imagined being pulled over on the A34 Wilmslow bypass a couple of years ago - though to be fair I only got threatened with a due care.
Oh and the unmarked R32 Golf on the A65 last Sunday, he was parting the hair of a motorcyclist as I tootled by.

If you'd like I could ask my mate - a traf pol Sgt in the Met with 25 years time served - if A: any old sweats in the force? B: If the Mets traf pol still do any traffic policing?

And but I would caution to think twice post once around these parts.

Chris

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The difference between intelligence and stupidity is that intelligence has limits.

I was nearly ran over by a drunk driver and I phoned it in, thankfully plod were nearby to arrest him (he blew 3x over). Cameras would have been useful how?


Perhaps it is only your memory which is failing?


That's right, they give joyriders mere speeding tickets!

This is conveniently topical (police campaign).
Edited to add: another topical one, pulled by trafpol!
I can recall police taking action for instances of: slow driving, wrong-way driving, racing, driving an unroadworthy vehicle, pavement driving, tailgating, disobeying signed instructions, lane hogging, swerving, causing obstruction, any form of intimidation - and let's not forget ... your cameras must nab a lot of people for impaired (drunk, drugged) driving, certainly much more than police do - yes?

I cannot take you seriously!

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

What about all the 'Police Interceptors' type stuff on the TV? Invriably they end up pulling the kind of people we all want off the roads. Yes I know TV isn't real life, but that does often show what I would call real traffic policing. And they get some proper police cars too

What does annoy me watching programmes like that is that penalties that the little scrotes they catch driving with no insurance/MOT/tax/licence don't seem proportionate to the fines Joe Public gets for doing 37 in a .

I'm usually shouting "throw him in jail!" at the TV.

Was my thought as well Johnny, if there's no traffic stops going on then how do they keep finding footage for these shows? I'm also often impressed on the show by the lengths most of the officers will go to to avoid issuing a ticket if a word will suffice, though some plunkers still manage to talk themselves into it!

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Regulation without education merely creates more criminals.

ummm
, just one of many points in case...
http://www.warwickshire.gov.uk/web/corp ... 5E0030038B



according to this the cameras are there to improve safety..... speed enforcement is merely the claimed means.


http://www.warwickshire.gov.uk/Web/corp ... 7700363F3A



they seem to get a bit confused here referring both to speed cameras and safety cameras.... wondering what the difference is

OPs concept that speed cameras are there "simply to enforce the speed Limits " really illustrates the non-Peelian mindset that so many law makers and law makers are now in. Since 1215 we have moved, in this country, away from a system where laws are arbitrarily applied and enforced from the top towards a system where the laws are made and enforced by the consent of the electorate. Any law must be seen to be useful and just or it will be held in contempt and obeyed grudgingly. The "rule of law" is not about blind obedience, it is about continually questioning the justice and usefulness of legislation. That is why some laws fall into disuse even though they remain on the statute book (the obligation to practice archery on Sunday for example) and other laws are only changed by civil disobedience (universal suffrage springs to mind)

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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

By the same rationale of enforcing the law just because it's there, I wish to see a nationwide crackdown on people copying their personal CD collections onto their iPods, which is of course illegal.

The middle classes do this, so by definition it is worse than some low life selling pirate CDs and DVDs by the van load.

My views are not representative of the Safespeed site but those of a driver who has driven for 36 years, in all sorts of conditions, at all times of the day and night on every type of road, in most types of vehicle and in that time covered well over a million miles, so knows a little bit about what makes for safety on the road and 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 the country's roads safely.



Yes agree I TOO HAve been about on the roads for 61 years !!