Safe Speed Forums

Do these numpties think they are the police now?

I have noticed them sat in the "Police Vehicles Only" areas between J15-16 M4 with their big shiny taxpayer funded Rangies. Of course everyone thinks they are cops and slam the brakes on.

I was thinking of reporting it to the local traffic division as they are NOT police, do NOT have police powers and therefore should not be parked in a police slip road.

Rant over.

EDIT
Just sent an email to the local police asking them about this....

_________________
"Are you sh**ing me?"
"John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute."

Their role is to patrol the motorways and assist with breakdowns, accidents and removal of debris - to do this they need to be on or near the motorway, and to me, the "Police Vehicles Only" refuges are a fairly sensible place to sit... They are definitely providing a useful role as Police time spent protecting a breakdown on the hard shoulder is a waste of time, as is dashing across 3 lanes of motorway to retrieve a section of lorry tyre, but still dangerous work.

The fact that everyone "thinks" that they are the Police is not their fault as such, as to do their job in relative safety they do need very high visibility. The simple way to tell them apart from Police at a distance is the colour of the lights on top: Police have Blue and Red, HA have Orange.

All fair points well made.

The issue (as I feel), is that there are those of us who know the difference, and carry on as normal.

Then there are those who don't know the difference, and swerve and cut in because they think there is a cop there (seen this this morning).

What to do - its a difficult one.......

_________________
"Are you sh**ing me?"
"John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute."

What I do, is take advantage of everybody slowing down and pulling into L2 (probably for the first time in 20 miles), and overtake in L3 with no more slowing than I would for any other bunching of traffic. But I do pretty much the same with Police too - they haven't yet pulled me in for doing 80 in L3, and to do so they would have to get out of their self-imposed "boxed in" position first.

I saw the very same thing this morning, sudden slowing down of traffic in all three lanes from the usual 80 to around 60 - why? because of the highways vehicle parked up in the "Police vehicles only" sliproad....HA patrols seem to me to be a complete waste of time and money. As for police patrols, well havent seen one of those for weeks on the M4......

Just imagine - police patrols to catch all the bad lane discipline, tailgating etc. I forgot, that costs money, doesn't raise money....

_________________
"Are you sh**ing me?"
"John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute."

So why do the HA lights appear to have smoked glass fitted, so you can't tell if they are blue, red, amber, yellow or green?

They are probably a good idea, but playing plastic police (as opposed to helpful HAs) on motorways isn't the best behaviour!

mb

It is the blue that I look for - Police "glass" is definitely blue on the light bar, if it isn't blue, then it isn't Police; this means that HA and the AA for example are automatically grouped together and instantly removed from my mental list of hazards.

Just why should it be made so difficult for members of the public to identify a genuine police vehicle?

Don't bother replying - I know the answer.

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

I was totally against the idea when they were first introduced. Looked like another case of plastic police (e.g. community support officers). lower paid, lower skilled 'coppers' doing 'visible policing' whatever that is.

however, provided they stick to their current role I think its OK. they've been quite useful where I have seen them e.g. marking breakdows etc.

I do however feel that it could have easily been outsourced to the RAC or AA and there was absolutely no need to make them look nearly identical to police vehicles unless of course it was to deceive people into thinking they ar cop cars.

I suspect they (like traffic wardens) will soon be given police powers and we'll see them opporating motorway speed checks etc soon enough. Then they'll do away with traffic cops altogether.

I also don't think there is any reason why they should get high end 4x4s instead of transit vans - the AA and RAC manage fine.

Interestingly enough, this very question was asked in the Commons yesterday:

Mr. Greg Knight: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport in what circumstances and upon whose authority Highways Agency vehicles use observation parking bays marked ‘for police vehicles only' on motorways. [73666]

Dr. Ladyman: The Police are able to stop on any part of a motorway, including the observation platforms, by virtue of Regulation 16 of The Motorways Traffic (England and Wales) Regulations 1982. Regulation 16 allows a Police officer to stop where they do so in the exercise of their duty.

These Regulations were amended by The Motorways Traffic (England and Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2004 to give Highways Agency Traffic Officers the same ability to stop in the exercise of their duty as the Police.

The use of these observation platforms by Highways Agency Traffic Officers provides a visible reassurance that an official vehicle is available to assist and support road users, if needed, and allows Traffic Officers to park on the motorway, minimising fuel usage, while still maintaining an appropriate response capability in the event of an incident.

I have no problem with them parking on those things. I do have a large problem with the fact that the design of the vehicle is identical to the old police range rovers except the non-reflective blue bits have been replaced with non-reflective black bits.

Surely it can't be good for safety to be having all the people who know this peering at the vehicle trying to determine the colour (especially in low light) while the person in front who doesn't know this is jamming on the brakes to get to 60

If they made them yellow and red things would be a lot better, ok the muppets would probably think that they're a fire engine but in many ways that is more appropriate to their actual function.

To the person who overtakes them in L3. Lucky you, whenever I encounter these things L3 has dropped to 60 as well.

In the meantime, just remember this simple rule: Orange light? Can't do shite.

Well, i had a call from a traffic sergeant about this, he explained basically what Stephen Ladyman replied.

I gave him my thoughts about drivers panic braking, and he said the lights are different, and they shouldn't be speeding. I explained I had seen drivers who were not speeding do the same, exactly the same behaviour as observed next to Gatso's.

He was very helpful in explaining everything, and he also said it was giving the motorway high visibility patrols (which is a good thing), and I said I would rather see traffic officers patrolling the motorway, and we agreed that was politics although I get the distinct feeling he had the same thoughts as me on trafpols being out and about!

I personally think that the vehicles should be dressed differently (as Lum said)

_________________
"Are you sh**ing me?"
"John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute."

Strangest thing happened, I hadn't seen one of these vehicles, or at least not the light bar as mentioned, until last saturday when I was in Southampton and spied two of them. One was in front of me and as we stopped at traffic lights, well I happened to have my camera:

LEDs all round!

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Andrew.

Ahh, the warm feeling of tax dollars wasted. Why couldnt they issue them with diesel transits instead of gas guzzlers like that?

_________________
"Are you sh**ing me?"
"John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute."

Yes... why does a Highways Agency vehicle need to be an off-roader? Surely by definition they are used on roads... Highways, even...

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Andrew.

Ah, so I wasn't seeing things when I caught a quick glimpse of one passing by a couple of days ago - I thought the light bar looked a bit different to the more obviously amber ones I've seen in the past...

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Chris

Hey I remember those..

I think the intention is that they have sufficient towing capacity to pull cars and smaller vans off the lanes after an accident.

So does a transit van

_________________
"Are you sh**ing me?"
"John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute."