Safe Speed Forums

I've some suggestions, if you're struggling.
Sloman's 'Car sick' expands on the Aberdeen research.
So are you saying looking an ass is a possible outcome of peer review? Might that explain...?

Baseless, flabby guff. Spare me any more, please.

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Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?

Is it? I mean money from non-motorists? Are non-motorists not benefiting from the roads motorists greatly help (!) to finance?


Yes, it might explain the total reluctance for the SCPs to allow their work regarding: long term trend, RTTM and ‘bias on selection’ to be reviewed. To do so would cause people’s support for their cameras to fall even further – no?


That was a rather ironic response.

The research is flawed. All motorists in groups i , ii and iii are simultaneously in group iv (malcontented) whenever they are stuck in traffic (unless they are sedated - no mention of that group). Yet there are supposed to be roughly 25% of drivers in each category - an impossibility.

So there you are. Knowing that the underlying classification used by Aberdeen University is ridiculous, any inferences are also ridiculous. Has this "research" been peer reviewed and published in an academic journal?

Oh no, I've just seen it ... "Environmental Psychology"! No wonder it's ridiculous ...

Also published in: Transport Policy 12 (2005) 65–78

Not a quick read!

I note however:

"This study focuses on day trip travel to leisure attractions, although the principles and methods adopted are equally applicable to all sectors of travel demand. This paper presents the results of a mail-back questionnaire survey and segmentation of 666 visitors to National Trust properties in the northwest of the UK."

and

"3.3. Sample population
The questionnaire was administered after approaching
visitors with a short intercept survey at two National Trust
properties near Manchester in northwest England. Almost
100% of those approached stopped for the intercept survey
(NZ1222), and 78% agreed to take the questionnaire home
with them. Of those that agreed to take the lengthier
questionnaire home with them (it took an average of 45 min
to complete), 69% (NZ666) returned a usable survey. The
final total (666) represents an overall response rate from the
first point of contact of 55%. One of the properties (Dunham
Massey) was chosen due to its exemplary transport links,
being both on a National Cycle Route and having its own
hourly shuttle bus service to the local railway station, with
connecting services to the Manchester metro network. The
second property, Quarry Bank Mill, is served by a public
bus route and attracts more families with children and ‘oneoff’
visitors than Dunham Massey. The aim was to attract a
good diversity in the range of attitudes and behaviours in
order to draw conclusions about all the relationships
between the constructs. This involved ensuring that bus
users and cyclists were captured in adequate numbers, even
though they may be over represented with respect to the
actual visitor population."

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I won't slave for beggar's pay,
likewise gold and jewels,
but I would slave to learn the way
to sink your ship of fools

Yes it is.
Quick example.
I work for a local authority. If I drive to work at HQ I enjoy free parking. My employer gives me a matching grant to support my commuting transport choice; as long as that choice is a private car. DfT figures (now out of date) give the annual cost to the provider of a single parking space at £300 - £500. So straight away there's an incentive gradient. As a driver my needs are sufficiently important to qualify me for a £300-500 annual sweetener. There are @600 spaces covering 4 acres. So my local authority diverts to its car-commuting employees - at this site alone - a gratuity worth, conservatively, £180,000 to £300,000 of general tax-payer's money every year. You have to drive to get it, you can't take the money to put it towards a year's commuting by bus. If you cycle your needs - the facilities my employer recognises in its own policies support cycling - aren't there, and nor are they going to be there. The driver sweeps the pot. Effectively this is a deterrent to commuting by other means.
Compare this with something approaching best practice by Pfizer, who are able to support staff in sustainable and active commuting choices with the money saved by not providing parking:
http://www.pfizer.co.uk/template4.asp?pageid=38

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Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?

Brilliant!
You should head up a research dept somewhere.

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Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?

Lyn Sloman... author of "Car Sick"...

You couldn't make it up

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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 turn.
Your proposals for the future of UK transport?

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Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?

Well, I'd like an integrated public transport system myself?

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I won't slave for beggar's pay,
likewise gold and jewels,
but I would slave to learn the way
to sink your ship of fools

Well, yours were remarkably vague and wishy-washy. But you could do worse than starting here.

The one thing I would do before all others is to give the go-ahead for the construction of the "SEMMMS" road (A6(M)/A555/A523) around the south-east of Stockport as a proper, grade-separated 70 mph dual carriageway

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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

I recently asked you, but never got an answer for: Care to substantiate that suggestion? Even if true, ask yourself: how can that be? What is taking that value?

Don’t cyclists well and truly 'sweep the pot' with cycle lanes?


How many of those taking the money drive and park nearby, not on company grounds? For most people, an extra fiver (no tax) is worth an hour of walking, even £2 is worth 5 minutes of taking the bike out of the car and cycling the rest of the way.

I've just been thinking about that. I love doing these "Christmas cracker" "fortune telling" type things!

I'm definitely a Category (i) - I love my cars, I've got more than one (well, I've got the use of more than one anyway). My own car is the best part of 20 years old and has an engine capacity of just under 3 litres so I MUST be a (i), surely? I mean, I've got petrol in my veins, I've spent my whole working life in the motor industry, I've GOT to be a (i)!

But wait a minute! Sometimes I'm a (ii)! In fact, if I'm honest with myself, maybe I'm usually a (ii) - given that I don't do many miles in my own car and I hate Clarkson with a passion!

...but then again, as I have previously stated, I like my bike and I do use public transport when I'm doing a trip that is better done using public transport... but then, I wouldn't regard myself as an "environmentalist" particularly!

Now at least I know I'm not a (iv)...
...well, not always anyway! Someone has already beat me to the point that plenty of people will be (iv)s when things aren't going well!

I'm itching to say something rude and disparaging about that "research" but as I haven't read the rest of it, maybe I shouldn't. Maybe there's something else in there that makes a bit more sense...

Construction costs spread over the life of the facility, admin, maintenance (sweeping, gritting, re-painting, gardening the beds), lighting, security, opportunity cost. 4 acres of prime building land in the centre of town. Supposing £2m per acre which isn't over par for this area. £8 million in the bank at 5%= £400,000 per annum right there. Although we're cash strapped and making 'efficiency savings' - cutting services - everywhere we can't be arsed to bend down and pick up this money, preferring that it should go from taxpayer into the pocket of employees who by definition - being in work - are least in need of subsidy. If you need more info on this figure you could ask the Dft, or even pfizer, whose own estimate of the cost of providing parking to its staff was @£500 per space per year.

4 people do, and they're all safespeed members. I don't bloody know, do I? Ask pfizer. What is this grinding dog in the mangerism? It's a roaring bloody success from every possible perspective and all you want to know is how many cheat it? At least you acknowledge that you get a lot of active and sustainable travel for your buck.

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Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?

Any employer is entitled to charge its employees for parking on site (which effectively is all that Pfizer are doing). However it needs to bear in mind that policy may deter people, especially at lower grades, from working for it. I suspect that Pfizer as a successful multi-national corporation pays so much above the local odds that most folk aren't too bothered. And £2 a day isn't much anyway. I have to pay £2 a day to park at work - but there's no realistic public transport alternative, so I'm stuck with it.

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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

How is a book full of detailed specifics vague and wishy washy?
Yours is great, mind; the Diplodocus roar of progressive transport planning!
I'm a bit concerned that the desired more visible presence of police on the roads will lead to a spate of accidents caused by panic braking and people looking out for them failing to notice other hazards. I'm not sure you've thought that through.
Of course it's shameful. Especially the bit consigning public transport users to no transport in the evenings and weekends. Freedom! Are you the author?

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Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?

If the only tool you have is a hammer, everything begins to look like a nail, eventually.

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Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?

Well pardon me for not having rushed out on Sunday afternoon and bought a copy. Possibly you could have provided a précis, but obviously not. I bet it involves screwing the motorist, though.


But it doesn't say that, of course, does it? Only that they have to pay the full cost for it. Which motorists do all the time - and the rest.

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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

Are you the author of that document?

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Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?

That's what Safespeed campaign has been saying for years. I think you've summed it up for us rather nicely

A quick trip to the homepage of the website concerned would demonstrate that.

http://www.speedlimit.org.uk/manifesto.html

in case anyone else is interested. Seems remarkably moderate to me - doesn't even propose the abolition of all fixed speed cameras, let alone the building of new trunk roads on greenfield corridors

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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