Safe Speed Forums

Well said Gizmo. Sixteen months ago, I picked up my first speeding ticket, getting caught by a mobile Gatso sited on the opposite (right hand) side of the road, hiding behind some hedges! This was my first driving offence of any type in 24 years of relatively high milage driving and riding motorcycles. Since then I have been absolutely paranoid about my speed.

I am also absolutely convinced that this has not made me a better driver, or rider, but it has certainly made me feel a lot more vulnerable on the road.

Another thing I have noticed, is that driving a lot slower can almost make you MORE likely to get caught at a few MPH over the limit. Even when paying the best attention you can to the speed limit, it is very easy to find yourself 5mph or so over the limit on occasions, but instead of being in with the flow of traffic, and noticing other vehicles slowing for the Gatso they know is there, you are poodling along in the slow lane all on your own, with no one in front to give you the warning of the camera up ahead.

One other comment I will make is that since getting that speeding ticket, and despite 16 months passing, and my now driving with my mind more on my speed than anything else, I still have an almost irrational fear of looking at my post each day in case there is another ticket in with it. I am sorry I can't explain this any better, but it is just how I feel, and it shows the lasting psychological effect these things have.

Just some random ramblings..

Cheers,

Russ

Still not answered my question though....
To answer yours it is not wrong to try and obey the speed limit. Now answer mine..."can you absolutely guarantee that at any given moment at any time that you are not breaking the speed limit" YES OR NO

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Speed camera policy Kills

Gatsos dont care that you are TRYING ot obey the often ridiculous limit. If it flashes you are a criminal, trying or not.

Further, your comment about such technology being able to help, I very much doubt it will happen. Too much lost revenue with motorists obeying all the stupid limits. You dont actually believe they dont want you to get cought do you?

You're flattering and deluding yourself if you think your tactic was subtle.

NO! The only things that are absolutely guaranteed are death and taxes. What I can say is that if you are driving so close to the absolute top limit that you have to worry about exceeding it, then you are going to pick up a ticket sooner or later.

The other thing is this. At what point in history did full blooded Englishmen, (descendants of great men like Cromwell, Churchill, Henry VIII and Stanley Matthews), become blubbering babies whining about a measly fine and 3 points? Is the whole nation on Prozac because we are pathologically unable to obey the speed laws?

And one more thing – I have devised a speedo that is absolutely accurate. It’s a bit high-tech to explain here, but the idea is based on Hubble observations about the expanding universe! This gadget (along with other modest advances) could give you an absolute guarantee!

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Anything to get the job done. I managed to worm out an admission that some of you think that obeying speed limits uses up too much attention, causes inconvenience to others, makes you drive badly, and makes you sleepy. Most people would agree that compulsory remedial training would be a priority for people like that!

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Thank you. so you are just like the rest of us.

You break the law the same as everyone else. Statisticaly it is only a matter of time before you get points.

So we now have it confirmed. Even the most ardent supporter of speed cameras on this forum admits that they can occasionaly speed....

I assume that if you do find that you are over the limit you don't go straight to the police station and hand yourself in.

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Speed camera policy Kills

Yeah, but as the wise man said, at least death only happens once.

At what point in history did full blooded Englishmen, (descendants of great men like Cromwell, Churchill, Henry VIII and Stanley Matthews), become blubbering babies whining about people going a couple of mph over the speed limit, and attempt to deal with it by lowering many limits to criminalise more people.

While it might guarantee an accurate indication of speed and therefore be great for determining if I am over or under the limit, it would be of absolutely no use in finding out whether that speed is safe for the circumstances or whether the limit has been set by a politically motivated bunch of tree-hugging pedal-pushing car-haters.

:roll: Try again. Hint: remove "uses up" and both "makes" and insert "may use" and "could make" instead. It's no more an absolute than, say, the safe speed on the road outside my house.

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I doubt they'd care, they've got more important things to deal with like catching dangerous drivers, and all the other more heavy duty criminals!

Why bother with those who speed when the cameras can catch them?!!

I am (at least) trying not to break the law, and I hope everyone else is too. We should ask people to obey the law, while making sure that measures used to implement it are appropriate and fair.



No - I can put it down to speedo error!

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Just goes to show. It's just one of those laws that people break from time to time. Interntional or not the law is the law. Speed cameras don't take that into account. That would be called discression. Its what the police used to use in the good old days when the death toll was dropping.

Brunstrom said slipping over the limit was like slipping a knife into someone. It sounds like even you fall into that catagory...welcome to the club. Only 30 million members in the UK.

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Speed camera policy Kills

That is a good point. Should we hypothecate funds for road policing directly from road users? After all, there is a clear division between catching "traditional criminals" and simple road abusers. Also, should traffic police be a wholly separate organisation from "traditional criminal" police? That way, there would be none of this 'blurring' of roles that you have noticed.

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I know, and some people just take their medicine, while others hope that they can whine their way out of it. I admit it’s a bit of a wake up call when they realise that the law is a serious thing.



Discretion costs money, and I don't want more tax - I want less tax! I don’t want to pay pensions for even more superannuated coppers, when machines can do the work! And I want bad drivers to pay for their own admin and training costs, and for their own policemen to look after things, and I don’t want that on the general tax.

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Actually, on second thoughts, I think you are right. The cameras system as it is now is coarse, and it is only a small step from "coarse" to unfair. The right way to deal with speeders is to go after the worst ones. The NIPs should only be sent to the worst of the speeders that a camera detects - the 25% who break the limit by the most mph. But penalities should be increased greatly. After all, the whole idea should be to blow the froth off.

The rest should get a polite warning saying that they have been detected and should watch out in future. The whole system should be financed from the fines and tax on road users.

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Are you thinking of something along the lines of US style Highway Patrol? What would the pros and cons be? Although I quite like the idea of a dedicated national traffic police force (rather than 40 or so regional ones) I do wonder if it would be much more effective, and whether or not the 'blurring', as you put it, has desirable side effects that we ought to keep. In it's favour we could expect a more consistent approach to road safety and enforcement across the whole country than we see now, which ought to be a good thing. Hmmm.

Edited to add:If something adds value it's worth the extra cost, if not it's money wasted. The machines are effective at only one thing which in itself changes next to nothing. To give good value they'd need to cost a damn sight less than they do (like about a fiver apiece). I'd rather pay a blue-suited donut destroyer to have a wide effect.

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Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler - Einstein

Quote of the day.

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Speed camera policy Kills

Or, as Woody Allen said, I'm not afraid of death but I don't want to be there when it happens!



Actually, I put Henry VIII in there as a subtle ruse to get Observer going. In fact, Henry VIII was not a full blooded Englishmen, but of Welsh Tudor origins.



What do you mean, might! It would guarantee an accurate indication! Lower speeds mean more chance of survival, and a gadget that could tell you when you are over the limit would be a good thing for tree-hugging pedal-pushing car-haters, as well as car drivers, so everybody would be happy.

Or would you rather not know when you are breaking the law?

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I agree with that. But make a further point about what 'the law' really is.

With respect to speeding, the boundary between lawful and unlawful behaviour, as I see it, is defined by the scope and scale of enforcement activity. The massive increase in automated or semi-automated detection and the introduction of fast track enforcement has re-defined the pre-existing boundary and, in substance, changed the law.

I would argue that one has to either accept that view or agree that 75% (or whatever the percentage is, that I think is almost certainly understated anyway) of the driving population are, in fact, criminals who repeat their crimes on a daily (or even hourly) basis. That is preposterous.

Yes. The main pro is that all the money it needs comes from drivers pockets, which must be a good thing as it isolates administration of the roads directly to those who use them most. Other pros are that it isolates "traditional crime" coppers away from drivers' opprobrium, which is good.




Another pro is that if drivers think like you, you can hire as many road-police as you like with your own dollars, and we won't need machines. As long as the total cost of ownership (wages, pensions, expenses etc.) is added to petrol or road tax or to the level of fines or something, fine, go ahead, hire your cops. But if general taxes have to rise to pay for more human bobbies, forget it!

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I can agree with that. We either have to fine 'em and ping 'em back into shape, or we have to change the system. Perhaps we should skim off the worst 25% of boneheads with cameras, but give all the records on violations to the insurance companies so that they can add the risk to the bills.

Edit: That last sentance is a bit of a brain fart, but I threw it in the pot to see if it raises some hackles.

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