Safe Speed Forums

Please excuse the long post.

I have just returned from a 3 week 6 thousand + mile motorbike tour of Northen Europe and Scandinavia. During that time I was able to observe the average driving in 8 countries. I must admit in some cases I was quite surprised about what I observed.

Please note I view myself as a purely average rider/driver. I have too many minor faults in my driving, that I recognise, to currently be any better atm (although I am trying to improve ).

France, Belgium. Holland, Germany and Denmark

Most of my time in these countries was spent on 2/3 lane trunk roads. The flow of traffic on these roads was fairly good even in road works, with a couple of exceptions. The speed limits 110, 120, 130 kmh and unrestricted were fairly well observed, but not absolutely.

The thing that impressed my was the lane disipline. When an overtake was completed the overtaker would in about 99.9% of cases return to the nearside lane, irrespective of need or not to allow following faster vehicles by. Even if this meant they would have to return almost immediately to the outside lane for another overtake once the faster vehicle had passed.

Most of the time a vehicle would be in the nearside lane if no other vehicle were around. Separation distances seemed to be slightly more than I would normally see on UK roads.

Sweden

As with the previous on 2/3 lane trunk roads, very good lane discipline and fairly good but not absolute limit adherence.

On their single lane roads I saw something of a revelation. When attempting to over take a slower vehicle, it did not matter whether the slower vehicle was going at the limit or below, my indication to overtake would be replied to by an indicator going on and the vehicle in front pulling to the nearside to aid in the overtake The first few times this happened I was a bit apprehensive, but after a short while it proved to be almost the rule on single lane roads.

Finland

I can not pass to much comment on Finnish drivers as I saw so few of them and was only in the country for a few hours. However the limit adherence was not absolute here.

Norway

What a strange county as far as limits were concerned. In the main most single lane roads are 90 kmh. The are many 80, 70, 60 and even 50 kmh stretches but only around towns and villages. The limits are soon ended once past the the area and mostly the 90 kmh limit resumed.

However when in the more southerly areas the limits seemed to be set more towards 80 or even 70 kmh on roads of better quality for the same density of traffic. This seemed to result in trains of vehicles following at very short separation distances. Where I would be able to go past many vehicles in short order further north because the gaps were bigger, in the south I would sometimes have to clear two or more vehicles in one go to make similar progress. Something I rarely did.

Also owing to the almost total adherence to the limits by the Norwegians, in the more southerly areas the speed travel was usually 10 or even 15 kmh below the posted limit because of the trains that built up. I did see many frustration overtakes by non residents on stretches of road I would be reluctant to attempt something similar.

I very rarely saw the assisted overtake in Norway. When I did it was usually a Swede doing the assistance.

My Conclusion

In the main, outside of towns and cities, the standard of driving is a little better in Northern Europe and Scandinavia baring Norway. Norway seems to be at about our level but with lower traffic densities.

In general the standard of the road surface was much better than we have here. That is from the lightly trafficked north to the much more densely trafficked areas like Hamburg.

Will I be going back? Oh yes. The scenery in Scandinavia is STUNNING. IMO much more so than the Alps or Pyranees simply because of the contrast of mountain to sea. It is such a shame that I had a camera failure while there otherwise I would have taken an awful lot more pictures.

Works for me too - France is great for lane discipline... but roundabouts are another thing altogether!!

How can they get them so wrong?

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

I wish I could drive to Scandinavia, I can't get past Swansea yet

Sounds like a nice trip though

No problem. It's a really good "visual impression" of whether drivers are good or bad. It also shows how
misleading human judgment is on these counts. So let's look at the outcome rates, rather than our intuition.

The UK index was per capita crash death rate was 5.81 per 100000 (in 2003) so I'll use that as a baseline.
If life expectancy is (say) 80 years, then you have a one in 200 chance of being killed in a car crash, and a one in (say) 20 chance
of being mangled up quite a bit, e.g. bones crushed or spine broken, brain damage etc. It basically means, on average, that a couple of the
people in your street will be crushed to death by cars, and several or many will end up in the emergency room.

France, Belgium. Holland, Germany and Denmark

9.49, 14.5, 6.31, 8.03, 8.00

So that means poor, abysmal, good, decent, decent, but all inferior to the Brits!

Sweden

Close but no cigar - 5.88. It may be marginally better now - or maybe not. Latest UK figures show the brits are best, when set against international benchmarks. Not good enough, of course, but the others are worse.

Finland

Getting worse - 7.02

Norway

Not too bad, but worse than us - 6.01



Not as good as us, else more would survive. But you're right - they are pretty good.



Less survive.



Despite the road surface - less survive than here. Someone is doing something right - rejoice!
It seems that human judgment (as used by, say, traffic cops) is a pretty poor way to
tell if accidents are going to happen more frequently. Weird, eh?

That was naughty Abercrombie - you cherry picked 2003 to give you the result you wanted. Later figures as you very well know show that Britain is at the bottom of the pile.

Exactly the same tactic that the partnerships use - hmmmm!

Not at all. Britain has the lowest of all, apart from a few tin pot countries. In fact, the very last figures were
the best since the 30's. There was huge improvement. There may be a blip here and there (I don't know about that)
but WE ARE USUALLY THE WORLD CHAMPIONS OF MOTORING, year on year.

Far from it. Here's some data from 2005. It's Australian, so you can't put much faith in it, but
as usual, of the important countries, we are tops. Holland does well here, I admit. But their
roads have no bends. Norway, Sweden etc. look good too. But the 2007 figures should blow them away
totally - the lowest in 60 years!

Australia 8.02
Austria 9.38
Belgium 10.41
Canada 9.13
Czech Republic 12.61
Denmark 6.15
Finland 7.25
France 8.86
Germany 6.58
Great Britain 5.55
Greece 15.01
Hungary 12.71
Iceland 6.30
Ireland 9.54
Japan 6.21
Netherlands 4.61
New Zealand 9.94
Norway 4.94
Poland 14.33
Portugal 11.81
Slovakia--Slovenia 12.92
South Korea 13.24
Spain 10.24
Sweden 4.99
Switzerland 5.57
United States of America 14.72

It is widely accepted the UK used to have the best road safety record in the world (a good thing of course) and that this is no longer the case. How did we get overtaken even though our driving population isn't significantly increasing?
Yes we're still doing quite well, but we should have been doing better (the "fatality gap").

Things won't get better. The government targets for KSI reduction by 2020 are below the falls we used to get before the speed cameras came along (1992 was the first trial), and that doesn't even take into account the relative change of net distance driven.


This target rate is well under the previous rate of reduction we have before the baseline. Why set the target so low?

Comparing the same characteristic before speed cams came about:
1978-82 = 6195
1994 = 3650
% reduction = (6195-3650)/6195 = 41%
41% is what we have done, why is our target only 33%? Surely targets should be better than earlier achievements, or at least equal !?!

Don’t forget, net distance travelled has always been increasing and has only recently hit a plateau - in other words: the rate of increase has fallen. Repeating the same calculation for fatals per net distance driven (a much better measure of safety) gives a humongous fall of 62% (the same timeframe giving the greatest fall). This is the measure and target we should be adopting for the 2004-08 to 2020 timeframe.

Our government have given up before they've even begun!

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

[quote="Abercrombie"/quote]

Far from it. Here's some data from 2005. It's Australian, so you can't put much faith in it,................
[/quote]


Oh dear Abercrombie. You simply cannot get over the fact that the more intelligent of us young newly graduated people fled the UK when Harold Wilson and his mob got a working majority in the mid 1960's.

The figures that you quote were not derived here so I will take your comment as demonstrating envy of our lifestyle and/or bitterness at you own!

Comparing statistics between countries, or even parts of countries, is fraught with difficulties as there are very different circumstances, hazards and practises in different regions. Even the method of counting road casualties varies.

For example. One of the important factors affecting your chances of survival after a major crash is how soon you get medical attention (our medicos talk about the "Golden Hour"; get attention within the hour and you have a much better chance of survival). In most urban areas you will have a paramedic on site in 15 minutes, a bit longer in rural eastern seaboard areas but usually within the hour. However in the hinterland it will be much longer. There was a case a couple of years ago when some tourists rolled a mini-bus on a Northern Territory Highway; it was two hours before anyone came along and a further two hours before the first ambulance arrived and another 4 hours before a crane arrived to lift the vehicle off a couple of people. It was a multiple fatality in a small population area which distorts the figures.

Annual average distance travelled varies a lot. I would imagine that the Dutch would drive less distance than most therefore reducing their exposure. I would also suspect that the people of Luxembourg would have many of their crashes outside their borders as it is such a small country.

Raw comparisons rarely stand up to scrutiny and your examples are no exception.

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The only thing that should be prohibited is prohibition.

Ah yes. Harold Wilson. The man who made it possible for us underpriveledged children to obtain a University degrees and fill the gaps in the graduate ranks left when the educated toffs fled the country, firmly clutching their wallets.

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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

Interesting, even our government accept that the UK is the worst improving nation in Europe with relation to KSI's. Abercrombie seems to know better with his "made up" figures. Perhaps he should take a job in politics, since he knows better than our elected politicians.

Grant support for undergraduates pre-dated Wilson by many years. My first visit back was in 1976 after 10 years and the country was poorer than when I left. And who could forget Barbara Castle; the non-driving sheila appointed as Transport Minister! She made Ernest Marples look benevolent. It was that era of unparalled economic and social incompetence that spawned the current generation of road safety "experts". (We have them too!)

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The only thing that should be prohibited is prohibition.

My post was just to show my experience on my trip.


Having seen the traffic and population densities in Scandinavia, to be honest, I am surprised more do not die. The chance of witnessing a major single vehicle crash north of Stockholm and Trondheim are minimal. The were times when I did not see another vehicle, in either direction, for almost 25 kms or in my lane for an hour and I was not on unclassified roads or rigidly sticking to speed limits.


The distances and time to good medical help are significantly more than in the UK. This is the major difference between the UK and many of the countries I travelled through. It is also the reason we have a higher survival rate in crashes, I believe.


It is good to see you have good judgement . You not only attack me for my impression of my experience on my trip. You also attack the people who see first hand, and often first, the results of serious crashes. Questioning their ability to do a job they are specifically trained to do and whose judgement is used to improve road safety in this country. Well done

Can't have been that intelligent if they fled to the Antipodes


Of course there have been a limited number scholarships and grants since Victorians times but the provision of University places was vastly expanded making it much easier for bright working class children to get a University education. When I started at Grammar School in 1959 it was almost unheard of for some one from my class to go to University. When I graduated ten years later it was common place. Admittedly most of the reforms and financing that made this possible had been put in place by Macmillan's government but Wilson drove them through. And founded the Open University[/quote]



She couldn't pilot a plane, drive a railway engine or con a cruise liner either: all as essential to a Transport Minister as driving a car. The GDP of the UK increased from £107Bil in 1966 to £225Bil in 1976, an increase roughly in line with that of the USA, though only half that of your adopted country.

Although Wilson or possibly Callaghan was PM when you revisited us there had been the intervening (1970-74) disaster of the Heath administration with the its massive inflation. That is where the decline of this country really began.


[/quote] It was that era of unparalled economic and social incompetence that spawned the current generation of road safety "experts". (We have them too!)[/quote]

Nah. Every thing that is wrong with this country today can be directly attributed to Thatcher's distrust of "Society"

Apologies to the Administrator for massive topic drift

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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

Altough I used to be a labour voter, it seems ironic that the Labour Govt cocked up our speed limits in the sixties, big time and they are now doing exactly the same forty years on.

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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.

Cynical mode on:

The figures as commonly spouted have very little to do with anything: They are about as believable as the inevitable reply by any politician of



(which, as we all know from reading the tabloid press , basically means "we have done bugger all except fill in our expenses sheet!" )


The criteria as regards the "pecking orde"r in a fairly meaningless "league table of road safety" is not based on number of accidents or KSI - but on the percentage level of improvement against previous years.

What really annoys about the willy nilly bandying around of figures is the way certain people use them to score meaningless points in a debate instead of focussing on how to improve road safey standards for all/develop the correct required skills.,,,which speed cameras do not address despite all the farting around on the part of some.


Back to the topic - Never had a problem when abroad. I am usually impressed by the overall standards. As regards this country - I usually find the further north I am - the better the driving standards appear to be

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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.

Yes, but some of us got Canadian passports instead. I live here now because
it's so boring in the colonies.

Thanks for your kind words. The Brits are doing something far better
than other comparable countries, of that there is little doubt. And the
latest figures are the best of all.

It's a complex, cultural phenomenon that has resulted in our superior
safety standards. There's probably not one thing (cops, training, politics,
legislation, etc.) that could account for it. But overall, we are the champs.

I'd like to find out why we castigate the decision makers who have
created an environment where (in effect) we win the motoring world cup,
year after year. Despite appearances, the foreigners are always playing catchup.

Why are we so damned good at driving?

We used to be, but we're not anymore.
The 2006 figures from the DfT put us behind Malta, Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, Norway (the list isn't exhaustive) for deaths per population.
It is far worse for pedestrian deaths and child pedestrian deaths per population; we are significantly worse than all the above as well as Finland France, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, and Austria. [table 51, RCGB2007)


I've already stated this a few posts earlier in this thread. We used to have the best safety record in the world, now we don't. We also used to have a much better fall of fatalities on both an annual and exposed basis ("fatality gap"); now our target reductions are below this earlier rate !?!
We now have ineffective, needless and misplaced policies based on little more than pseudo science (RTTM, bias on selection, displacement, etc). How can these not be good reasons to castigate?

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

We also now have the most ridiculous speed limits ever imaginable and we seem to be encouraging the worst type of driving on our roads. We now pander for the incompetent and instead of encouraging the bad to improve we are lowering the bar so far that the good are encouraged to give up and join the poorest.

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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.