Safe Speed Forums

Exactly and the law does exactly that?....NO!

_________________
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.

I think that my example above explains quite clearly that driving whilst being on the (hands free) phone is extremely sensible under those conditions.

Your statement is thus incorrect!

mb

Why have you suddenly brought hands free into this?

Edit: ah, sorry, didn't spot the original post was testing hands free use; I wasn't talking hands free, sorry!

Still, would like to see hands free calling made specifically illegal too, clearly most can't do it, so those that can would understand why it should be proscribed.

That's like saying that many drivers can't drive succesfully through snow anything above 2 inches deeep, does that mean that it should be banned for all competent drivers?

_________________
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.

Again , like the speed limit issue, you are reducing every procedure to it's lowest common denominator. speed limits are no longer limits not to be exceeded safely but more like "advisory "limits which are limits that the worst driver would be expected to accomplish with limited difficulty.

_________________
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.

But what you said was "...being on the phone IS driving like an idiot".

What I asked was whether it was the same as driving whilst using a 2 way radio. You then waffled on about it not being ideal, but might be lifesaving - sometimes, and sometimes not.

What I'm TRYING to get you to accept is that:

(a) these people clearly aren't "idiots" all the time. THEREFORE
(b) there are times when doing so does NOT make a driver an "idiot". WHICH MEANS THAT
(c) before deciding whether or not someone is "driving like an idiot", you have to assess all the other circumstances.

This is absolutely (IMO) FUNDAMENTAL to road safety and goes for a great many driving misdemeanours (eating, phoning, speeding, overtaking...). This is why rigidly enforcing speed limits has never really worked and never will. It's EXACTLY the same problem! Depending on what else is going on, it's SOMETIMES safe and it SOMETIMES isn't!

And-after that weepy manure heap - head off to the clubhouse and vote .

_________________
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

Come on chaps we all know that if the Police were on the roads observing and pulling drivers over - then the drop in use would fall unless fully legal with handset in full operation.
The problem is 'is a driver in full use of the vehicle'? That can only be judged at the time, then 'were they dangerous or just momentarily distracted but still safe'?
Because the TrafPol are not much on the roads the surveys /authorities cannot take in much from Police reporting because they have all but been replaced with spy cameras.
I think far more research needs to be done in this especially. We have enforcement taking place from observation of an infringement of a legality whether there was good driving or bad, there is no longer a distinction. This teaches motorists that as long as you are not observed, have no accident you are OK. The fact that the driving standard was low and you had 3 near misses is now ignored and irrelevant - appallingly !

_________________
Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

What I'm TRYING to get you to accept is that holding a mobile phone to your ear whilst driving a car is idiotic.

I presume you're referring to this earlier post?:

Perhaps you should ask the consensus of the forum whether they think that driving one handed whilst concentrating on something other than driving the vehicle is sensible behaviour?

_________________
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

Perhaps if you used the word 'understood' instead of "accept".


Of course not; a driver’s concentration should always be on the driving.
However, is driving one handed, whilst concentrating on driving the vehicle, sensible behaviour?
Isn’t that the point of this thread?

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

...but holding a microphone to your mouth whilst driving is, er, "sometimes", OK????

If you'll forgive me, I can't help feeling there's a degree of inconsistency in your agrument!

I hope your car doesn't have a radio in it and I hope you never adjust the volume or station whilst driving!

Why? I never said that driving one-handed was wrong. Nor does adjusting volume require any degree of concentration. The point of my remark was that hadd the question been framed that way few would have disagreed .

_________________
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

It is about when we concentrate with full recognition of a developing hazard, and so the driving task demands 100% of concentration :
as opposed to choosing when it is safe to do so, (i.e. straight road clear vision and so safe) to adjust the radio or pay alternative attention to another device momentarily.

When the phone rings there an be a temptation to answer it and without hands free, one might be distracted when it is unsafe to be so.
So is it about:
timing vs road attention requirement/s,
time taken to answer vs voice recognition and just talk,
degree of distraction vs paying full attention to the road, or
ability or fail to react appropriately.

We can all observe many people on the phone - yet many are not having accidents so the real world tells us that some people are doing something right as they don't have accidents just because they are on the phone. (hands free and otherwise)
So what is going right ? When and how they choose to 'chat' vs road attention vs driving attention.
The is precious little research that has been done and a lot more is required. As humans we are all very differently 'made up' we think and act differently and then to differing degrees, so it would be wrong to assume a 'one size fits all' solution or in this case a one size 'fine & penalty' punishment.
Hence why some are completely safe all the time, some are safe some of the time, and this goes all the way across the scale to the one's that are dangerous all the time.

_________________
Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

I'm not the only one asking - but the only thing I hear from you is SILENCE ,or are you afraid that by answering you might just dig in a bit deeper .

_________________
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

I don't quite get this logic.

Doing something that clearly impedes on one's ability to control your car is OK, so long as you don't have an accident?

Very few accidents are caused by just one thing. The phone users who have not yet had an accident whilst on the phone may well have been lucky so far.[/quote]

_________________
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

It is like saying that running on under-inflated tyres is fine so long as you don't skid.

_________________
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