Safe Speed Forums

No......it means that, only 1% managed to spot your 'concealed/disguised' scamvan !

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"CAMERAS "DO NOT" SAVE LIVES" !!
(Richard Brunstrom Says so !!)

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

And the other 99% didn't need the tug because they already had their own agenda for the day

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What makes you think I'm drunk officer, have I got a fat bird with me?

People seem to be missing one very simple concept, the speeds done over 70mph are wrong, beacause the law states it. It doesn't matter if its a straight piece of dual carriageway road, the law says you have to do 70mph. The chap from the partnership said they weren't interested in people doing a bit over the limit, just the loonies. Now if he REALLY means this then thats ok in my book.

The idiot who crashed is plain and simply an idiot! He obviously cannot control a vehicle properly if he crashes because of the van. Yes the van obviously made him brake but why was he speeding so fast in the first place? I could understand if everyone in front of him reacted so quickly because of another crash or something, but because of a van?????

One thing that sickens me about this though are the fools who still got caught speeding AFTER the crash. They really need a serious talking to because that is not driving sensibly or with care at all!

I know the road has been made safer by re-engineering it and I doubt the speed cameras have contributed to the safety, but whilst there are people doing these ridiculous speeds then it is useful to have them there.

Mr C,

I don't think there is any disagreement here about the standard of driving of the guy who crashed, but surely the more sensible pragmatic approach is to try and avoid adding the catalyst that turns his bad driving into an accident?

Now I know the same risk applies in the case of a TrafPol parked up next to the motorway, but in this case I believe it's a worthwhile trade-off, as the patrol car driver is capable of making a positive contribution to safety that outweighs any negative element. This isn't true of the talivan, from all the statistics we have available we can pretty clearly see that they have been of no positive benefit to safety, so the distraction and panic that they trigger is a danger with no associated benefit.

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CSCP Latin for beginners...
Ticketo ergo sum : I scam therefore I am!

That depends on whether it has mud on it, which is quite likely in East Anglia.

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I stole this .sig

That's one way to look at it. The camera just revealed how crazy the bonehead was, but in a more dramatic way that I would normally recommend! These 1 percenters have to be filtered out somehow or other.

Camera shock therapy is a bit much, though. Paradoxically, it can be overcome by having many, many more cameras.

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I stole this .sig

But even the good Mr Brunstrom has finally realised that there is a saturation point for cameras, and indeed that we have already reached it.

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CSCP Latin for beginners...
Ticketo ergo sum : I scam therefore I am!

Indeed - visually, these boxes are a blight on our villages. Other ideas that might be explored include car mounted transponders. This would give us great granularity, with the ability to, say, constrain certain drivers to certain routes, e.g. allow offenders to go to work or the supermarket, but nowhere else. The same boxes could allow other services such as metered insurance, routing hints or fee-based congestion control! Horror!

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I stole this .sig

I don't actually think its spurious at all, but in any case here's a better one.

The other night my wife put a clothes horse on the landing to dry some clothes. It is a rather complex folding affair, and she ended up with two of the arms protruding slightly into the doorway, just at a child's head height.

Needless to say, within ten minutes both the girls were howling, having banged their heads on it in two separate incidents. Whilst consoling them I asked my wife to move it up a couple of notches and she defensively said that it wasn't her fault but theirs, for not looking where they were going.

Quick as a flash, this formed the following parable in my mind...

Some scaffolding is erected in the street, with a pipe sticking out at eye level. Now of the passers by, all the "advanced walkers" see it in good time and react without it being any more than a minor distraction. Now walkers displaying only average levels of observation and anticipation only see it at the last minute and have to react in a bit of a hurry. Still not really a problem, though they impede other walkers a bit and cause a bit of congestion.

But now someone not paying full attention walks clean into it and has a major accident, which wouldn't have occurred at all if the damned thing hadn't been there in the first place.

As he staggers away with the remnants of his right eye hanging from it's socket, the "Scaffolding Erection Partnership" poke fun at him for his lack of observation - it never occurs to them that they are the ones actually causing the problem.

Then someone from "SafeWalk" comes along and points out the error of their ways, but still there is no remorse. Now they fall back on to their reason for being there, which is that the potentially dangerous roof needed mending. So even though their operation posed more of a hazard than the danger they were there to address in the first place, this is perfectly justifiable because they can now place the blame onto the victim, for not looking where he was going!

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CSCP Latin for beginners...
Ticketo ergo sum : I scam therefore I am!

JT, Brilliant

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Ross

Yes I'm a hoon, but only on the track!!!!

JT mate, you can dream up any amount of ' x wasn't there, y wouldn't have happened' scenarios you like, you won't convince me one iota. I understand perfectly the point you are trying to make, but I don't accept it as a reason for the van not being there.
This is a chicken and egg scenario, of course the individual who was shocked to see a speed camera van over-reacted and crashed his car - had the van not been there to be seen, he wouldn't have crashed. But had he not had a sudden surge of guilt/awareness he wouldn't have needed to react. Thus, as an argument against speed cameras its one of the more feeble.
Let me offer a scenario - much as though I loathe scenario building - of my own.
A burgler breaks into a mans house and threatens his wife and kids. The man reacts by attacking the burgler with a golf club and suceeeds in driving him away. Unfortunately the burglar is a vindictive individual and returns at a later date with a gun and shoots the man dead. We could argue that if the man had done nothing in the first place, the burglar would have got away with a few valuables, but the man would still be alive. Do we then campaign to prevent people from fighting back against burglars for fear of how burglars might react?
Speed cameras, like burglars, may be loathesome things, but arguing against their use based on fears of how people might and do react is not a winner IMHO.

If that was the main argument against their use, I'd tend to agree.
But there are very many good arguments against scameras, not least of all that they do absolutely nothing for road safety.
As such, they're useless and therefore shouldn't be there - so I'd say this argument is a valid one, which just adds to the already long list.

Cheers
Peter

I think your burglar case actually proves my point quite well!

When it comes down to it, if you choose to assault a burglar then you are in effect accepting the risk that he is now more much more likely to retaliate against you, either now - if you don't hit him hard enough - or later.

Just like the speed van thing, this isn't about "right and wrong", it's about pragmatics. It is indeed no good saying you were "right" to attack a burglar if he later comes back and murders you for it, is it?

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CSCP Latin for beginners...
Ticketo ergo sum : I scam therefore I am!

But at a macro, rather than a micro level, arguing against the overall right of people to attack burglars just in case burglars in general over-react proves my point I believe.
I don't think we are ever going to agree on this one because we seem to be approaching the issue with largely differing value sets. I take your (and Pete's and Pauls and BMWMK3's for that matter) point and respect your right to postulate it, whilst reserving the right to refuse to acknowledge its validity

Indeed. The issue is about what "is" not about what "should be".

I think it scales up pretty well actually:

At a micro level, the specific burglar in my specific house will probably pose a greater risk of attacking me if I attack him

At a macro level, burglars in general will probably pose a greater risk of attack to householders in general if they attack them.

I don't see a difference here - remember we're talking about "best practice" here, not about defining laws.


Rest assured I have exactly the same philosophy. I don't actually believe there's much difference in our value sets either. The underlying point here about the cameras was that the distraction risk they pose to "bad" drivers is not worth running because there is no benefit to even it out. If it were the case that cameras were yielding big drops in fatalities then I'd agree that it was right and proper to risk the occasional numpty wiping out because of them. But they aren't doing that, the hazard is all for nothing, so there's no point in exposing us to it.

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CSCP Latin for beginners...
Ticketo ergo sum : I scam therefore I am!

Um ... does not seem to stop the hard core though.

We don't know exactly why he crashed - other than he braked hard and a camera van was in the vicinity.

At least a policeman can see the situation as it evolves and form an opinion. However, I did book an appointment with the magistrates for someone for dangerous driving some years ago - trying out an emergency stop at 90 mph when he saw the marked car....so the panic brake has always occured..... and not always resulted in a crash....

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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.

As said in my previous post - we've always had the odd one who panic brakes as they wish to avoid a fine . and points and ensuing extra insurance premiums. However, on aggregate ... would say very many (if not majority) slow down gradually on seeing us as they've realised we 've copped 'em at it anyway.

Said on many occasions - depends on what has been observed and the attitude as to actual outcome.

Would say from what I observed on a jaunt to Cambs this weekend - that people bubbling at or just below the speed limit were still stamping on brakes for the remaining Truvelos (is it me - or are there less this year - some of the ones we noted last time are [i] not [/] there but the road markings are ) on the A14 towards Cambridge. I do not see or hear of this occurring on our patch for either the van or our lads out on patrol.



I never know how the person I am about to arrest will react to the handcuffs. You never know if the person you are arresting or the burglar you disturbed in your home is a paranoid schizophrenic - out and about on a "care in the community" order.



But Riggers - the speed camera (like the identity card and other measures to combat potential threat is based on fears and nightmare politics.

The speed camera argument is based to "preventing the accident and death waiting to happne on the roads" and the identity card and other anti-terrorism laws are supoposed to protect us against the act of terrror that someone may be plotting against us.

These measures actually do very little in preventing any of these occurrences. Good police and military intelligence may sniff out the latter - and only education, engineering and enforcement by genuine police officers is going to resolve the former.

Suspect practical measures may be a better vote winner than deceiving Joe Public by spinning twisted yarns.

But would you vote for the party who wants to tax you more to pay me my wages?

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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.

Rigpig,

One point being missed a little here is that the same thing could happen if the driver was NOT speeding.

Imagine the scene; TIB driver driving along, at or below the limit, suddenly sees the van and rather than risk a fine, because he/she hasn't been taking any notice of their speed, he/she slams on the brakes and loses control. Or worse, another TIB driver behind slams into the back of TIB driver 1 and they both end up in hospital.

I believe that this scenario is the fault of the van. TIB driver(s) should have been more aware and seen the van much earlier but that does not mean that they are in the wrong just as in the example of the scaffolding.

In Gear,

A plod friend of mine recalled a speed trap he was manning years ago when using the old amphometer (hollow tubes across the road). A car crests the hill just prior to the speed trap, sees the trap and hits the brakes.... hard.

Unfortunately he forgot that he was towing another car at the time. The car behind slammed into the back of him and both cars were totalled. Both drivers walked away but it shows just what can happen when confronted with the unexpected.

Paul,

Love the new emoticons

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Ross

Yes I'm a hoon, but only on the track!!!!