Safe Speed Forums

With video

Also couldn't help but notice the blatant Regression to the Mean fallacy being used again!

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

It's a pity in a way that it's happening from shortage of money rather than as a result of the pro-camera arguments having been defeated, but I'm sure Paul would be very pleased to witness current developments. And when the predicted epidemic of carnage fails to materialise it will do much to undermine the case for speed cameras. Indeed I'd confidently predict we'll see another substantial fall in road fatalities in 2010 against 2009.

I continue to believe - as Paul did - that the flatlining of casualty stats in the early 2000s had much to do with millions of motorists bricking it over the vast upsurge in cameras and Talivans and neglecting broader aspects of their driving. The foot had very much been taken off the gas with the camera programme in 2009 which saw one of the biggest falls ever.

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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

PeterE's theory is broadly right I would say.

More than once I've heard people say "so what if I don't <insert element of driving here, e.g. indicate>, I obey speed limits so I'm a safe driver".

Plain wrong. I'd rather have a fast-but-skilled driver sat behind me than a slow-but-useless driver in front.

Well BBC news have featured that campaign group in action in Swindon saying there's been no increase in accidents etc since the switch off

and there's this piece on BBC- which I think is the piece on news today , complete with SCP staff looking at redundancies and
talking about the demise of South West cameras-

with south west SCP staff issuing premonitions of doom and gloom .

But as Peter said -it's sad that it's cash that's ending this folly ,rather than good old common sense . There was a quite in the video somewhere that backed up SS research ,about a fall in casualties TILL the introduction of cameras .


Whoops -pea roast ,but at least someone else has gotten hold of the SS hymn sheet and is singing in tune .

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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

300 + comments though, last time I looked.

Might be worth a few of us going on and being the voice of reason! I've just left a few comments.

Might be worth a look at this video.

Speed Cameras : A New Beginning

Regarding this article in the Daily Mail.

Speed cameras could face the axe as government cuts funding

How else did we think it was going to end? Even with a change of government, there are still plenty in LAs who stand to lose face if they up and say "we were wrong, cameras don't save lives", and this would also close the door to any future use as revenue generators. The very fact that they are being cut illustrates clearly that the consensus, both amongst those making the cuts and their perception of the public mind, is that they are not essential road safety devices, otherwise how do they plan on getting away with it?!

Imagine if they declined to remove asbestos from primary schools due to budget constraints...

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Regulation without education merely creates more criminals.

From what I can make out, they are cutting fixed cameras and flooding the UK with Average Speed Cameras, as a result they are not actually cutting speed cameras just moving the goal posts. And as it's said in the video Average Speed Cameras are much less about road safety and all about making life more difficult for the driving population, and at the same time milking people.

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Useless laws weaken necessary laws.

I went up to Manchester (M6) the other week, on a coach, and noticed that behind EVERY gantry there is a camera device of some sort. I had never noticed these before when travelling in a car but obviuosly being on a coach, higher up and not having to concentrate on the road, these things are more noticeable.

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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.

There have been a few recent SPECS installations, but I doubt whether we'll see many more because of the withdrawal of funding. SPECS are expensive to install and operate and in practice, once people are aware they're there, raise very little revenue.

I also would imagine that the conventional fixed cameras have been subject to the law of diminishing returns as people become aware of them and invest in GPS-based camera detectors.

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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

It'll be interesting to watch and only time will tell I suppose.

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Useless laws weaken necessary laws.

I always think the best driver is the one behind the one in front of me, or the one in front of the car behind me

Sometimes it's the one to the left of the car on my right and other times...

"Is it the end of the road for the speed camera?"

Well if they put them at the end of the road we wouldn't have such a problem with them.

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

On a coach, Graball? You'll be joining the Green Party next I think that those cameras are used for traffic flow measurements so that the gantries can warn of congestion ahead.

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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

If they were blue then they are traffic management. I think they are used by traffic master iirc.

Thet weren't the blue ones you normally see but Grey, the same colour as the gantry and hidden BEHIND it.

DCB , I was on my way to a Green Party Conference...

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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.

Hi all, it's been a while.

I don't think you should be pessimistic.

Once hypothecation was stopped this was always going to be the inevitable conclusion. Once Police Chiefs and 'safety partnerships' had to weigh up effectiveness v cost then it was clear that the cameras would fall by the wayside. If they were effective in reducing accidents then they would be a 'price worth paying' and something else would go to pay for them.

I wonder how many employers are going to be faced with CV's containing SCP employment history??

Although it's a shame for those who will have taken the job, who would take any job, for the sake of keeping a roof over his/her head and feeding the family.


From Monbiot...

“They urge that police officers be diverted from preventing serious crime to stand in for lumps of metal.” Lumps of metal doing just one thing, badly, whereas a traffic police has the ability to do very many things well.

“Which circumstance most closely resembles one: an occasional £60 fine, or the daily carnage on the roads?” So we had better do something which actually works!

“Every time I walk though that hospital I see the broken bodies, the shattered hopes, the endless complications, both physical and psychological, caused by the war being waged on the roads. You will see something similar in wards which specialise in the loss of limbs and eyes, the smashing of faces, the crushing of brains.” I see it all the time, more so than you and with more intimate involvement! So we had better do something which actually works!

“Bluh's hostility to the cameras might have more to do with the fact that he was banned for speeding.” Done for speeding when he has never harmed anyone with his driving no doubt. Banned for driving safely all his life, like so many…

“Penning might have fallen for another tabloid myth: that speed cameras are unpopular. The most recent poll whose results I can find shows that 82% of British people surveyed approve of them, and that the percentage has been rising.” That’s funny because I’m damned if I can find more than one in my office of twenty four, but no matter. Let’s examine this from his ‘trusted’ source shall we…

“Despite the impression sometimes given by the media, there is no doubt that speed camera enforcement is very strongly supported by the public. Research showed that throughout the last decade, on average 82% approved of speed camera operation.” 171

Given the date stamp of that pdf file, this would be during the period starting from 1995, before the proliferation of speed cameras and before the general public new how they were going to be used and abused.

I agreed with the CSA before they ripped me off and fathers started to commit suicide! I confess I agreed with invading Iraq, before I found out we entered it on an absolute lie. I can’t believe that years ago I even agreed with speed cameras in some places - before I saw the how they were going to be used and who would get caught in the net.

The devil, as always, is in the detail. It’s not what they show you, it’s what they hide from you. When an educated and seemingly well versed man like Monbiot makes an argument look so eloquent it sounds all the more plausible. It must bother him immensely that not everyone absorbs his mantra like the blotting paper he so obviously thinks we all are.

Let’s see how Swindon gets on shall we? So far, so very good...



Edit to add: Oh the perils of trying to work and fit a post in at the same time. : Forgot to add the link to which I refer which I stole off Peter from another thread + typo's.

More haste, less inappropriate speed.

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Ah, it's George "I've run out of rational arguments, so I'll misrepresent instead" Monbiot

"They urge that police officers be diverted from preventing serious crime"
We've been calling for a return to the greater numbers of policing we had in the past. Police in a car can still carry out non-motoring policing.

"cheaply by machines"
Does he know how much these cameras actually cost, and how much needed to maintain them?

"They insist that those who break the law should not be punished or even caught."
Oh of course they did
Perhaps they recognise that prior misuse of the law has resulted with needless criminalisation through what is now regarded as mere technical infringements?

"they are the only people who can expect to get away with breaking the law on almost all occasions."
Cyclists? (note: that was merely a point of observation. I cycle more than I drive)

He spins heart-rendering events (Are all those victims you describe a result of someone exceeding the limit – I don’t think so, you cheating sod) without ever taking notice of the strong argument regarding the fatality gap: http://www.safespeed.org.uk/sscw.html

"A study for Penning's department shows that 19% fewer people were killed or seriously injured at accident black spots after speed cameras were introduced, above and beyond the general decline in accidents on the roads."

"found that after speed cameras were installed there was a reduction at those sites in deaths and serious injuries of 69%."
All together now Regression To The Mean.
Cameras are installed where the KSI rate is temporarily inflated, so one can expect at the sites even without the camera installed.

It is impossible to believe that after so many years these people who feel they are smart enough to publish such comments still don't know about the proven and widely accepted RTTM.
Then there is the tendency to add in other unrelated safety measures at these sites too (bias on selection).

You're in denial George, or is there more to your agenda?

As for the fundraising issue: viewtopic.php?p=225904#p225904

"The most recent poll whose results I can find shows that 82% of British people surveyed approve of them,"
I've seen a few of those around recently too; they had the very loaded question: "would you support speed cameras IF THEY WEREN'T USED TO RAISE MONEY?". So, do you remember the results of recent surveys asking if cameras are about making money? They didn't turn out so quite well did they!
Support for speed cameras is waning because the public are beginning to realise that cameras are actually being used to make money instead of aiding road safety.

"This Tory cut has nothing to do with saving money."
Oh I agree - they may actually want to end the war on motorists!

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

Hang on, does he think speeding is important enough a crime to need enforcing or not?

And does he think drivers want to be policed or not?