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 Post subject: That gut wrench feeling
PostPosted: Sat Feb 08, 2014 23:15 
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Folks,

Have had a clean license for many years.

Driving towards Bournemouth on the A338, dual carriageway, fast moving traffic. Have the cruise control on the Alfa set to just below 60mph.

See a van in a layby, police van, speed camera! Suddenly that gut wrenching feeling kicks in and I brake too late.

Get home and go on the internet; there is a mobile trap set 100yds inside the change from 70mph to 50mph on the A338 at that point. But neither my wife nor myself saw any sign for a 50mph speed limit - nothing. There are no signs.

Now there is the 3 week wait for the envelope through the post.

Been there, done that. :( The B*******.

Alex.

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PostPosted: Sat Feb 08, 2014 23:53 
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Get out and look for a :50: limit. If necessary set up a dash cam ( or one person operating the cam corder) . Check out traffic regs for a new limit. But the envelope in post MUST be served in 14 days after the day of the alleged offence, not as you think three weeks. If outside the 14 +1 days, you must send it back with details of driver, but with date of delivery .
On the glee side- Cruise control set to "just below 60". If that's 60 on speedo , it could be 10% above = 54mpoh, and with a force policy of 50 times 10&+2 , that's a limit for prosecution etc of 57, so you could be well under, and out of the poo pants area. I'd still wait for GS to surface and throw cow muck on that, but I & and others have seen that he's proclaimed on PH never to post again on his noms de guerre. But if you decide to go to peppipoo fro advice, be aware that SCP trols frequent this area ,so be careful of what you say on open forum .
As in the poem,Drake's Drum, "Captain, are you sleeping down below". In this case it's a reference to Cap'n Pugwash's naval job. :sub:

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PostPosted: Sun Feb 09, 2014 10:23 
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Thanks botach,

If I lived near Bournemouth I would certainly be checking the road signs, but I'm 100 miles away. Don't these things so often happen when we don't know the area and the roads?

Yes, there is a chance of being just below the borderline speed. Also, other traffic was travelling faster and I was in the slow lane so the camera guy might have already got his quota for the day.

Just checked my license and the last 3 points were 6 years ago so shouldn't hit the insurance if I am caught. Sorry to be so panicky, I know there are other folks in much worse situations, but I have really been trying to be good and it's very hard. :(

Alex.

PS, Managed to find the exact spot on Google Maps street view. There is a small '50' sign in the central reservation, but a large yellow sign with information about beaches beside the road on the left, with no '50' on it. My wife remembers that we were looking at that sign and commented on it therefore must have missed the other one. The camera van was just 100yds further on in a layby.

As the small '50' sign is the first one going into Bournemouth from the national speed limit, better signage could save accidents on this stretch of road.

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PostPosted: Sun Feb 09, 2014 13:05 
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As the small '50' sign is the first one going into Bournemouth from the national speed limit,


Surely the sign at the changeover point, has to be much larger than a repeater sign and , I believe, on a yellow background now, to be legally enforceable? Maybe Claire can confirm or deny this one for you.

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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.


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PostPosted: Sun Feb 09, 2014 17:29 
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This location is a favourite one for the mobile vans as there is no discernable change in the road conditions to warrant the limit change. They have been camping out at this point for years and all the locals know it.

The question they should ask is "was it dangerous?" but compliance with the law trumps all other considerations.

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PostPosted: Sun Feb 09, 2014 23:04 
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Cooler wrote:
Thanks botach,

If I lived near Bournemouth I would certainly be checking the road signs, but I'm 100 miles away. Don't these things so often happen when we don't know the area and the roads?

Yes, there is a chance of being just below the borderline speed. Also, other traffic was travelling faster and I was in the slow lane so the camera guy might have already got his quota for the day.

Just checked my license and the last 3 points were 6 years ago so shouldn't hit the insurance if I am caught. Sorry to be so panicky, I know there are other folks in much worse situations, but I have really been trying to be good and it's very hard. :(

Alex.

PS, Managed to find the exact spot on Google Maps street view. There is a small '50' sign in the central reservation, but a large yellow sign with information about beaches beside the road on the left, with no '50' on it. My wife remembers that we were looking at that sign and commented on it therefore must have missed the other one. The camera van was just 100yds further on in a layby.

As the small '50' sign is the first one going into Bournemouth from the national speed limit, better signage could save accidents on this stretch of road.

perhaps Google Maps might be your friend. Might be worth a try .

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PostPosted: Tue Feb 11, 2014 18:32 
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A change of limit sign has to be full size. And its placement is also stipulated.

Check abd.org.UK/speed_limit_signs.htm

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PostPosted: Wed Feb 12, 2014 10:23 
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guys,

I've backtracked further on googlemaps and found the '50' signs. They are on both sides of the road just outside the city limits. :(

My bad.

So, it's back to watching the post each day. Dorset speedcam site says that a speed awareness course is available if the caught under 64mph in a 50mph. That's pretty lenient and my cruise control definitely puts me in the ballpark.

Wife and I are preparing for a Travelodge break on the sunny South coast :sunny: and a spot of adult education for me.

Alex.

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PostPosted: Wed Feb 12, 2014 23:10 
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malcolmw wrote:
This location is a favourite one for the mobile vans as there is no discernable change in the road conditions to warrant the limit change. They have been camping out at this point for years and all the locals know it.

The question they should ask is "was it dangerous?" but compliance with the law trumps all other considerations.

Sorry, Malcom, I disagree, it's profit before safety that trumps all other considerations.

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PostPosted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 02:51 
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The signs need a pair and if lit then both need to be lit - so if one has failed then they are invalid.

You must hear within 14 days unless your vehicle is Company owned (or other company linked like on HP etc) then it could be up to 6 mths!

Often that instinct to brake can help you too, as so far from my experience, that sudden drop in speed makes it really hard for any LTi camera that I have tested to be able to get a fix. (This is not any official testing, just private, you understand).
If they hadn't broken the 85%ile speed limit setting with 'average mean' then the road speeds would be about right for the speed that you generally feel comfortable with. It is only because the road speeds have now been artificially lowered, and as such many drivers who might otherwise travel within the SAFE 85%ile are now 'illegal' and thus open to prosecution!
Cant say that you will get any 'training' perhaps indoctrination ! :(
After the 4th year you can and should request a new clean licence.
I am surprised that they don't increase the entire point system to try and cater for all the extra points that they know people are accruing on their licences! Although I dare say to do this would indicate an element of guilt on their part, as to the un-necessary cause of all the additional points. After all if 'speed' was so bad as they would have you believe then how come we don't have total carnage on the road with ALL these people still speeding about ? They have no answer to this, nor to where is all the volume and density testing ! and so on ! :) Just disgusting as while they focus people on this they are ignoring the true real road safety messages and will improve road safety! :) They misguiding will tell you 30% of accidents are 'caused' (!!) by speeding - wrong 6% of accidents have speed as a 'factor' not a cause ! That's it and we can guesstimate that half of those are WITHIN the speed limit! (too fast for conditions and excessive speed).

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PostPosted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 21:27 
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SafeSpeedv2 wrote:
Often that instinct to brake can help you too, as so far from my experience, that sudden drop in speed makes it really hard for any LTi camera that I have tested to be able to get a fix. (This is not any official testing, just private, you understand).


SS,

Yes, in this case cruise control was not my friend. :(

Thanks for you helpful post. We are at 12 days so far; every morning's mail is a new excitement. :shock:

Alex.

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PostPosted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 17:29 
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I think I may have got done a while ago but my agony is longer than yours Cooler. :( It was at work and I was in a pool car, our Octavia.

My work colleague got done during work about a year ago and he said it took over two months before someone presented him with a NIP. Apparently, this because it was issued within the two weeks but the bottleneck was in our NHS system; so it did still count against him. :x

He decided to go on the course but I don’t think I could stomach one! I’d probably just take the hit and if I got banned through topping up it’s goodbye England. Mine was about two months ago now so I’m feeling better but still on egg shells TBH.

Daft thing was I could see it up ahead but my brain was full of who and what I was going to see and do. Image I remember looking down and seeing my speedo reading 38mph and my Sat Nav telling me 35 to 36. Main arterial road with four lanes going into Birmingham. No peds around, perfect visibilty, fine weather etc. etc. usual stuff...

But maybe a child was going to pop up from a under a cover in the middle of the road. It's 30 for a reason, so they tell me :loco:

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PostPosted: Sat Feb 22, 2014 10:30 
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Big Tone wrote:
Daft thing was I could see it up ahead but my brain was full of who and what I was going to see and do.


Big Tone,

That's how it happens. When driving we are just not looking for speedcams/traps every minute of the time. Then we see one and it's "Is it -isn't it? How fast am I going? What's behind me? Can I brake in time?"

We do the best we can. :shock:

Alex.

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PostPosted: Sat Feb 22, 2014 21:59 
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Big Tone wrote:
Image I remember looking down and seeing my speedo reading 38mph and my Sat Nav telling me 35 to 36. Main arterial road with four lanes going into Birmingham. No peds around, perfect visibilty, fine weather etc. etc. usual stuff...

But maybe a child was going to pop up from a under a cover in the middle of the road. It's 30 for a reason, so they tell me :loco:


To them ,the conditions etc don't matter .As the song says (well my version ) "we've got to fill a pocket 9 or classroom0 or two -o ,got to pick a pocket or two".

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PostPosted: Wed Mar 05, 2014 12:15 
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graball wrote:
Quote:
As the small '50' sign is the first one going into Bournemouth from the national speed limit,


Surely the sign at the changeover point, has to be much larger than a repeater sign and , I believe, on a yellow background now, to be legally enforceable? Maybe Claire can confirm or deny this one for you.


My bold.

The following is in no way an attack at your understanding, purely me venting at the state of the traffic engineering skillset in this country:

This isn't the case but I wonder if the numpties we see designing signing schemes think it is. It's my one huge bugbear as a professional engineer that people don't read and/or understand the regulations for signing roads.

The yellow backing board is only to highlight a sign that could be camouflaged in some way, the correct way to make a regular sign more visible is to increase its size. All that happens is every sign gets a yellow backing board and the whole point of them is lost. Similar to every second person wandering around the High St wearing a hi-viz jacket then I nearly get run over on site with a cheery wave and a SMIDSY because the person is conditioned not to notice them any more!


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PostPosted: Wed Mar 05, 2014 21:44 
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Section on ABD - http://www.abd.org.uk/speed_limit_signs.htm.

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PostPosted: Wed Apr 02, 2014 21:43 
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Folks,

The feeling of not having received a ticket in the post must be one of the best things that can happen with your clothes on. :)

Alex.

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PostPosted: Wed Apr 02, 2014 23:06 
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Cooler wrote:
Folks,

The feeling of not having received a ticket in the post must be one of the best things that can happen with your clothes on. :)

Alex.

Cooler- I know the feeling. Not so long ago I had an idiot pass me on a camera site. The camera went daft, he passed, but he had no comment to make when I caught up with the graeasball and asked him WHY he decided to pass me on a camera site.

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PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2014 00:26 
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That is good news :)
Having even better processes to ensure that good observation is improved I am sure has been your most recent priority.
I wonder if that might be a 'camera benefit' - hummm? :scratchchin:

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PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2014 21:03 
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Claire ,I might agree. I came on here after finding a lot of stories about cameras. I decided that the way to defend myself was with the information. Topics from ,particularly IG opened my eyes to the training I'd received years ago but had never really thought about. But there's another side to the COAST equation ,that's missing. Concentration and Observation are great, but nowadays, we have to look out for safe honeyspots. i.e places where there's no safety hazards, but there's a SCP profit to be made. Then again there's the question of whether cameras are there to promote safety ( i.e they should be highly visible to promote adherence to the limits) or there to make income(hidden /obscured ,as to keep drivers looking for hidden traps at the demise of looking for other hazards. ) Of course brake and SCP say drivers should be keeping an eye on their speed, but should this be at the failure to spot a child about to walk out. WHAT is more important. Driving around a housing estate with eyes glued to speedo ,or keeping eyes peeled for the todler that can get past open doors and not closed /faulty gates onto a 30MPH road. Road outside my place id 20 , but many's a time I get tailgaited by female drivers, as I'm not going fast enough, when weaving through a maze of parked cars.

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