Safe Speed Forums

Hello again all. Now that I have learned how some members think about speed and safety, I thought I would advance some personal views for discussion:

One thing strikes me on reading many of the posts in this forum. Members rarely agree what constitutes a safe/reasonable/sensible speed for any given scenario. We can ignore built up areas for the purpose of this discussion, I think we all agree that some sort of limit is sensible for safety reasons. No it is the out of town roads I am thinking of, motorways, dual carriageways, bypasses whatever, the roads which were constructed to allow traffic to reach distant destinations in a reasonable time. This is where a great deal if dissention arises. Some say 70mph is fine, a large number opt for 80mph, others for 90mph and a few brave souls for higher speeds. Now, it appears to me that we are doing, ourselves, what we accuse the authorities of doing, namely setting limits in an arbitary fashion. We are obviously influenced by our personal modes of driving. There are those who, even in the absence of any limit at all, would drive at 65-70 along the motorway, and why not, freedom of choice is a wonderful thing. I personally would advocate going back to the notion of NSL meaning "no speed limit" and extending that freedom to all drivers.

I drive on the motorway every working day. My route is the M1 from Luton to Milton Keynes. Average speed varies with traffic conditions but I would say, with a fairly clear road, the average is 85-90 (at least in the outside lane) with the odd driver well above that. Personally I have never been bothered by other drivers going faster than me, it happens, doesn't concern me one jot (but then I'm not a traffic policeman or someone who thinks they know better what speed others should drive at). But it seems to me that a lot of people don't share that view. Their reaction is to accuse such drivers of acting in a dangerous manner. I have always ascribed this to an inability to see beyond their personal limits. The attitude seems to be "This is as fast as I feel it is safe to go, anyone driving faster is a danger." They can never seem to grasp that drivers have different capabilities (and reaction times) and, just possibly, that chap shooting past you is well in control and no more a danger than you are. (I acknowledge that, if the driver is a youth in a modified jalopy with a baseball hat on back to front, this may not apply!)

These people (the judgers) unwittingly aid the government's cause which seems to be to brainwash everyone into becoming automatons (and fully compliant with any crazy directive they wish to inflict upon us!)

Have you ever considered this: motoring is a form of natural selection. The inadequate, careless and stupid perish, and the good get better. You can't argue with nature!

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I'm not always right, but my score is higher than the government's

as

I'd be interested to see the effect on fatality and SI stats of a 110-120mph limit on three lane motorways, with a different focus of attention by the enforcers emphasising the risks associated with discourtesy, carelessness, inattention, intimidation and aggression, also taking into account vehicle and driver capablility.

It might make enforcement a tad more subjective, but I'd have no problem with that.

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Fixed ideas are like cramp, for instance in the foot, yet the best remedy is to step on them.

Ian

Quite so, I too would like to see the police spend more time on the motorways watching for carelessness, inattention and slow, middle lane hoggers. If you could get rid of the last category there would much less intimidation, aggression and discourtesy!

As to the effect on fatality and SI stats, if they went down the control freaks would say it's an anomoly and should be disregarded, if they went up they would say "told you so" and if they stayed the same, they would say "we've been lucky so far, let's not push our luck" There is no way you will satisfy these people that the motorist can be trusted to exercise good judgement. Only strict controls enforced with draconian sentences will satisfy their burning desire to extinguish any vestige of pleasure and satisfaction in everyday driving.

What was that famous comment from the "Friends of the Earth" "speed limits should be made very low and rigidly enforced to take all the glamour out of motoring"
Friends of the Earth, 1995

Is it any wonder that these people are considered bonkers?

Keep up the good work Ian

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I'm not always right, but my score is higher than the government's

You see, you are doing it too! You consider that it might be OK (with you) if the limit was raised to 80-90 But (implied) no more than that. So you don't believe motorists could be trusted to drive safely at speeds over 90, is this because it's your personal limit?

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I'm not always right, but my score is higher than the government's

Different vehicles add to these misconceptions. See:

http://www.safespeed.org.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1885

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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

That would be absolutely brilliant for experienced and responsible drivers, but (as I've expressed before) I'm concerned about the effect on the ~5% of drivers who need speed limits most - the inexperienced. This small group haven't developed hazard perception, the ability to look well ahead, or any decent speed sense.

I believe the answer is to test the concept of a higher motorway speed limit with a 50 mile section in the middle of a long route to provide a test with control group.

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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

I suspect that 50 miles is too short to provide a statistically significant test, unless you are prepared to run it for 10 years - plus you'll get plenty of chavs turning up simply to floor it. How about doing it to one direction of a motorway? Although this almost seems to be the situation with the A1, which has about 3 times as many speed cameras going north - perhaps someone's already thought of this?

I don't necessarily believe that we need a huge deal of experience to develop hazard perception and COAST, simply to learn from the experience we gain. But this could tie in well with a subsequent test, about 2 years after the original, where the new driver must be able to display the ability to perceive hazards and display COAST to an adequate level to release him to the full freedom of the motorway (perhaps initially limited by law to 70/80mph).

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Fixed ideas are like cramp, for instance in the foot, yet the best remedy is to step on them.

Ian

Sounds good Ian. It's one way to raise the perceived value of skill and experience too - I rate that as very much in the interests of safer driving.

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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

One thing that would help with this is a seperate test for motorways, to be taken at least six months after the first test, allowing people to get a few miles under their belt before being let loose on the motorways.

M-ways may be the safest roads, but potentially they are the most dangerous, i.e. the effects of poor driving tend to be amplified by the speed of vehicles.

It's not for nothing that the police have a tiered system of driver privileges - in most industries you have to build up experience on one level before moving to the next. After all, you can't learn to fly a hang-glider then hop into a Tornado!!

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Never point a speedmeter at a civil or military aircraft, vessel or armoured vehicle. Many military aircraft, vehicles or vessels have target acquisition detectors, some of which initiate automatic counter measures.
Association of Chief Police Officers

I know it sounds logical, but there's very little in the injury stats to support the theory. Average crash intensity is somewhat greater on faster roads, but crash frequency (=crash risk) is quite significantly lower.

Speed IS an 'error amplifier' when it is inappropriate, but the incidence of inappropriate speed (especially amongst responsible drivers) is really quite low.

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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

If, on a 3-lane motorway, they had a 60mph limit in the left lane, 70mph in the middle lane and 80mph in the right lane, that sounds nice in theory, and could work with cruise control but you're enforcing drivers to go at exactly those speeds, i.e. someone who wants to drive at 65mph will hold up those in the middle lane.

As for what you classify as MLH's - many drivers will use the middle lane because it is far less stressful than driving in the slow lane. Why? Because in the slow lane, you have merging in traffic at junctions, you will reach vehicles you want to overtake only to find you can't pull out, either because there is a long stream of vehicles overtaking you or you have a slow overtaker (someone who hangs just over you but never actually gets around to overtaking).

Actually, I think slow overtaking is a major problem (and possibly caused by speed limits), (and of course is particularly a problem with lorries, but can be with other vehicles as well).

I haven't done as much out-of-town driving recently as I used to and I virtually never use motorways apart from the M1 between Brent Cross and Watford. I have 2 cars, one of which is very fast and the other of which struggles to even manage 70mph.

Chavs would only turn up to floor it if the road was truly derestricted - a trial of an 80 or 90 mph limit wouldn't have the same effect. Perhaps they could try it out on the M6Toll, which might give people a slight extra incentive to fork out to drive along it (although at quiet times the average speed seems to be around 95 mph anyway).

One of the problems with derestricting roads is that it takes away a useful and straightforward mechanism for prosecuting nutters. And, if they knew it was legal, some people would inevitably try to max out Picantos and Tacumas in a way they just don't now.

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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

Hiya goldminer,

I tend to agree with your basic approach as per the bulk of your post, but the bit I've quoted above worries me.

While the inadequate, careless and stupid are wiping themselves out, there are going to be innocent people involved as well sometimes, so we can not afford to have a free-for-all type of scenario.

I used to want to abolish the NSL completely, but I'm now more inclined to seek the introduction of an advanced licence that would permit the NSL to be disregarded by those who can prove their ability to use high speed in a suitably expert and safe manner. There are those who maintain that such a system would be impractical, but I don't see why it should be, and I think we should seek ways of making it work.

My travels today have included quite a few motorway miles, and once again I have found speeds of up to 105 mph to be quite satisfactory for short distances. What I find is that while you might often be limited to around 80 mph by traffic density, you tend to find windows of opportunity where the traffic thins out and you can run up to 100-110 quite happily. In these situations I almost invariably find people move out of lane 3 quite decently when there is space in lane 2 - and I don't drive anything that looks like a big chunk of battenburg! I am sorry to find that many people in these forums regularly seem to complain that they are forever surrounded by numpties, but it does not feel like that to me. For the most part I find people seem to progress in a fairly decent orderly manner, so I'm generally quite happy with things in that respect.

For my own purposes I would still like to be rid of the NSL though.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

I am at an age (59) when I can remember the late fities and the sixties, and the gradual spread of motoring in the UK, and reading some old 'Autocar' magazines I was given recently it is obvious that there were far more fatalities; nearly twice as many as now, with a lot less traffic. Of course there were no national speed limits then, either, just the urban limits of 30 & 40. However strange as it may seem, the traffic was actually a lot slower then, there were few motorways, and most cars were pushed to do more than 80, generally people kept to about 45-50. Nowadays every car can do a 100, (or almost). Cars then had small engines - Minis 900 cc, family cars 1500, only the Jags and others could go fast and even then in not many places. Frankly, speed was not then the main cause of accidents, just as it isn't today, so what has changed ?

(Of course if there was no speed at all there would be no accidents. Perhaps we should all walk !!)

Well, we now have much more commercial traffic, lorries etc. The failure of railway freight is a theme right through this period which includes the Beeching cuts whihc cut railway mileage by over 50%. Currently, commercial vehicles are involved in around 26% of accidents, (and a larger percentage of fatality accidents), but are only around 10-15% of the vehicles registered; food for thought there, maybe.

Roads have improved a hell of a lot. more motorways, better signing, and road junctions etc, and cars themselves are safer - better brakes, handling and so on. And casualties have gone down markedly, with the largest reductions before cash camera patnerships were introduced. Yet we are now stubbornly stuck at around the 3200-3500 mark for deaths.

What has really changed is that far, far, more youngsters drive, and are able to finance the running of their cars. I was a motorcyclist until the age of 32. Yes, I fell off a few times, and it taught me to drive to the conditions. But nowadays, at the age of 17, most youngsters are driving around. This has been accompanied by the dumbing down of the motoring magazines. You have only to look at the style of writing in the magazines of the 1950s compared to today. They were written by educated people for educated people; responsible people, people with families etc, natural law-abiders and people who took care, and were polite to others.

What is urgently needed is a cessation of mechanistic processes which punish people for minor infringements. Nobody, BUT NOBODY can be totally perfect when driving, yet this is what the cash camera partnerships rely on. They are feasting on fallibility. Of course they have generous salaries to pay, and pensions too. Even, dare I say it , incentive payments for maximising revenue from fines.

A concentration of effort on recklessness is what is needed. I think this can only be achieved by police road patrols, not robotic and sinister roadside cameras. People driving recklessly need to be confronted AT THE TIME with their stupidity. Fore some, a warning, for others, the full eight of the law. Of course this will cost more, and frankly, I have to say if any new model of partnership was formed which could draw its cost from the fines imposed for recklessness alone, I would be content, but the current cash camera partnerships disgust me now and always will.

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Good manners maketh a good motorist

today .

TripleS, I wasn't advocating the measure, merely commenting that it could be viewed as such. I suppose that almost everything in life is a form of natural selection (after all, life itself is).

I don't think your idea of an advanced licence (allowing the owner to disregard speed limits) is really practical (however appealing it must be to many). For one thing, even if you had such privileges, how would you exercise them when almost everyone else is travelling much more slowly? Then again, the authorities would never sanction such an idea, they would point out (with, perhaps, some justification), that while you were flying along (safely) other drivers could be taken unawares, might not react sensibly to the situation, and this could lead to accidents.

I think there is merit in your suggestion, albeit in a modified form. Those who wished to could take a series of advanced tests over a period of time. Success would be rewarded by reduced insurance premiums (much as happens now with advanced driving tests) but, critically, the certificates could be used as mitigation in any case brought against the driver for exceeding the speed limit or careless/dangerous driving etc.

I realise that this last sentence will bring howls of fury from some members so I should perhaps explain this more fully. I'm not suggesting that production of said certificates should, neccessarily, absolve the driver from blame. What I am suggesting is that, in my opinion, many charges of careless/reckless/dangerous driving are brought because of the judgement of the traffic patrol officer (right Ian?) What looks like bad driving could be viewed afresh if the officer was shown proof of ability. Take an obvious example: We have all seen police cars rushing off to some emergency, blues and two's flashing etc. We are aware that the driver has been trained to a high standard and disregard the fact that he is driving very fast, sometimes on the wrong side of the road, going through red lights etc. If the same behaviour was exhibited by a civilian car we would be outraged right? Having proof of ability would go a long way to avoiding potential miscarriages of justice.

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I'm not always right, but my score is higher than the government's

</delurk>

Hello,

Not wishing to steal your thunder, but I actually suggested this to my girlfriend (while we were trying to solve the problems of the world, as we do) and I said that wouldn't it be good if I could take a series of courses, tests or whatever to prove to the Police that I was a confident, competent driver at "above average" speed limits.

You know, get awarded with a "+10mph" certificate or percentage-based or something.

So then, when getting flashed by said Gatso, the operator would check plate to name, name to "advanced drivers list" and see that I am legally allowed to exceed speed limits by 10mph.

Not a solution to the Speed Kills mentality problem, but it was just an idea. Nice to see I'm not totally barking up the wrong tree.

My view on motorway speed limits is that it is primarily speed differentials rather than absolute speeds that are the important factor. I believe that for safety, you need to have neither too much nor too little speed differential between vehicles. My non-scientific estimate of the optimum would be 15mph differential between each lane. It's rare that you encounter people who want to drive slower than 60 mph on motorways, so that would give us 75mph for the middle lane and 90mph for the outer lane.

If we make everyone drive at the same speed, bunching will result. If differentials are too great, the risk of misjudging another vehicle's speed and changing lanes in front of them when they can't stop in time is increased. If we could increase the speed of the slowest vehicles, I therefore believe we could reasonably safely increase the speed of the fastest vehicles, too, to correspondingly more than 90mph.