Safe Speed Forums

I'd add that usually due to the traffic present it's impossible to speed when there are children around and that by focussing solely on schools and playgrounds people forget that children, as pedestrians, can be anywhere.

But might there not be a "crying wolf" effect if VAS were used far more widely?

FWIW this is what I say on this issue on my website:


Paradoxically, I think a smaller number of cameras would be far more effective than loads.

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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

perhaps but despite knowing better I know I end up looking at my speedo far more than normal when driving past them. Do we really want this in danger areas?

If you're the sort of arsehole (which obviously you aren't) who drives down shopping streets at 50/60 mph then it is probably better for you to be doing 33 and staring at your speedo.

Before the cameras there was a particular type of driver (almost always male, middle-class and middle-aged) who had a powerful car and thought it was his God-given right to drive everywhere at the speed limit +50% or more, and trust to his luck to avoid prosecution.

That's a thing of the past - licensed drivers have to be more observant and circumspect now. That is a benefit of cameras.

Incidentally - I strongly advocate covert speed traps with a trigger well over the limit, where a copper will pull you over half a mile down the road.

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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

Yes, I think there would. VAS need to be used with care and where necessary - i.e. in areas of special danger.

They should NEVER be used to function as a speed limit reminder and especially so when the speed limit is on the low side.

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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

an interesting problem there. Watching the road at 50, or staring at the speedo at 33. Who's more likely to stop in time?


it doesn't help the rest of us if the only thing they're looking for is cameras.

Maybe not, but the "I'm above the law" mentality is seriously unhelpful.

_________________
"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

can't argue with that but why not counter it with better policing?

Yes. Would be excellent.

Just like it used to be.

edited

I can see your point but if you need to check your speedo to ensure you are not doing more than 20 then you need to learn to drive. People believe driving is a right; it is not, it is a privelege. In order to gain the privelege people ought to have to demonstrate they have the necessary skills on a regular basis.

You don't need to check your speedo at all to know if you are driving at an appropriate speed. Few experienced drivers would need to check their speedo to know they were doing 'something around 20mph'. But if your licence is under threat from a camera you need to check and check again in order to verify precise legal compliance.



And where's the evidence that 'never exceeding the speed limit' is a necessary skill?

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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

so if someone puts a gun to your head and says I want you to drive at around 20mph but if you exceed it even for a fraction of a second I'm going to pull the trigger. Do you look at the speedo?

I would have thought the lower the limit the more necessary it is to make frequent speedo checks to ensure you're not exceeding it, and the easier it is for the slightest pressure on the throttle to take you above the threshold for prosecution. In a 20 mph SPECS zone, you would be staring at your speedo for grim death.

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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

Having had a car with a faulty speedo (it came on randomly) I found that my judgement of the cars speed was pretty spot on.

I agree that you should be able to gauge the cars speed without the speedo. (I always know when my partner is over the limit. )

Maybe the driving test should have a section with the speedo disconnected

You're talking about ONE of the TWO entirely idependent judgements of speed that we all use.

The ability to judge numerical speed is similar to speedos and speed limits. You might be able to say "this is about 30mph" and expect to be right on most occasions. But after a long high speed run, you'll probably be miles out at 30 mph. In fact you might call 50mph true as 30mph subjective.

But the speed judgement that matters is the result of a subconscious risk assessment process that determines a speed that's suitable for the hazard environment. It tells you when to brake, when to slow and when to speed up. It doesn't care at all about th numbers and 40mph in town might feel far too fast while 40mph on a motroway will feel far too slow. This jusgement isn' much affected by the long high speed run, which is the exact reason that roundabouts at the ends of motorways haven't turned into piles of crashed cars.

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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

Very easy in a modern car to exceed 20 mph and not feel it. Try it. Book a track day and drive along at 20 mph and attempt to stay at 17-20 mph - you would blip over to 25 mph fairly often.

Now our lads have done courses to keep steady 10 mph - but that's the skill we need if escorting an "extraordinarily heavy" It takes a lot of practice to make perfect!

By the way - I can ride my bike at 20 mph and above. I could (if really unlucky) do a lot of damage to someone including myself I hit something or someone ...

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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.

Ru**ell - depends where you live, and some do not have any warnings. Passed on myself in Derbyshire's High Peak - no signs or anything.

When we use our one van - we tell people where it will be and put huge signs up. But I have to say - not all do so and I have seen this for myself in Derbyshire, Wales, Lancs and Notts - and then there is the little matter of the really odd statistic in Cambs. When we get to March - ca 21st - check it out. It will be there again claiming huge number of accidents at one spot over past three years - only no one has seen them, been held up in the aftrermath or anything.



The risk to all road users is posed by bad drivers - but they do not all drive at high speeds or even above the speed limit. Now I know this - have been : for long enough. But they drive dopily enough to have an accident - and I've seen the lot to date - some straighthtforward - COAST absence, some sheer bog standard of amoebic brain cell proportions, many "under influence of something" and some just pure reckless insanity.

Now if we can get COAST sytem of systematic, silky smooth driving into the general psyche - we find (and this is based on DIS and SA feedbacks and evidence still being collated under these experiments ) but we are finding those who have attended such courses are more compliant to all traffic laws as these course aim to teach hazard awareness and within risk assessing hazards - choice of speed pops into the equation. Hence - easier and better compliance and choice of a safe speed - as the COAST model does insist that the limit is not some target to aim for and that sometimes we are safer below it.



Even the blippers. We all blip to 4 mph +/- and more dependent on road surface, camber, wheel size, gradient - whatever. Some of the sillier fixed cams I've seen are on hills at point of max "stealth increase"

Here - we tend to observe the driving and then make a professional judgement based on our training. By the way - people do not get away with that much here! Fines - we do our bit for the Treasury

But what we get here is our public's respect which helps us in other policework and if we issue a prosecution - by gum - our customers know and understand exactly why!

Knock on effect is an overall more comfortable driving standard and - yes - I admit some slip through our net. We cannot be everywhere anymore than we can have a speed camera monitoring each and every lamp post.

So - we have occasional work shop courses, liaise with our schools and colleges, "campaign of the month" and when we stop anyone - they get a COAST lecture whether or not we decide to issue a fine or not.

Result? We have some accidents and a real biker problem in one certain area which we target relentlessly - but by and large - we appear to have a better record on safety than most - the quaint old fashioned way.



If only it were that simple. If everyone obeyed every law - I'd be redundant!

Accidents happen at any speed - for any mistake. They can be just s fatal at low speed as at high speed. You can be legal at 70 mph and cause a fatal or be below the speed limit as the poor chap in Wlaes and cause carnage at a patch of black ice resulting from a probable macro climate at that particular point which no one could foresee.

Have investigated many high/low speed collisions over the years and prime cause was error/defect/illness/stupidity and speed of vehicle, point of impact affect outcome - but the speed is directly and irrevoccably interwined with the driver's observation, perception and risk assessment of the hazards. Hence I would rather see COAST as THINK! model than single issue of "SPEED"



I do not think that this is necessarily so, Most of the lads and lasses on here do not seem to advocate driving at high speeds. In fact I once posted that I find it relaxing to tootle along at leisurely pace. The Mad Cats and Swiss cheeses go off on track days and we all drive accordingly when in Germany...

All of us want safer roads - and our lads tend to go after the lunatics and allow a bit of slack and tolerance to our just over blippers as long as they demonstrate a decent understanding of safety and when they see us - reign it down a smidgeon to limit +10% -ish (proves they observed and saw us as hazard to wallet )

_________________
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.

With all due respect, I strongly disagree with this statement. I regularly have to ride to save my life because of this very driver you have described! He still exists!

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Pecunia Prius Equitas et Salus

Actually BottyBurp, in my experience its not Mr Merc who insists on exceeding the limit like that that causes the most problems, its Dorris and her mates in their Metro who don't seem to think that they actually need to look where they're going.

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.