the sensible majority wrote:
No i'm not in a job related to road safety just a safe driver.
I came to the forum after seeing pauls comments to the press re: the £1000000 camera.
No I think the goverments got it all wrong, you have to prove that you need a camera and the fact that people speed along the road isnt enough, I would have cameras every where, the sorts of driving witnessed everyday need thousands more people reciving bans from driving.
I did wonder what kind of morons complained about cameras sited to save lives and what idiots belive they are wrong now I know
Actually if cameras really did save lives, I'd be in the front line cheering for them, it's just that has not been the experience in this country over the ten or so years they have been here.
As many people are dieing today as did before, despite better engineering in cars to make them safer, this means that there are more bad accidents than there was.
It's a pretty easy thing to do but when youlook that the most activ safety camera regions have seen the biggest decrease in traffic police and also generally the worst performance on traffic accidents then a correlation is all too easily drawn.
Cameras do not detect "bad driving" as you describe they detect speeding, but speeding is a very small part of the problem, in fact the Governments own departments have judged thios to be in the region of 5% of serious accidents.
What about the other 95%?
I am here because road safety is a primary importance for me and I'll share why:
When I was 5 years old I watched my sister die on the road, she was 18 moths old and run over by an ice cream van that was reversing.
When I was 16 years old I refused to go with a group of friends who Twoced there parents car, one died
When I was 20 years old I lost two friends in Drink driving accidents
Whilst serving as an accident investigator with the Royal Military Police I investigated countless fatal accidents, most of these involved drivers falling asleep (the army does push its soldiers too far) but other ntable included a heart attack, drink, drugs (yes even in the army) and suicide.
I attended one accident where two soldiers died which was directly attributable to speed, They were on an Autobahn their speed was eventually calculated (wreckage etc) as in the region of 130 mph and they were doing it in fog, they hit the rear of a lorry that was travelling at the speed any sensible person would have been. I helped the pathologist pick the bits of skull out of the mush that was their brains.
Since then I have buried (literally at a recent muslim funeral) around a dozen biker friends not a single one of whom was speeding or riding recklessly when they were killed in Smidsy accidents by "safe drivers".
If the loss of the traffic police is the by product of safety cameras th I choose the former not the latter. Not because I am some speed crazed freak but because I have kids and I want the roads to be as safe as they can be for them and cameras are not the answer.
By the way I give you another three days. By then you'll be bored, you'll move on to your next soap box and we'll never see you again as you will never give another thought to cameras, road safety or this site. Meanwhile we will still be campaigning; for a real debate, for a true study as to the effectiveness of cameras, for a return to real policemen on the streets, for greater education, training, for responsibility for accidents to be recognised, for pedestrian jaywalking laws, generally we will still be the voice of "the sensible majority" who actually in thir hearts know that the Government is on the wrong track and that something has to be done.
