S0 - More or less points for speeding...

Sounds like revenue generation. Less points equals more opportunity to get money out of you before the disqualification comes.

There have also been plans to increase to 20 the number of point you can have before a ban. KERRCHHING for the authorities
Martin (doing 70.1 in a 70 and becomming a criminal)

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I personally think that the points should remain as they are, and if 4 strikes aren't enough (4 x 3=12 therefore ban) to get you to slow down...

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Quite. Provided that you are notified after each offence and cannot accrue any more points until this happens.

With the GATSOs you are effectively notified of your offence by the double flash that is hard to miss even in daylight.

With "Talivans," TRUVELOs and SPECS there is no flash so it is entirely feasible to have a clean licence one day and be banned the next and know nothing about it until it's too late.

To a professial driver that means loss of livelihood to which many of yoou will say "fine," to which I say "yes but not the points and disqualification as well."

When someone loses his/her livilihood they may not be the only ones to suffer - others may rely on them and not just for their income. Dangerous driving warrants a ban not a series of minor speeding excesses that the driver may not even have known about because s/he was watching the road...



Regards,

Steve.

Cliff - I'll join

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A still camera picture tells you nothing. You need to see to the left and the right and whats behind the camera, to see what the driver has seen before engaging the speed being used.

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Thre are two pictures taken in order to determine your speed with GATSOs. I did think that cameras should only be used at accident black spots. Now I say such blackspots should be engineered out and that cameras should be completely abolished.

Temporary 20mph limits outside schools that only operate at the beginning and end of a school day with electroic signs that are switched on by a calender-controlled timer. What do you say guys?



Regards,

Steve.

Accident hotspots that need engineering out in Notts are only covered by a pitiful county council budget. I did used to know how much it cost to put, say, a mini island or speed humps in place - I'll contact someone in the know and feed that back.

Steve, good point re the camera's flashing and you could get caught several times - but - (puts crash hat on before saying this) If you wern't speeding in the first place, and you were looking ahead properly, you'd see the camera anyway wouldn't you? (I'm referring to non-mobile cameras..)

Near where I live they have put an island in the road covered by a 30mph limit, (its a single carriagway with one lane in each direction), so you in effect have to give way to oncoming traffic before negotiating it. The number of times I pass it on the way to work and the bollards have been flattened by a car etc is amazing...!

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The number of times I pass it on the way to work and the bollards have been flattened by a car etc is amazing...!

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Although speed is obviously a factor here or the vehicle wouldn't be moving, flattening bollards isn't speeding it's bad driving.



Regards,

Steve.

In response to a number of points:

Being unable to take a corner or judge the width of a gap due to excessive speed IS bad driving.

We have some 20mph limits outside schools around here which come on at various times. Good idea.

Being clean one week and banned the next. Technically possible but unlikely. You will be treated with discression - unless there are grave circumstances against you.

Cameras vs. police. Agree. What's likely (under most cirstumances) to result in the greatest loss and tradegy - me doing 56 in a 50 on a clear dry road, or six kids chatting to eachother, bouncing around in in a 20 year old Escort with knackersd shocks, doing 49mph?

Cheers

Harry

I take your point about knackered shocks. A couple of years back my ex-taxi Mondeo passed the MOT on two of its shocks because the leaks were only "dry."

So I took it for a spin along one of my favourite B roads and overtook two cars (they were doing 40, I passed them at 60). I had to wrestle with the steering to bring it back under control after the manoeuvre.

I can't blame the garage as they are probably the strictest you'll ever find (that's why I use 'em) - the regulations are just not strict enough, imho.

Anyway, I didn't waste time in having all four shocks changed.

If 90 % of all accidents are not directly related to excessive speed, (and lets not argue about the exact statistic on this) then surely the government would make more progress in reaching its 40% reduction in road casualties by looking beyond the "speed kills" maxim.

The only reason why the government is failing is because it is focusing only on a tiny percentage of the causes of accidents, as a pretext to its undeclared war on private transport used by the masses.



Regards,

Steve.

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Martin (doing 70.1 in a 70 and becomming a criminal)

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Fortunately not. You are not a criminal despite t2000's attempts at rigid enforcement of all speed limits by threatening the Police with High Court action for not enforcing the law of the land, you are still entitled to a ten percent tolerance on all speed limits.

The reason for this is that no speed-measuring equipment (your speedometer or the means used by the police to check your speed) is 100% accurate.

To prove your excessive speed Beyond All Reasonable Doubt would require you to breach a given tolerance above any posted speed limit.

If, say, your speedo measures up to 80 mph then you are almost certainly safe from any possible conviction in a 70 limit - 10% will allow up to 77 mph and then your speedo will almost certainly over-exaggerate your actual speed slightly.



Regards,

Steve.

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If, say, your speedo measures up to 80 mph then you are almost certainly safe from any possible conviction in a 70 limit - 10% will allow up to 77 mph and then your speedo will almost certainly over-exaggerate your actual speed slightly.

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Yes Steven, I just wish someone would tell that to the drivers who potter along at less than 35mph on the 40mph Nottingham ring road in the outside lane. (Only since the speed cameras were installed).

Steve B

Yes Steve. Speed kills when the driver either isn't trained to drive safely at that speed, or isn't trained to recognise that's he/she's going too fast for the conditions. I spose we have to factor in the slow traffic emerging situations where speed differential is too high to avoid a collision, although you can make the case that a good, alert driver will have killed the speed difference before the situation becomes dangerous. But speed kills QED? Naaah. Not even close. Take a look at this for an accidebt which happened (according to the driver) at a mere 35mph, which as it turned out, was too fast for the conditions - or at least the rather unfortunate conditions that suddenly confronted the diiver which he didn't manage to anticipate.

http://bimmer.roadfly.org/bmw/forums/e39/forum.php?postid=4530353&page=1


Isn't it the case that most speedos under read? Mine's 5% too fast and that's considered a feature by the car maker. The last four cars I've had have been pretty much the same - same make different models.

Cheers

Harry

I think it's illegal for a speedo to under-read. So, to take into account tyre wear and the threat of being sued, manufacturers tend to build in this error.
Steve B mentioned people doing 35mph in a 40. When the euros get there way and PREVENT us driving over the speed limit, can you imagine the carnage when sane drivers try to overtake with a maximum speed only 5mph higher than the other car????
Tony

Sorry, I have a cold. I mean speedo tells me I'm going 5% quicker than I really am. The terminology is obviously getting beyond my technical expertise.

Sniff.

Harry

I was agreeing with you!!

Tony

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Take a look at this for an accidebt which happened (according to the driver) at a mere 35mph, which as it turned out, was too fast for the conditions - or at least the rather unfortunate conditions that suddenly confronted the diiver which he didn't manage to anticipate.

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and don't you love the way that people insist on denying ALL responsibiility for an accident that they could have avoided had they been paying attention and driving to the conditions? Problem #1 with current driver training and "speed kills" brain
washing.

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If 90 % of all accidents are not directly related to excessive speed, (and lets not argue about the exact statistic on this) then surely the government would make more progress in reaching its 40% reduction in road casualties by looking beyond the "speed kills" maxim.

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Of course this will NEVER happen. I believe the only real way to reduce casualties further will be to introduce far stricter training and testing of drivers. This would, of course, mean that a good percentage of people who currently believe they have some sort of god-given right to be on the road will have their licenses revoked. Apart from the political backlash against any such move, the enormous amount of money generated by having as many people as possible on the roads is more important to the powers-that-be than a few thousand lives each year.

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Originally posted by Tony Lockhart:
I was agreeing with you!!
Tony

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See what I mean?

Whend by brain is snod free I'll comb back here and loog ad all da rubbish I've wridden.

Cough.

Hi Steve,

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Although speed is obviously a factor here or the vehicle wouldn't be moving, flattening bollards isn't speeding it's bad driving.

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I echo what someone else put here that speeding is bad driving. If you cannot control the car sufficiantly to keep it within the limit (and it is the limit - we don't actually have to go that fast if the roads/conditions dictate) then that is a due care.

For what Its worth If speed camera's etc result in one less fatality or serious injury because they make someone slow down then I'm all for it.
In the past i have had to deal with the victims of crashes due to speeding/bad driving so I'm admittedly biased in this area....

...accidents (which by definition must involve an impact of some description) arise through a combination of circumstances. Speed and direction of one's own vehicle are the only two parameters involved that each individual driver has control of.

If you're going slowly and you steer wrong, you'll still hit something.

If you're going too quickly, but you steer correctly on a nanosecond by nanosecond basis, you can avoid an impact.

The faster you go, the more difficult it is to steer correctly for the circumstances which may arise in the next nanosecond.

I find it astonishing that so many people are so hell-bent on making life so bloody difficult for themselves.

Best;

Mark

...I would strongly favour two particular innovations:

1. A minimum speed limit on motorways, which varied according to conditions. This is well within current technology and would reduce the domino effect of trucks successively pulling out to pass the 35mph vehicle. Changing lanes on motorways seems to be where many problems start.

2. The French idea of having a dashed line border on the hard shoulder. The dashes are long, and you keep two dashes visible between vehicles.

Of course, neither of these will produce revenue.

Best;

Mark

PS,
There is no such thing as a road traffic 'accident'...
They are all collisions to which there is a 'degree' of blameworthiness...
even the losing control on a slippery road surface (ice) can be controlled by reducing speed - driving more carefully.

Just ask the legal dept in any insurance company....

I have to say that the variable speed limits on the M25 have inproved traffic flow. Back in the 80s it seemed to be 100mph or stop. Course, it still gets clogged up but what used to be a stressful and frustrating 15 miles can now frequently be done on cruise, even at the intersections.

Each to their own, but I'm a great believer in leaving a generous gap. Some people don't like the waste of road space, but it gives you plenty of time and means the lunatics have space to weave into, rather than hitting you or cutting you up. The main reason I do it is that it cuts own on stone chips. Yes it does. Try it.

Cheers

harry

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2. The French idea of having a dashed line border on the hard shoulder. The dashes are long, and you keep two dashes visible between vehicles.

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The dashed line border pre-dates their current safe distance-keeping function.

The only sure way to meaure your safe distance in relation to a vehicle in front is to measure the time elapsed between said vehicle and you passing a given point. The time should be greater than two seconds.

Deux traits is ok at 130 km/h but it needs to be more at speeds greater than that, and only un trait would suffice if you were only doing 65 km/h.



Regards,

Steve.

"Only a fool breaks the two second rule"

On the defensive driving course I went on - I was told to mutter the above when the car in front went past an object on the ground and to make sure that I did not go past the same object before I had finished muttering the mantra (which takes about 2 seconds)

and if the car behind you gets close then you are to open up the gap in front of you to include the braking distance of the car that is tailgating you.

Unfortunately tailgaters do not understand braking distances.

Derek

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