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All we need now is the courts to punish them. Hmmm....
However, its a fact that motorway limits were set 40 years ago. Time and technology moves on. Perhaps those boards which display variable limits on motorways could be adapted and used to display 80 or 90 limits on dry uncongested roads, and 40 or 50 when the conditions are dangerous.
Besides, its inappropriate speed which kills, not the act of going fast, but in the wrong place or under the wrong conditions.
I do also agree with an earlier point about cameras and the Orwellian aspect of them. Someone has suggested putting GPS on cars, yet more spying, but you'd probably think we should put a microchip in everyones head at birth and record their every action. Someone else said about if you don't like it then leave the country, thats what they said to Nelson Mandela.
How can speed cameras cause accidents?
The camera is always there.. the fact that road users brake sharply when they see a camera proves that they know they are breaking the law. Replacing the camera with a police vehicle would have the same effect.. would that mean that the police vehicle was the cause of a crash !!
There is no argument !! if you speed and you're caught... tough. Pay the fine & get up earlier
The speed cameras at Wyley on the A303 cause accidents for LEGAL speed traffic because some drivers instinctively brake when the see a camera.
I use that bit of road frequently, and the traffic is flowing along nicely until you get close to the cameras, then there is a tail back cause by the grockels going to/coming back from holiday when the see an unexpected camera.
Sometimes in heavy period the traffic come to a complete halt and there is a mile tail back.
I've been in a stream of traffic doing 55 (in a 60 limit) when somebody has panic braked and 4 cars were involved in a nose to tail shunt.
It was lucky then none of the cars ended up crossing the white line and hitting on coming traffic.
On a couple of other occasions I've seen the remains of such incidents.
You can argue that they are driving too close. True.
You can argue that they should be aware of their speed. True.
But never the less this pair of cameras DO cause accidents
On this section of road I usually give the car in front anout 10 spaces if the traffic is heavy.
If every car had GPS how can you inforce the speed limit where (you instance) a dual carrige way (70 limit) has a bridge over it with a road subject to 30 limit?.
What about my farm track? can I still do 100 down it?
Matthew Child - u say that the GPS system is an invasion of privacy? Bet you would have said the same thing a few years ago before Ken Livingstone put up hundreds of cameras in central london recording the movement of every car. Its only a matter of time....
I don't care about Ken Livingstone and the congestion charge, most of us in this country don't live or work in London, yet we've bombarded with crap about it for months.
Perhaps we should bombard those of you in London with our objections to the one way system in Perth?
I won't get into an argument with you over DNA databases and GPS tracking, the Orwellian nature of your comments betray the fact that you have no idea of the dangers that such systems pose. For example we are already seeing insurance companies trying to get their hands on peoples DNA to see if they are prone to various genetic disorders or diseases later in life.
Secondly i wouldn't want to live in a world where crime is impossible because such a society would be totalitarian and not worth living in. We should be striving for a society where crime doesn't occur not because it can't but because the citizens have to wish to offend. How we get there of course is open to debate.
Ed M - I am completely aware of the content of the advanced motorists course, and also fully aware that people are not programmable robots. ie, just passing the course does not mean that every time you get in a car for the rest of your life you will drive with due care, or fully alert. The fact that some people were mentioning that they had their advanced motorists cert. and implying that they were therefore more able than others to 'know their own limits' is just naive, and slightly worrying.
I also disagree with the argument people are using that because car technology has moved on since the 50's so should the speed limit laws - errr a human body hit by a car going at 40mph in 1950 would have been damaged as much as a human body hit at 40mph in 2003. just think for crying out loud. And yes, maybe in another 50 years when most cars have abs as standard, along with airbags, impact bars etc. then motorway limits should be reconsidered, but while there are cars on the road that don't, then it would be stupid. There will always be an idiot in a powerful car who takes out someone not so well protected who was driving safely. and it is precisely because of those idiots that these laws are here. EVERYONE knows the majority of people are safe, sensible most of the time, and have no intention of being involved in an accident, but those rules protect us from the stupid stupid minority.
Orwellian?? Its happening already matt, I'm just pointing out the inevitable!! Just because you don't like or don't agree with a system for various reasons that I would agree with in principle, doesn't mean it won't happen.
in my experience advanced driving puts alot of emphasis on attitudes to driving, over confidence in your own ability, do we learn from mistakes & why not, attitudes to sapeed & risk, red mist.. and overconfidence after training.
it certainly forced me to face these issues, which i wouldn't have made time to think about normally.
You suggest that we shouldn't bother fighting for our freedom and privacy because its inevitable that both things are going to be lost? Just why is it inevitable?
So we should just accept that some of us are going to be classed as genetically inferior when our DNA profiles are stored and analysed? (Remind you of the 3rd Reich perhaps?).
That we should all be subjected to surveillance wherever we go? Our actions and words recorded, scrutinised and stored away (the Stasi in East Germany perhaps?). Indeed this is already happening in the US, with their wonderfully named "patriot" act. Implying of course that if you don't support the greatest roll-back of freedom in the history of the USA you are somehow unpatriotic.
Maybe i'm going over the top but the above are just some of the end results of the society you are advocating. Nothing is ineveitable, i'm proud to live in a society which for now is still one of the most tolerant and free in the world. However, we will only keep it that way by continuing to dissent when our freedom is under threat. The state should always be a servant, never a master.
I don't doubt you mean well, but a wise man once said "the path to hell is paved with good intentions".
Oh, and on London, well something had to be done about the traffic. City centres are for people not cars.
Freedom, perhaps, but at what price?
The M45 off The M1 and towards Coventry is officially the second safest stretch of road in Britain. Yet the road is nothing less than a dragstrip for many, with cars regularly doing 110mph plus. Again the question of speed is down to the surroundings - the M45 is long and straight with very cars few cars using it at any time of the day.
Just a few miles up the road on the A45 is a string of safety cameras (Which Top Gear once declared the most sneakily placed they knew until they yellowed them). What always happens is that cars travelling at respectable distance apart will break upto the slowest moving and run bumper to bumper and side by side. In my two years of driving on this stretch of road I have seen many accidents or near accidents in this stretch of road and with cars braking for the second or third cameras and causing a chain reaction. Also with cars running side by side at 50 mph constantly in your blind spot, you need to be far more aware of what's going around. It reminds me of restrictor plate racing in the American NASCAR series, except without the spotters telling you what cars are around you.
Why don't we have seasonal /time related speed limits - especially for motorways? I cannot see how doing 70mph on the M1 at rushour less than 10 feet behind another car is less dangerous than doing 100mph on a deserted stretch of motorway in good conditions at 3am.
Finally, I am all for low 20/30 mph limits in built up areas, but one thing that bothers me is that if you apply strict liability (i,e. max 3mph/ 10% tolereance) then surely a driver will spend more time looking at their speedo than on the road in front of them. IMO a driver oscillating at between 30/35 mph is safer than a driver constantly looking at the speedo doing 30mph.
Unless of course we all have F1 style speed limiters fitted....
If there is, then how should you view it if the motorist accidentally injures some one, rather than deliberately as a mugger does?
Not that I advocate being run over, but you stand a much better chance of surviving the impact with a modern car than a 30 year old car with both doing 40 mph.
Legislation has made sure that cars are much less damaging to pedestrians than they used to be. (I build kit cars and the rules are much more stringent than even 5 years ago).
Modern cars have much improved braking distances, so, provided the driver had started to react, the modern car will slow down much more rapidly.
RR:
The government wants to introduce compulsory identity cards to make sure that troublemakers (and those nasty aslym seekers in particular) are identified. Do you want to have to take yours with you when you go running?
MathewL CCTV is even in small town centres. We are spied on all the time!
Personally, I have little time for people who speed, as I live along country lanes populated by walkers, cyclists, runners (all me!), horse riders, small children, considerate motorists AND THE OCCASIONAL IDIOT WHO ENDANGERS ALL THE OTHERS! However motorway speed limits are clearly in need of an overhaul- 90mph at a safe stopping distance is less dangerous than 70mph on someone's bootlid.
And no, I'm not suggesting that others should do something that I'm not prepared to.. I have a clean licence as a result!
Now how about at 20mph and lower......
I beleive the facts are that the lower the speed in an accident the more survivable it would be...and no I am not prepared to take the test...... well not voluntarily anyway LOL
They are the result of the neglect of road safety by the majority of drivers on the road today.