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everyone speeds to some degree, no point being wholier than though about it.
Just keep an eye out for the cameras.
Like I said in another thread I drive like a madman and I have no points on my licence. :-)
Your not meant to speed iso its hard to moan about them being there, but calling them "saftey cameras" is daft bit.
I love the stats logic thats used to justify them....its superb...
Take a road which has an unusually high accident rate one year e.g say 6 as opposed to 3 a year normally - bury an old pair of underpants at the side of the road. Wait for next year to pass. It is overpoweringly likely that the accident rate will naturally fall back to the normal trend and resume its rate of 3 accidents per year. P
..and voila you know have scientific proof that burying your underpants as the side of the road has been responsible for a 50% reduction in accidents!
I can see your train of thought about not everyone deserving to drive.
How about this thought though - everyone who gets into a car should be aware that they are choosing to take a risk.
The human body just isn't designed to travel faster than it can run and any sort of collision at speeds above that does a lot of damage to it. We all take it for granted when we jump into our car each day, whether we are sensible, law-abiding drivers or complete lunatic speedsters.
Somebody actually did this with some underpants - or so I saw in the the paper a while back.
Anyway, take the following scenario
"I support speed cameras, the other night I got flashed and had a £60 fine and 3 points. I was lucky, I had 4 bald tyres, defective brakes, no MOT, I was drunk and I had a boot-full of stuff from some houses I had just burgled"
You get the point, more traffic cameras = less traffic police stopping vehicles etc etc
And I know that Police get a cut of the camera cake, but this only means Govt can reign back in its spending.
Anyway I said "less traffic police stopping vehicles" not less police.
Even if we have more police, we also have more paperwork and more desk jockeys and middle managers within the service so it actually means less policing.
Anyway, what about mobile phones in the car, I hate them. This morning I was cut up by a motorist on a phone and consequently I dropped my shaver in to my cornflakes. After this happened I had no idea where I was on my Dictaphone and had to start again.
I guess any industry has paperwork and civvies working for them, but I know of 4 or 5 police peeps and only one civvie police admin person - so in my very small poll - that seems pretty decent.
Mobile phones are a nuisance - wonder if they can invent a camera to spot those ?
They recently resurfaced an A road near to Stratford. With safety clearly in mind they repainted the graduation marks by the camera some 2-3 months before repainting the lines showing the centre and adges of the road. Safety partnership my *rse.
I still stand by what I said earlier. Especially in towns, the limits need to be enforced.
1. Well officer, you must have been going faster than I was, because you caught up with me, so don't have a go at me about speeding.
2. I didn't notice how fast I was going. I was too busy supping out of this bottle of Jack Daniels.
3. What do you mean blow in to this bag? I've just thrown her out.
4. Why do you want me to accompany you to the police station, don't you know the way?
5. You can't take my licence off me, I aint got one!
6. I haven't had a c*nt all day drinkstable, or should that be a drink all day constable.
And finally one thing you can say to the local constabulary.
Police Officer:- "Anything you say will be taken down, and may be used as evidence."
Motorist:- "Ouch Constable, stop hitting me!"
I agree about enforcement in built up areas - in all seriousness, I'm very careful and law abiding in 30/40/50 limits, also in motorway traffic works. Mobile phones bug me too, I drive about 35k a year and sometimes the car resembles a mobile office but I've got a handsfree kit so why can't every one else buy one and use it?! If I'm in a hire car and don't have handsfree, then I don't answer the phone.
When they make cars that have speed limiters that restrict the top end speed in built up areas it may stop a lot of the problems.
Its people using the wrong lanes on motorways that realy gets up my nose.
"im doing 70 so i can sit in the second lane and not move" Even if lane one is empty.
God its hard being perfect...
when? thats easy peasy to do now.
manufacturers will only do it if theres a demand, which there isn't... or if the government/EU legislates for it.. and what government who wants to stay in power beyond the next election is going to legislate for it?!
I reckon the biggest change will come about from digital photo technology getting cheaper and cheaper in price. Eventually every lamppost will contain a speed camera, liked to a central database. It will be possible to lose your licence on a trip to the local newsagent.
AND they can introduce this incrementally, avoiding the general election meltdown...
They'll put speed cameras on every lampost and then they'll put cameras to watch the cameras in case they get vandalised (they already do that in some places).
Not sure they will put cameras on every lampost to catch the muggers & rapists & drug dealers though. Personally I think all people should be bar-coded on the forehead at birth, that way they could put readers all over the place and know exactly where everyone is!
which is technically illegal at present isnt it?
Bar-codes not needed. Facial recognition technology can already do this.
There is a camera outide East Ham station which checks every person coming out against a CD rom database of wanted persons, supplied by the police each month. If a wanted person is spotted by the camera it sounds an alarm in the Council CCTV control room and they can track the person's movements and inform the police. This has been going for at least the last 5 years. I don't know where else they are in use, but I've seen this one myself.
outside
Tell that to the CIA. I am sure they are watching me. They know where I keep my jelly babies. Keep them away! Keep them away!
Newham Council
Tracking of mobile phones isn't quite as accurate as 'they' would like you to believe. It can get your position down to being within a certain 'cell' or micro-cell but it can't determine if you are 'in the back alley behind number 53' in some cases cells can occupy several square miles. There are so-called experts who claim they can do exactly this and track you to within a few feet but, in my professional opinion, these guys are sharlatans, the methods they use are subject to too many variables beyond their control.
Firstly, we live in a supposedly unified Europe, so why is it possible that I can (and do) legally trundle around at speeds double that national spped limit in England that would have me on the front page of the newspapers in England?
If the British government is so worried about the safety of the population why does it not make smoking illegal rather than trying to stir up a lame moral majority against speeding?
It is clear that the government (and I am not being partisan here because i believe any government would behave the same) want us to believe that it cares but is only prepared to do so under circumstances where its revenue is not materially reduced.
If the government was serious about road safety it would do the following:
1. Reduce the speed limit in urban areas to 20mph.
2. Ban Gatso and Radar detectors
3. Invest any funds generated from speeding offences solely into driver retraining and traffic calming.
If the governemt were then serious about not alienating motorists it would:
1. Remove cynically situated speed camera's.
2. For minor offences (say less than 20% over the posted limited) levy a fine only rather than a fine plus points.
3. For minor (but not serious offences) offer points or retraining at the drivers own expense.
As this will never happen I suggest you all visit Germany once a year and get your fast driving out of your system (and boost our tourist income).
But my observation was that where there was a speed limit in force, everyone was exceeding it, even in the atrocious weather. A bit like the UK!
I also think that if the government in the UK increased the speed limit dramatically there would be an immediate increase in accidents while people became accustomed to driving faster than they have been in the past.
What have you been up to anway. Not heard from your for a long long time. Still cycling as much or have you been able to start running again?
Unfortunately struggling with injury! The injury that kept me out during 2003 and 2004 finally started getting better towards the end of 2004, then I had a back injury and now another (as yet undiagnosed) knee injury which is also keeping me away from cycling (aaaagggh!). Currently keeping fit with rowing (concept 2) and weight training. Did some MTB marathons in 2004 and would like to do some this year if I can shake of the injury. Have found that I can run two days a week which is enough possibly for a duathlon.
What about yourself?
There are definitely restricted parts of the autobahn (in fact a lot) and German motorways are very bad when visibility is poor (no cats eyes). Camera's are less common here (mainly at road works) and generally there are no points if you are less than 20 kmh over the limit. Where did you pick the car up from?
You are of course right that the big difference between the UK and Germany is that because average speeds are so much higher that people tend to have a better appreciation of speed and therefore will not pull into the overtaking lane without first making bloody sure that nothing is coming.
I have driven legally (late at night on an empty four lane motorway) at 175 mph (not for a long distance) and what annoys me is that the EEC can legislate on the straightness of bananas and whether chocolate can be called chocolate but that can't seem to get any consistency in important things.............not that I am advocating imposing speed limits in Germany!
Would this account for making up numbers for the end of the month? Bit like car sales, end of the month approaches and you get a deal. End of the month approaches and you get a Kojak with a Kodak?