Safe Speed Forums

Oh, the Dutch "everyone all together, nice and safe" experiment!

http://blog.hemmings.com/index.php/2006 ... reet-jump/

Used to take you to a video of someone driving through one of these areas in Holland. But the owner of the video has had it removed.

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www.thatsnews.org.uk / www.thatsnews.blogspot.com / http://thatsmotoring.blogspot.com/

There's no such thing as luck - unless you're interacting with another vehicle the speed you can go round a corner at is all physics and chemistry. And given she doesn't seem to have been much of a driver I'd suggest a driver with track experience could negotiate that bend a lot faster (with the road closed )

Barkstar

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The difference between intelligence and stupidity is that intelligence has limits.

Handy - everyone does hover over from time to time. Not even the scammers prosecute at "zero" - they all allow for a flux of around 10% -ish. We have proesectued for "careless" when NOT speeding in the past.

That's where "discretion or professional judgement" comes into "play" so to speak.

But a red light and texting or just the act of picking up the phone to read a message is very much "absolute and deliberate".

Going marginally above the lolly? They may have gradually crept up .. missed a sign for some reason.. may even have had an average speed over the distance of "generally compliant". Um.. that's why we do follow - we do use the unmarked here as well as our high-viz fleet.

It's about common sense and if we zapped the blippers - as once happened to me years ago on the M1 (I was still on that learnng curve ! Pulled a guy at just 77 mph. Whilst I was having a word - 4 cars shot by at 90 mph. I decided to leave the guy with a "Now just you be careful" and went off on wild goose chase after them. Had not a hope of catching them really ).


So you target the stupid and obviously unsafe first To go after the marginal fluctuator blip - you can usually spot these.
Their speed will be generally compliant overall - but sometimes some of these do benefit from a quick tug and a cosy little chat there and then.

A cam does not have this power. I think the "I never speed brigade" mostly fall victim to PC Gatso based on FOI on average ages of attendances to Speed Aware The tricky ones are the ones who slow for the cma and speed up again. Was why my old guv would not have 'em! to old guv!

So that's why you can afford some discretion on the "speed" issue. Traffic lights are different. You can see in the distance. Not hidden by bus stops You know the rules on these are concrete.

We will and prosecute cyclists, bikers, and drivers who disobey traffic lights in this area without any "discretion" allowed. The rest of the drive is normally judged on what was observed and how dangerous in regard to any other road user.. and we may well prosecute the inconsiderate slowster just as much as we hammer the blatter. But we also apply a fair margin of tolerance and a high standard of professional judgement.

Must be doing something right as whilst we have the odd fluctuate - we still keep steadily below the average. But it's swings and roiundabouts as Wildy has posted up that Switzerland kept a steady reduction 2004-2006 and then had a fairly sharp rise in 2007 which they attribute to a rise in unlicenced drivers.

Texting? Only a fool would be fiddling around on these tiny phones whilst driving. She would have been in big trouble here without hitting anything or anyone.

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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.

Ah, so she could have done this with her eyes shut then.

You are clutching at straws! Take a look at the picture....

One dual carriageway joining a three lane road at an acute angle, with a left curve leading into the joined road. At a busy time of morning, in low light.
Interestingly there is a white car over the stop line, despite the presence of other vehicles proceeding through the junction!


If anyone was in such a rush that they jeopardised anybody's safety because they thought their time was more important than everybody elses, then you have to include the cyclist who jumped the red light.

The court did not prove that the driver was doing 45mph - Mr Jenkins suggested that she was - and she admitted she was over the limit. She did NOT admit to being on the phone, and the prosecution certainly dont seem to have proved this beyond all reasonable doubt.

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Time to take responsibility for our actions.. and don't be afraid of speaking out!

OK


Load up Google News. Choose Sweden.. Denmark and Sweden in the country field


Then type in cycling accident.. or road accident.

Tis really amazing how MANY they do have in that "utopian state". Sweden was the only country which had reduced incidents. Like Switzerland - it's seeing a sudden upsurge in the stats.

France does seem to still be doing well though. But they tightened the initial training and whilst they have invested in "le scam" and have a few protest groups who are yanking up cams by their roots - per another Google sortie as advised by the - they did increase police as well. Unfortunately - these police - according to Wildy seem to go after all foreigners - with UK or German or Swiss reg plates


Meanwhile .. UK is still falling down the charts to land currently in 7 th ranking from the "top poll position"

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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.

Ah.. the long hours culture.

Perhaps a little leeway from bosses and so long as employee makes up time lost on way into work? Or more flexi-hours given our "global economy"


Or simply get up 5- 10 minutes earlier

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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.

Cannot prove the speed - other than that she admitted she was over the speed limit. How much over? She probably could not recall as she was not looking ahead.. not looking at her speedo .. but was looking at the text on the phone. As the pointed out - you travel 16 yards or so per second at 30 mph. It's still a distance if you are reading a phone message in that second I suspect she had eased off whilst looking at this. We seem to find our "customers" are not speeding at the time glued to the phone. if "texting" because this requires looking at what they are tapping .. . but they are still very, very dangerous. It's the act which makes the standard dangerous. Be warned.. we do try to go for the more serious charge if there is a collision and blot on our stats.

It's the act of reading the text, picking up the phone to read it, which would constitute the offence in real terms. We've prosecuted for that here. Luckily no incident. Astute cop was on the ball and driver admitted when pulled. Ok - so we do issue the normal fixed penalty - but we always do include over it ... Part of the job has to be to try to make sure the person understands why they got done for the offence - politely on the spot.

Yep.. we do get the classics of "go catch real criminals"

But by and large - we don't get the same wafts of resentment as felt elsewhere in the country.

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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.

Hang on, how can reading a text message be classed as an interactive communication function? It is simply pulling data out of memory and displaying it on screen. No radio waves involved...

Even sending one is arguably just queueing it ready to be sent. If you put the phone down fast enough the radio part will happen when you're not holding it.

Reading a text message while driving is something you can practice doing, just like reading RDS information or reading a GPS/map. But then I do have a phone I don't need to hold in order to read the screen.

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Andrew.

So that is a photograph of the road concerned?

What the hell was a cyclist doing on that bloody road? Especially dressed in dark clothing? Cycling through a red light??

Ye Gods!!!

I mean... surely you'd have to have death wish to... even attempt such a dangerous manoeuvre? I... God! It made me shudder just to think of it!

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www.thatsnews.org.uk / www.thatsnews.blogspot.com / http://thatsmotoring.blogspot.com/

But she probably did have a phone which required handling. That's why they had enough evidence to put to test in court for the case against. I am not certain it was actually proven based solely on the press report. There may be something we do not know about.


But these phones have a small screen and you still have to look down to say "yes" to viewing. The act of having it in her hand would be enough for a prosecution to stick. It's been in the courts already.

Looking back at the photo.. was she in the filter lane or heading straight on.. where the "ahead arrows" are. There's quite a distance for that cyclist to travel after passing the red light and out of her vision there... He'd be at say 20 mph if seasoned by then.

Cyclist then made a daft decision. Look at the car lengths and the gaps between before he reached the crossing where the white car intending to go straight on is. It's some distance. There are bushes too. Possibly she accelerated to "get the green light"

He was per the article "three quarters of way across".. so I'd bet she was straight on and not joining from the filter lane. If she was joining from the filter when she hit - cyclist must have pedalled at some take off speed to get to that point if he had stopped and then decided to go.

Depends exactly when she looked at the phone message or even texted back before she came into conflict.

She may have a ground for appeal and perhaps her defence may be looking at this for her.

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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.

Hmmm. weepej mate. Anton says it's fairly free flowing.

You say people would be diving for space.

Not really safe enough to ride through on red given it's a very wide junction. I base that on the safe distance between the three lanes of traffic flowing through at presumably 30 mph from the photo. The photo shows one white vehicle stopped in a two lane ahead only. In a rush hour situation - this would be flowing with normal traffic as well.

So the cyclist did make a very unwise and illegal decision given he had stopped allegedly .. then set off whilst still on the red signal. She had perhaps read a text message which in her mind is not the same as "using or sending a message" and very likely accelerated to "get the green" as drivers do. A wise road user at any set of traffic signals and especially a wide crossing like this one.. would know this.

had he approached from the ahead only two laner across the three lanes - we are still talking of a long junction and to reach say the point of the little blue car in L1 - he'd still have to have pedalled at some seasoned rate given the average timer of traffic lights. The angle of the road would have perhaps obscured him .. along with dark clothing and lighting.

Woman is pehaps unlucky because whilst her speed cannot be proven absolutely - there was evidence of use of the phone shortly before hand. Her defence should really have argued when.. at what point did she use this phone and whether or not the act of using the phone led to the accident. Under the circumstances - I think wrong to send to prison. Fine and points or short ban would serve justice. This will not please the cylcist's family - but two wrongs do not make a right. The sooner we stop messing around and creeping around on false political correctness and just accept that each action out there requires responsibility for own self as well as others . the better. It applies to cyclists jumping red lights just as much as the driver accelerating to get a green light - even if daft enough to text or read a text at the time

_________________
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.

sending people to prison should be for pre-meditated acts of negligence. Such as drink driving, totaly unsafe motor, street racing, severe overloading and texting. In this case I am far from convinced that "beyond reasonable doubt" has been proved.

There is another element that should be concidered before sending people to prison. Ther was the fact that the cyclist had at least 50% blame in his demise. It is not like he was innocently standing at a bus stop.

I think that road should be cycle free. There are a number of flyovers and slip roads that leave a cycle very exposed for a long time. However cyclists I know say that the cycle route is too slow with too many giveway points.

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Speed limit sign radio interview. TV Snap Unhappy
“It has never been the rule in this country – I hope it never will be - that suspected criminal offences must automatically be the subject of prosecution” He added that there should be a prosecution: “wherever it appears that the offence or the circumstances of its commission is or are of such a character that a prosecution in respect thereof is required in the public interest”
This approach has been endorsed by Attorney General ever since 1951. CPS Code

You see, from that photo it frankly doesn't matter if the cyclist had jumped the light (from the left, travelling left across the picture), she simply should not have sped out into the road assuming nothing was coming.

I would (and do) always look back along the road when pulling out of there (where the white car is coming from).

Dangerous driving that resulted in the death of somebody; death by dangerous driving.

She was on a green light which had been green for a while. She thus had no reason to expect another person would have deliberately gone through on red at this point. This was not rush hour as it all suggests little traffic on road to me .. three lane road. In a rush hour all lanes would have traffic in them. He would not have taken a chance then. If he did then was was a fool.

There are two white cars. He three quarter of way across. the junction. Was he passing the filter lane or where the little blue car was as IG seem to think from the press story which say he stopped und then cycled across. If he at the filter on the three lane section - then he did not stop at all as it a LONG way from the lights und actually across the junction.

Was he on the two lane ahead only .. crossing the three-laner? Or going across the three laner und colliding with woman approaching from the two lane direction?

Either way.. that ist a long way to cross on a red on a bicycle.

This look to me as if it was a big roundabout in the past which been re-engineered drastically

She was texting allegedly either at impact or just before und accelerated to get the green light in probability balances. He had ridden through a red light which had been on red for a while per the report. He also perhaps pedalling at speed given how far he got. Neither looking out for traffic. If he chose to take that chance then he should have been more watchful for traffic on green light. I do not understand how he not see.. but then again a 37 year old cyclist in Aachen, Germany did not notice a big fire engine when he rode in front of it.. last week. (Aachener Zeitung)


. They both in the wrong.. und it cost one party his life und bereavement for his family und ruined the life of the driver und her family as well.

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Nicht ganz im Lot!
Ich setze mich immer wieder in die Nesseln! Der Mad Doc ist mein Mann! Und ich benutzte seinen PC!

UND OUR SMILEYS? Smile ... und the the world smiles with you.
Smiley guy seen when you read
Fine me for Safe Speed
(& other good causes..)

Greatest love & Greatest Achievements Require Greatest Risk
But if you lose the driving plan - don't lose the COAST lesson.
Me?
Je ne regrette rien!

No - if there is any chance of a surprise when you go around the corner, then luck in involved, as well as physics and chemistry. It's a mistake to hope for the best, but not prepare for the worst - driving like that does catch you out in the end.

I think that certain "confounding factors" for the improvement in France have been advantageously ignored by the camera lobby...

The recent increase in the number of speed cameras was matched with a massive crackdown on drink-driving - which used to appear to be the national pastime! I'd venture to suggest that this had more to contribute to road safety than the, increasingly vandalised, speed cameras.

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"Politicians are the same the world over... We build bridges where there aren't any rivers." - Nikita Kruschev

Placing ones self in harms way, against the law? Suicide.
Failing to employ recognised safety equipment? Suicidal
Failing to make use of a provision for a safe route for cyclists? Suicidal
If I was on a bike on a busy dual carriageway, and had just jumped the red light, I think I would be looking to see if anyone was going to run me down for being so stupid, and at the very least I might hear a car coming!

So you could view it as causing suicide by dangerous driving!

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Time to take responsibility for our actions.. and don't be afraid of speaking out!

But jailing her isn't going to make her realise what she did wrong. Mobile phone asside, MOST drivers (rightly or wrongly) don't bother looking for conflicting traffic when they have a green light - they simply assume that nothing will be there.

IMO this very valulable message has been completely lost in the 'don't use your phone whilst driving' mantra. Whilst completely correct, I suspect that even if she HADN'T been using the phone, she still would have failed to make complete and appropriate observations and he may well still have been killed.

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

incidentally.. where is the safe route ? i cant see one at the zoom level of the photo given in this thread.

CLICK HERE FOR MAP

The cycle path is between the road and rail track and is fenced both sides

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Speed limit sign radio interview. TV Snap Unhappy
“It has never been the rule in this country – I hope it never will be - that suspected criminal offences must automatically be the subject of prosecution” He added that there should be a prosecution: “wherever it appears that the offence or the circumstances of its commission is or are of such a character that a prosecution in respect thereof is required in the public interest”
This approach has been endorsed by Attorney General ever since 1951. CPS Code