Safe Speed Forums

I'd love to see the statistics they userd for this - baring in mind the M6 carries about 120,000 cars per day, these stats could have been generated in a couple of hours on most of britains motorways. Not very representitive.

I've driven over the chevrons on the M6 and they're nothing but distracting. They distract the eye on the road and give you cause to spend time messing around counting the number of them between you and the car in front instead of paying attention to what's happening up ahead!

I would also claim that the sign posts warning of tailgating, appropriate distance and risk of prossecution if caught tailgating contribute more to reduced instances of tailgating in the chevron areas!

I can report a smoking related accident - happily the only damage was to the front of my trousers. At first, I thought that the car in front of me in the queue was on fire but then I realised that the smoke was rather closer to my face. Embarassing day at the office..

There must be smoking related accidents, however I remember reading somewhere that addicted smokers lose ability to concentrate etc when they don't get their fix.

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DO NOT PANIC

Yes, when I saw some brief examples of Ellul's ideas, I thought of McLuhan, especially the one about marching into the future backwards. We are. But that is what I have been banging on about. We have no power to resist the onward march of technology, be it good or bad. The cameras are the first major wave of feedback control technology to hit the road system and stick. You are trying to prise it off because you think it doesn't work, and I am trying to keep it there because a) I think it does work and b) its good for my line of work. Only history will tell, but, as McLuhan (and Ellul?) can attest, technology is on my side because Invention is the mother of necessities, and resistance is futile. So you are better off spending your time thinking of ways to improve the technology that removing the technology. That's the basic point I have to make.

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I stole this .sig

But of course!



If you were referred to me (or indeed any of my colleagues) - we would be running a lot of checks to work out what was wrong. Of course - robots and people from another planet may take a bit longer for us to diagnose and we would be scratching our heads trying to work out what to plug you into here! Pain ratios differ - but I would find out your pain threshold and keep the treatment for you at just above that pitch! For as long as it takes to say "Speed is cool! It is fine! I like speeding"

Seriously - once I had diagnosed - would discuss all possibles and potential risks and pain in firm but friendly terms. Build up nice working rapport with all my many patients as well. Not nice for me if they do not make it!

As for the costs - most expensive is not always the best for a patient. Medical history, all test results would be taken into account.

Have had patients who could handle bad news and others who would go to pieces (in which case I am more reticent in what I disclose. Had one who appeared overall able to take it but who went home and just died two days later - he gave up will to live. Another - I judged unable to cope with bad news and advised good holiday. He had a good holiday and a good quality of life in his last two months or so of life. I need to be able to psychoanalyse my patients as well - very quickly.) Not always that easy and a computer cannot do that!



Again - lot depends on your bio-chemistry, your genetic history, yoour pre-disposition, tolerances, medical history and attitude. Most expensive drug on market may not suit you , but all of this would be discussed at time with the individual.




Not a Luddite. Both Wildy and me use computers in our work as a TOOL!

The machine serves us - not the other way around. We work on the information computer gives us - and take the research forward from there. Which is as it should be - no over-reliance. Simply using it in same way as I would use a stethoscope etc.



Already got there! Only when I get there - I find I need to go somewhere else!




Well - they have one for teachers. Medical staff feel most unloved and left out here!



But we do have them - but we do not let them rule us! We question their findings and ask more questions. Useful tool - that is all!





True. I did French and German to 'O' Level - which only taught me how to translate prose and so on. I found I needed to speak it properly when I married Wildy (whose English is perfect) but she speaks to the kids in her own language and I need to know what is going on! Then there are those relatives of hers......In -Laws.....

I went to the Manchester branch of this institution.

Then of course - it does help me when I go to conferences in my specialism and am then able to speak to foreign docs in their own language. And it is great on holidays! And I can read foreign newspapers! Quite useful really!



Ah! More to do with lack of hygiene - and the blasted thing is resistant to anti-biotics due as you say to over-prescriptions by GPs. Has a lot to do of course with patients telling the GP their job and demanding anti-biotics for a cold when alll they need to do is stay at home in bed with chicken broth, hot toddy, whisky and the wife of course!



Er - he had left the hospital and was halfway home when he got urgent call to return as one of his patients had taken turn for worse. He was hurrying back to save a life when he pinged the scamera at below guideline which LanCASH£££££re says "never happens!"

The one with the bells on it was used by my own dad when he was a lad. It still works and never loses a second.

The battery one was purchased for me when I was a baby. Since I am now mid 40s - it does not possess one micro-chip doo-dah.

There is also a hand crafted grandfather clock which will belong to me whne my father passes away. This was carved by my great-great- great grandfather and (brag mode on) - is still 100% reliable.

Wildy has cuckoo clock - which was a christening present for her. This is also in good working order. Highly irritating - but cuckoos each quarter hour without fail!




Have never ever used a mobile whilst driving. have always pulled over to take a call - and am same with hands free stuff.




Accidents happen for variety of reasons as you are aware. Mobile Phones have contributed, but again the one handed steer and other equally dangerous practices have all increased overall - and are not corrected because speed cameras tend to replace policemen. Most of the speed offences per se which are being prosecuted tend to be of the just over blip type as opposed to the deliberate blat type. Nothing dangerous has been committed - and most of these "offences" have occurred on the safest stretches of road - just before a speed limit change - and there is one fave in Cumbria which is now on the PH site somewhere and has thread all of its own on the local Prat's forum. It makes some interesting reading! Wales also does this sort of thing. That is not road safety - that is taking the pi55 of normal law abiding people under pretext of "road safety"



My mother's view was that they had no means of selling her and others the goods she wanted - and though it was a bit more expensive - she went to the corner shop and did her shopping there instead. The corner shop made a killing tht day and funnily enough - my ma says people are still shopping there because the service was friendly and cosier.





Hmm! Come up North mate - and I will ensure the biggest syringes poss! And operation without anaesthetic! Oh -0 forgot! You are an android! You feel no pain. Hmmm! Will increase voltage then and cause you to froth a bit instead!



I did - it led to kitten number 5 in the way, and this means I am in big trouble in that delivery room come November She will call me rude names and thump me!

As for bungeeee jumping - I do not like heights! I got stuck up that mountain when computer controlling funicular train failed and it was not a nice experience at all!

Nope - track days and going to Germany! And the odd ski (without looking down on the lifts )

And golf!

Because all you do is give us the kind of soundbites and other equally vacuous statements and arguments which we've all heard ad nauseam. You have not yet put forward a single reasonable argument in support of your contention that speed is more than just a parameter. You have not convinced anybody that lower speed limits and increased enfocement are going to save even one life.
If you know of one person whose life has been saved by speed cameras, name them and explain precisely how this happened.
In short, you have not added anything constructive to the debate.

I seem to recall that I did, so you'll have to give me a graph or something to prove that. Are you a speeder? Then you have no right to share my road space, and deserve to loose your licence.



Hey, wait one cotton-picking minute here. I just want the status quo, which is to deliver more cameras and automation. It's up to you to do the convincing, not me. It's easy for you to harp negatively from the sidelines, but you don't have an answer on how to stop these fast cars zooming along the highway. I was almost clobbered head-on yesterday on the way home from work, by a guy overtaking a stream of traffic, doing about 90 in the 60 zone. It's got to stop - I don't like you speeders sharing my road space, OK.



You'll have to give me a graph or something to prove that. If you know of one person who was pinged by a camera and wasn't breaking the law, name them and explain precisely how this happened. Also, please declare whether you yourself have been pinged, so that we can see if that is why you are harping so negatively from the sidelines, instead of helping to work out teething problems as we enter the age of societal control systems. Failing that, just pipe down, and obey the limit.

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I stole this .sig

Refresh my memory. And what do I have to prove? Far easier (and more scientific) to disprove your theories. Bring them on.



Why? What good will it do, and how? These are just some of the questions you're not answering.



Why stop at cars? How do you stop fast trains from zooming along the tracks, fast planes zooming through the air, or fast planets zooming around the solar system at 66,000mph?



I quite agree. Bad driving, such as you described, has got to stop. But it's at that point where we differ. I see bad driving, whereas you just see speed.
Presumably you wouldn't have minded him clobbering you if he was only doing 60? And if you really want to be pedantic, your risk of being clobbered would have been a lot higher had he been doing 60, because he would have been on the wrong side of the road for a lot longer.



You haven't answered why cameras are there in the first place. If it's, as you'll probably say, to stop people like me from breaking the law, then you'll have to explain why the law is there in the first place. And then go on to explain exactly how it can be expected to save lives.
You might just as well have a strictly-enforced law against farting in public, then we can have a stream of 'experts' stating how bad methane is for public health and the environment. And then you can design a hi-tech fart detector, which we'll, naturally, be compelled to wear in our trousers at all times.



No, I haven't



See the fart detector above.

But we all are - we all blip just over a limit on any one journey - and no use denying you are any different - because you are still a human machine!

And even the vehicle were controlled by a gadget - slight overspeed could occur on gradients, different road surfaces and onus on checking tyre pressures, servicing would still fall on negligent and fallible humans.




We do not need more of something which is not delivering. We need BiBs, old fashioned coppers out there who can help prevent really dangerous driving.

A camera does not deter our dangerous twazaks in their throw away cars. We need to invest in real cops, trained properly. And we also need to invest in decent driver training, introduce concept of continuous assessment for new drivers, and encourage existing ones to undertake further training, or at the very least - have continuous stream of catchy adverts and tips aimed at driver improvement on all TV channels as a constant.




Yes - dangerous twazaks like that - we need to get them off the road or educated to level of skill where that simply would not happen. Are you sure he was going that fast though? It may seem faster when he appears to be aiming his car at you. Not that that makes it any more acceptable...

Perhaps high profile Smiley Sid and plenty of warning signs, even a cam if a particularly dangerous spot, may have made him rethink his strategy. (ie intelligent use of technology Hidden one? No chance! And then of course, given the sheer numptiness of the behaviour - he could have been drunk, drugged, on a prescription drug.... even unlicenced scrote....

But what about your driving? What was your field of vision? How come you did not see him until he appeared suddenly and from nowhere in this apparently and particularly bad overtake? Even at 90 mph - he does not appear from nowhere. Did he just pull out in front of you? Was there any way you could have seen potential highly dangerous hazard developing on your approach? Was this a likely place for dangerous overtake? Or even a safe overtake if a straight stretch but after a series of bends?

I just mention these things to make you think about how you could help yourself foresee numpties.


It is part of the COAST thing. Wildy was driving me home tonight. We had numpty overake on straight just after a bend. Wildy had already seen him as she had glimpsed them in the distance through a clearing and simply made sure she had enough space in case he decided to overtake just as both cars reached the straight. Perhaps we know the road anyway and are used to this occurring just at this point so we always approach with caution ... But we have to have these "defensive" skills and develop them. Pure automation and trying to improve driver skills by speed camera is not the answer.





Au contraire. Basingwerk's views are interesting and worthy of debate. If he had one bad experience, as I understand, can well see why he would not want a repetition.

Besides I like arguing the toss!



Well - as you know - have not been pinged - but travel through LanCASH£££re quite a lot. They are known for being even more draconian than Wales! Would not dream of driving through there without the useful gadget!

But do have colleague (surgeon) who was pinged at 34mph. It was in March-ish. Still being challenged. He had knocked off for the evening and was on his way home when one of his patients developed a complication and he had to return immediately to sort it out. He pinged the scamera outside the hospital itself! OK - so he has option of the course, as have several Nurses! But when you are short staffed in the first place - we cannot afford to lose these people for a day! And the speeding was not a large margin, nor was it dangerous speeding in a dangerous location. Apart from that - it was not per guidelines - and Lancs are adamant officially that they adhere to guidelines. Obviously - a significant number "slip through the net"

As of the "age of societal control systems" - we had that in GDR. My wife spent a few months in Moscow (supposedly improving her command of Russian), and a few months in Leipzig. I visited her in Leipzig - and can honestly say that I would not want any form of societal control by digital doo-dah after seeing that kind of life at first hand.

Governments change, ideals change. In the wrong hands - this becomes a very frightening concept.

Societal control systems? You may not have meant it that way, but that will sound very Orwellian to most of the public, even those who associate 1984 more with the Eurythmics than anything else.

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Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler - Einstein

BW, methinks you are having trouble separating fact from conjecture:
Fact: there are people like you who believe this, and others who do not share this view. Conjecture: you are right and the others are wrong.
These are just quotations, they prove nothing. Some of them make sense and others sound like post-modernist gobbledygook, like this one.

You are beginning to sound zealot-like to me. Your assertions appear one-dimensional and simplistic and you have consistently refused to deal with the possibility that the road traffic system may be more complex than you imagine. This is how your views come across and how you appear to justify them:
- illegal is always wrong (because .. you think so?)
- the speed camera and the self-perpetuating 'partnerships' have no negative direct or indirect effects on road safety, nor has the inevitable over-emphasis on the 'speed kills' message (because it's obvious and 'common sense'?)
- the speed camera must be accepted regardless of its usefulness (because 'we enter the age of societal control systems' and 'we have no power to resist'!)
- we mustn't complain about the accompanying oppression (because 'the law is the law' and 'cameras save lives'?)

You are in danger of boring me away. Come on, let's have some hint of evidence that supports your views instead of opinion and quotations

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PS Of course you may turn out to be right and speed cameras or tailgating cameras or some such may have a rightful place on our roads but not on the strength of evidence before us at this time. You are not arguing your case very well!

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DO NOT PANIC

As BW has a vested interest, I suggest it is pointless debating him on the virtues or otherwise of technology and it's application in road safety.

It seems his livelihood is based on just such the technological wonders he is espousing for the road network. Naturally, he will not see any potential disbenefits or even be unable to see some, perhaps, over optimistic predictions.

I have avested interest in the application of technology including in the field of Road Safety.

Technology, unfortunately, suffers from exactly the same problem as driving. There are those that are good at it and there are those who suck at it. Those who suck make it an unpleasurable experience for everyone else.

Having followed this thread from its beginning, and experienced varying degrees of interest, incredulity and boredom, it is absolutely crystal clear to me that Basingberk is either a troll or has the intellectual and analytical capacity of a gnat. Either way, there is little point (apart from self-indulgence) in attempting reasoned argument with him/her.

I would save my arguments and my time for circumstances which offer some hope of a return.

I just can’t be bothered prefixing everything with ‘in my opinion’, and ‘methinks’, and ‘it appears to be the case’ and so on.



And there you go – straight into your own trap. Fact: there are people like you who believe this sounds like post-modernist gobbledygook, and others who do not share this view. Conjecture: you are right and the others are wrong.

By your own standards, you meant to say

So there you are, Authurdent, hoist by your own petard. I’ll ignore the rest of your impertinent post for a little while, and, in case you get bored, I'll leave you to dwell on your own failings.

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I stole this .sig

Be a good chap and get back to observing, which you are good at.

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I stole this .sig

Guilty as charged, your honour! Been indulging.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Over and out!

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DO NOT PANIC

I’ll answer you and authurdent sensibly (at least I hope it’s sensible!), but I’d appreciate it if “observer” keeps his promise. For the benefit of my esteemed co-poster authurdent, most if not all of this is my opinion, and I’m only saying that once.

Anyone who knows about systems in general will know that systems can be both simple and complex at the same time. Indeed, big systems are like onions, with layer after layer of organisational complexity within, and it doesn’t get much more complex that the road system. There are many different classes of stakeholders, many of whom have requirements that are not aligned with others. The evolution of the system has been haphazard to say the least, and given the number of operational parameters that it operates under, it is inevitable that the current solution is not ideally matched to the requirements. Indeed, no-one knows for sure what the requirements are, never mind what priorities should be attached to them. We have historical precedent, haphazard guesses, some engineering background, a bunch of statistics and maths, a lot of received wisdom and a decent political system. So, systems can be complex, but simple too? Little is simpler than a series of paths that are connected.

So what is it about the road system that is broken? Well, sometimes it goes lethally wrong. Also, it gets congested and slow, its noisy and polluting, and it costs a lot of money. Of yeah, a few other things – there’s no consensus about the priorities of the problems, and nobody knows for sure how to pay for the administration and development of the system, and no lists exist of stakeholders or rules for agreeing and controlling changes to the system.

Now, if we want to break out of the system to the meta-system, some of these problems are already addressed. The fact that some people believe that it’s OK to break the limit solve their own immediate problem that they are going too slow. This creates new problems (increased danger (arguably), when and how should limits be observed – what are the rules, common sense? Also, if it is OK to break the limits, why have them at all?) People who cut down rat runs to avoid congestion solve their own problem but create new ones with noise, pollution and danger in residential streets. People who have narrow streets solve the parking problems by parking on the pavement but create new problems for pedestrians. Authorities compete to create ad hoc solutions for development and funding issues without centralised de-confliction. And this is by no means a comprehensive list of problems nor meta levels.

As these local solutions have been observed, police, government and local authorities have seen their control diminished. They take the systematic approach, put up the bumps and cameras, lights and what have you. The planners always put in measures to re-assert their control. Oftentimes, these measures themselves cause unforeseen impacts, and more measures are required to address the measures and so it goes on. Change is the only constant as competing demands for speed, low-pollution and noise, less congestion, less danger, less cost and so on are constantly traded off at the local level.

These things are best solved by gradually systematising the road system. This is because random activity is harder to control than activity that conforms to rules. So yes, this sounds very Orwellian, but the laise faire approach to engineering often does not appear to work well beyond prototypes (if you fail to plan, you plan to fail?) and leads to endless bickering later, hence the need for this site.

Now, as for authurdent’s specific questions -


That has been debated for many years, especially in the 60’s. It’s not just a political question, but a moral and philosophical one. But it certainly conflicts with totalitarian attempts to systematise. So I have to wear two hats on this one, and say that, for the purposes of this argument, breaking the limit is wrong.



This relates to my assertion that systems can be both simple and complex at the same time. Given the shear number of operating parameters, any meta-discussion on the status of the road system will be merely a simplistic boiled down message for mass consumption, unsuited for logical dissection. Speed kills is both obviously true and obviously false, depending on contextual frame of the discussion. If I hit you at 100mph, your dead meat. If I hit you at 1 mph, so what? But the speed is not in control. But what is your point? Margin, damage, reaction time, break time, recognition ability, risk of mechanic failure etc. are all impaired the faster you go, so in absolute terms, high speed is more dangerous than low speed. I know PS has this graph with the curve that stopped going down, but traffic has increased 20% since the first cameras came on line, so it is holding back the dam (OK, in my opinion, dent).



The long view of history shows that automation advances are inevitable in most industries eventually. Maybe I’m wrong this time? I guess it’s remotely possible that road traffic systems are a special case, but I doubt it. Cost constraints and service improvement usually overcome user reticence eventually. It’s just the way it goes.



I do wish you wouldn’t restrict the discussion to cameras. The reason I think this will come is because instruments automate processes. That’s part of the systematic approach – simplify by automating it down, and take a few efficiency hits in support of the bigger picture. Yes, the English (who are suspicious of any new thing) can perceive totalitarian systematisation as oppression.

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I stole this .sig

What you appear to be suggesting is an eventual system, controlled by technology where there is little if any driver input. In which case, what would be the point of having a car?

An automated public transport system would seem to be more suitable.

However, in the UK, the most advanced system we have in terms of automation of transport is the railways. Now, I'm not saying they are a death trap, but they are hardly the beacons of technological control and safety are they?

Now, would you care to hazard a guess as to the cost of all this technology? Would it cost less, the same, or more than simply returning to the values that gave us annual reductions in road casualties?

If, as you say, the road system costs too much now, how much more will it cost with all this monitoring technology in place?

Of course, your zeal for such changes is entirely in line with your job, is it not?

Handy that, isn't it?

Thanks God you are back on-line, Gas. For a minute there I thought you'd joined dent and observer. Your question reveals an interesting notion - that a car is for soemthing else other than transport. The point of a car would be to get from A to B, with the minimum anount of noise, pollution and danger in the quickest way possible while respcting other roads user's rights. What's the difference? I think the fully automatic car is way off yet. I'd be more inclided to predicte (in the near future) much more CCTV and automatic scanning for spped/tailgaing, although with biometric id card technology and self-identifying vehicles with data tranfer cabality to on-road sensors, with maybe a little sateliite data transfer and monitoring thown in for good measure.




Now your talking. They have one of those in LA, I've mentioned it before. The trains have No driver!



Sadly not, but they are a lot better than horses. I jest not. The way this CO2 problem is playing out, I fear that cars may have to go altogether.




That's a loaded question, but I do that all the time, so fair do's. Rightnow, the cameras (which are (AFAIK) the first automatic feedback loop systems on the roads) are paid for by the victims, sorry perpetrators fines.



You can rest assured that if it is not cost effective (over the long run) it won't last. History shows that.



It is always good when things line up, but I didn't expect that to happen yet, so you can't blame me. But you are right, I've been working in automation/control and computers since the 70s and I havn't spent a week on the dole in all that time.

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