Safe Speed Forums

Obviously the impact speed is a factor in injury severity, though not the only one. That bears no relation to speed beforehand, and in any event the fact that an impact has even occured invariably means that something else has already gone wrong. That something else may also be speed related, such as driving beyond the limitations of the road or vehicle. More often it will be something else.
Not quite. I'd say that your reaction times and concentration deteriorate at lower speeds unless there's still some stimulus. I think my level of concentration is about the same on urban roads doing 25-30 as it is on m-ways doing 70. Well, mostly 70. Okay, sometimes 70 Anyway, back to the point. At 30mph on an empty m-way I would expect my concentration to be less than that at 30mph on an urban road.
Now you're introducing other factors here, none of which are speed related. Firstly, if you're tired you should take a break. It's that simple. High speed, low speed, so-so speed doesn't enter into it. "Don't Drive Tired" is one slogan that I am in absolute agreement in. When tired drivers kill or injure someone it is their tiredness that is to blame, and that makes it a driver problem.
Secondly, what we might call our safety zone does get larger as speed increases, but again it is a driver responsibility to maintain it. The two-second-rule works for me, though I tend to make it two-and-a-bit in practice. If I can't get a two second gap at 70mph, the solution is simple - settle for 60mph (or whatever). Failing to make this decision would again be a failure of judgement, rather than something directly caused by my speed.
Thirdly, yes, it is harder to avoid a collision at a higher speed, but that's why you increase the gap in the first place. It's supposed to make avoiding action possible at all speeds (providing someone else doesn't enter the gap before you can react, which would of course be their fault, not yours). Again, failing to maintain that gap is failing to drive safely, and is applicable at all speeds.
Last of all, yes, at sufficiently high speeds an abupt change of direction can cause control loss. However, the solution is simply not to make abrupt steering inputs at high speed. Ah, you say, but what if the car in front suddenly stops? Well, I had a two second gap didn't I, so I still don't have to make a sudden change of direction. A sudden change of underwear possibly, but not direction. Of course, there remains the possibility that someone else will enter that safe area and some drivers may panic and then lose control and collide with someone/thing else. However, this can happen at any initial speed.
Please tell that hypothetical knackered driver to get off the bloody road.
But only if there is an impact, which usually there isn't. You've already agreed that if no collision occurs initial speed is irrelevant. What about the millions of times where a collision is avoided, and by that I'm not just talking about near misses but also the millions of drivers on the road at any given second who are doing it right. Looking at it that way we should be as worried about being struck by lightning.
At the risk of opening a can of worms myself I'd say the situation's probably not as bad as it seems. As far as aircraft are concerned we only have to look at the volume of air available for them to fly around in. Half a billion square km times 30,000ish feet seems like enough room for everyone, so I think the real problem is one of traffic control around airports and over heavily populated areas (because of course there's more airports there). I'm sure there's more to it than that, ATC computers, airline maintenance yadda yadda yadda. But covering that would mean a lot of surfing for info to cover something that is wildly off topic.
On the ground the obvious solution to overcrowding is to build a few more roads, and improve the ones we already have. On top of that let's improve public transport to the point where it's actually a realistic alternative from time to time. (Dr Beeching.....hmm ) Now I know people who would say that we're already covering the country in tarmac, but in fact there's still a lot of room left for major road building. If we simplify things a little and assume that all motorways are 3 lanes wide (i.e. about 30 meters wide) and find out the length of the network (about 3500km according to the ABD site) we get a measily 105 square km of m-ways in a country of over 244,000 square km. That's about 1/24 of one per cent. Okay, there are still problems. We can't just plonk new roads anywhere - potential routes need to be carefully planned out to avoid unnecessary damage to the countryside, plus driving through a lake would create an aquaplaning hazard . So not everywhere will be suitable, and the surveys to sort out potential routes would take a lot of time. And that doesn't even begin to consider the costs. However, potentially some traffic might be taken off minor roads, which could reduce risks to road users there. Maybe even a few minor rural routes would become obsolete and could be turned into green lanes or bridleways.
Erm, sorry all. I've gone off topic and into a game of fantasy transport network here. I had a point somewhere but I can't remember where I put it.

I have been reading and writing to forums for quite some time that have been triggered by this slogan and I have found that because the slogan itself is very ambiguous a great deal of debate has been initiated.

I often wonder if that slogan was specifically designed to create contention and if it was it certainly seems to have worked.

I have never seen any subject get as much debate as this one and maybe because of this debate a lot of serious thought has went into the "speed" phenomenon that would have not been considered otherwise.

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The "speed kills" slogan was bound to bring all of the self-proclaimed good drivers out of hiding and it was bound to bring up exactly the statistics battles that have ensued here and in other places.

Maybe, if these deep discussions that have come about have made better drivers of all of us then the "speed kills" campaign has not been wasted.

When a group of people like we see in the anti-"speed kills" camp work so hard to dis-prove the statement the heat generated concentrates the minds of the protagonists on a subject that sorely needs to be studied at depth.

With all of the conditions that are wrapped around the slogan like road quality, lighting & weather conditions, vehicle maintenance, traffic congestion, driver failure, ( a possible multitude of flaws here ), and finally, the application of the driver's right foot, we must admit that it takes all of these conditions together to decide whether it was the speed segment that killed or maybe it was fate or simply divine intervention that did the dirty deed ?

One thing is sure: Your car will not kill anyone when it is standing still, ( not unless you put a hose from the exhaust to the window of course ).

One other thing is sure: This subject will create heat wherever it is raised on and off the internet and maybe there is only one subject that is more contentious than road safety and the "speed kills" slogan. That, of course, would be Racism....but that is for another forum and another time.

_________________
Regards

Papaumau

http://www.rip-off.co.uk/index1.htm
http://www.network54.com/hide/forum/100558

Or park it in lane 3 of a motorway, or when it falls off the jack, or after an emergency stop, and probably another ten I can't be bothered to think of.

The very idea that "movement is speed and speed is dangerous" is dangerous in itself. The greatest danger is that we risk getting distracted from real road dangers. Then WALLOP! we've crashed because we were paying attention to the WRONG safety factor.

Won't you PLEASE look at the simple unambiguous statistics I quoted yesterday and see for yourself that there are nowhere near enough high severity accidents for normal motorists exceeding a speed limit to be a factor?

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Papamau

Speed kills. Well - agreed - but only if COAST is not applied. If you are applying COAST - speed per se tends to drop out of the equation - because you have noted the hazard and modified your driving to address the situation and zeroise the hazard. This is why we argue for tighter L-Test, a driver assessment and medical every 5 years, and the re-test should be applied if the person's assessment shows this to be only remedy. (Well - you have to go a bit softly and gently if you want to sell the idea to some of the dross which admittedly are part of our current driving conditions!) We also want to see better overall training for all road users: fines for j-walking and careless cycling would also work wonders in reducing accidents. But Papamau - you have already heard this from us anyway.

You say the car will not kill anyone if whilst stationary. The A&E member of this family had one death in which this tragically happened. The toddler ran into the car in the driveway and hit her head against the vehicle. The impact was sufficient to kill her - as her skull bone was still forming.

You say speed kills and the speed determines the severity of the outcome. Well - cannot and will not deny this outright. But slow speeds also kill. Have treated people hit by speeds as low as 5mph. Depends on the point of impact and whether a vital organ was damaged at time of impact. My cousin (by marriage) was killed outright when articulated truckwith dodgy everything collided with his car after ploughing through central reservation. Vehicle struck him at lowish impact speed He was killed instantly as large vehicle hit smaller car head on. Wife survived crunch at 80mph, and is now "good as new" (Will not deny that she and I went through hell for long time - but she survived!)


But bottom line - driver error (zero or little use of COAST, MSM, PSL and POWER) causes the accidents. The money generated by fines should not be re-invested in more money making machines, but into proper driver training, prime time driver education adverts (like we used to see each commercial break), Green Cross Code, Compulsory Cycling and Horse Riding Proficiency Tests, greater trafpol presence, Smiley Sids, with scameras sited only at known, well-audited danger spots! That is way forward! Simple really!

I'm curious. Given your own admission that the slogan is ambiguous, why did you start this thread by stating you supported it? What exactly do you support?

The main problem I have with "Speed Kills" is that, simply put, it doesn't. I'm safer on a motorway than I am an an urban A road. My speed isn't a factor. I can quite honestly say that I have broken a speed limit every single time I've driven my car, be it 45mph in a 40 limit late in the evening or 80mph on a motorway. I have not had a single collision in 13 years of driving, and the only near misses I've had have been in heavily built up areas and have primarily involved people turning right across me, jumping lights and so on. In those instances, my observation and anticipation have helped me avoid impact. My speed had nothing to do with it. Inattention kills. Bad observation kills.

Recent DfT research (contained within the Safespeed site proper) shows that very few speed related collisions take place above the posted limit. What benefit can a camera have at all in those circumstances? None whatsoever. That is what is so annoying about the whole Speed Kills mantra and camera enforcement policy. The camera partnerships crow about accident being reduced at camera sites, yet take no time to conduct traffic level studies. Many roads with cameras in my area are simply avoided, hence less traffic, less hazards and less collisions. All the camera succeeds in doing is pushing traffic on to less suitable roads. How can you explain the increased fatality rates in so many pro camera counties? Fatality rates are on the increase, DESPITE cameras, DESPITE vastly improved vehicle safety. What on earth is causing these accidents? Has our overall driving standard plunged in the last decade?

I can offer no immediate proof to back this up, but I am of the belief that the MORE you emphasise danger, the LESS attention people pay to the warnings. Everywhere I go I see cameras, THINK! slogans, traffic calming, warning signs, speed limit reductions and so on. The warnings have ceased to be the exception and have become the rule, and consequently have lost all their impact. We're so bombarded with statistics and assurances that cameras are "only in blackspots" that a lack of a cameras is perceived as indication that the road is safe, so we over compensate and put our toe down...

Serious offences such as drink driving, uninsured, untaxed and unlicenced driving are on the increase as, simply put, an over reliance on single issue road safety enforcement has reduced the number of genuine traffic police. A speed camera can't detect a suspicious car, follow it and pull it over if necessary. A camera doesn't have "gut feelings" based on years of active traffic policing. It doesn't have hunches, it just sits there dishing out penalties to Joe Public, doing what will soon become irreversible damage to police/public relations and letting the real dangers on our roads carry on without fear of detection. Who cares about speed cameras whilst driving a stolen car!?

Care to raise those point to anyone within the camera set up and you get accused of being a "speedophile" or even akin to a child murderer. It's lowest common denominator single issue emotive drivel.

Just because I am anti cameras it does not follow that I'm anti road safety, which is the connection some of the more zealous road safety lobbyists try to make. I have news for them - I don't want to crash! I look where I'm going. However, I can't pay attention to the road if I'm too busy looking out for cameras and worrying about EVERY van parked at the side of the road. Their road safety policy is reducing the attention I pay to the road. What a great idea....

I am aware that all of the "super-efficient" and blameless speeders out there gravitate to forums like this one to bask in the warmth of the common message and that is why I came here to break you all out of your slothlike state of agreement !

Although I am intelligent enough to know that the "speed kills" slogan is WIDE-OPEN to attack I feel that often these attacks become a bit incestuous on forums like this that hold the "anti" line in comfortable fellowship.

Often a fly in the soup is a good thing and often one small fly can cause enough of a stir for people that are deeply entrenched in a single opinion to - just for a microsecond - examine their stubborn and dogmatic positions.

The standing still thing:

I knew that someone would not be able to resist the "car in the fast lane" or "the car falling off a jack" while standing still jokes, but the point is still valid. ( And you ALL know what I am talking about ).

The person that appears to be experienced in A & E work and who surprisingly illustrated the child who bumped into a stationery car and died must - if he or she stops and thinks about it - be able to think away from that sad occasion and think about the normal day in the ER.

If he or she does this he or she will maybe remember the injuries that have been presented to him or her after stored kinetic energy has been released into the body of each of these victims. Maybe too he or she will remember just how severe the injuries were when the patients resulted from high-speed collisions as opposed to low-speed collisions.

I find it amazing just how far all of you law-breaking and lead-footed speeders will go to justify your need for speed.

I have come to believe that there is not a type of person that is as intransigent in opinion as a full-of-confidence speedster in a powerful car or a very heavy pantechnicon, as, in their own minds they are always justified in doing what THEY deem to be the safe thing on our dangerous and congested roadways.

It is maybe a good thing that the speed-freaks of this world are NOT responsible for making the laws, because if this was the situation the presently dangerous roads of Britain would just be mayhem, carnage and anarchy.

_________________
Regards

Papaumau

http://www.rip-off.co.uk/index1.htm
http://www.network54.com/hide/forum/100558

Ah! But you are still seeing speed as sole cause of the accident. It becomes part of the equation if driver drives without COAST. When COAST is applied - accident is usually avoided. I admit I break the odd speed limit, admit that I save my madder moments for track days and little jaunts to Germany to visit the some of the wife's family over there!

My A&E colleagues do not see that many high speed casualties - the ones they do see as result of high speeds are usually boy racers, joyriders, and too many of these test positive for illegal substances. Leaving out domestics, DIY, gardening and those who use A&E as substitute GP surgery , the incoming RTAs, according to my colleagues' comments, appear to be occurring at low speeds. We have no real ideas as to why. Are these people not concentrating? These A&E people have heard comments such as "Only took my eyes off road for second to check my speed" . Perhaps they did! Perhaps they are just saying this as defence mechanism to make sense of accident. Who can really say for sure! What is even more staggering is the non-wearing of seatbelts at low speeds, the faffing around with car stereos and swigging water whilst driving at 30mph. (We really annoyed someone posting elsewhere as "Annoyed Motorist" who claimed he did this because it was "boring to drive so slow and it did not require as much concentration!" (His words!)) But perhaps this is part of reason why we are seeing more serious accidents and injuries occurring at lower speeds? People lulled into false sense of security. Driving slowly means you cannot kill or injure someone - according to you - right?

Injuries? A lot depends on the actual circumstances of each accident and sometimes the impact speed does not necessarily lead to severe injuries. One case in paper - January. BiB in (think it was Astra?) was hit at 80mph. He was wearing seat belt. Impact caused him to exit through rear window of his car. He received back injury and was off work for few weeks. Despite the high impact - he was admittedly very lucky. The newspaper story was on the PH site last in January.

Personal experience - My cousin-in-law was killed when lorry at low impact speed crashed into him. It was messy! Wife received some appalling injuries when vehicle ploughed into her stationary car at very high speed of 80mph - but she survived and lives her life in fast lane - and drives her cars at respectably high speeds (And she just about keeps legal ) Have seen a lot of accidents as more junior doc - both at high and low speeds - type of vehicle, wearing of seat belts, air bags, point of impact, actual circumstances of the crash itself, design of vehicle, general health of the victim... all these play major part in the outcome and severity of injuries. Sometimes a slight injury develops into something more serious even. Fractured leg and seepage of bone marrow into blood stream - can be fatal!

Driving at low speeds reduces accidents and KSIs - right?

WRONG! Driving with full COAST at normal speeds, not worrying about whether you have blipped just over the speed limit is far safer. Must be - as Lancs has more scams than they know what to do with - and my colleagues are complaining about the excess and increasing workload arising from RTAs in the county. And when we compare this with Co Durham and areas which enforce speed limits with more common sense - we see downward trend in RTA rates.

So it would seem that scams are less than efficient at promoting road safety and more than efficient at raising revenue!

If you wish for respect and an intelligent argument about the facts and the issues, then you are simply going to have to address the issues head on in reasoned debate.

As things stand, you're just repeating a boring and false mantra.

I am awaiting your direct response to my post of 5th May at 6:50pm.

This will be my last reply to you unless you demonstrate a willingness to debate rather than spout.

_________________
Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

And you're apparently so blinkered by your own prejudices that you cannot possibly accept that we might actually know what we're talking about.
If you're so sure of your facts, then prove it to us - mathematically.
Show us all the equations which support your contentions, and then we'll be only too happy to point out to you what you've left out.

Regards
Peter

Good luck, you'll need it.
Certainly debate from both sides is a good thing, and this forum would be a pretty boring place if people like yourself didn't throw the opposing point of view in from time to time. However, I take issue over your use of the terms "stubborn" and "dogmatic" when they can be just as easily applied to many people from your own camp. I can't speak for anyone else, but if anyone were to post to the Safe Speed challenges forums and shoot Paul Smith down in flames I would certainly reconsider. The fact is that 2 months on there's still nothing there. That suggests that the powers that be find it easier to ignore the points raised than to challenge them. Does that fit your criteria for stubborn and dogmatic? You are prepared to post here and enter into debate, though the conclusions you have come to differ from the majority here. What a shame that no-one from the DfT, TfL, BRAKE, ACPO etc has the Jerries to do the same. Stubborn and dogmatic? Pots and kettles, mate.
This seems pretty close to an ad hominem attack on those of us who admit that we speed from time to time. It is simply not good enough to say that since we have broken speed limits our thinking is faulty. You cannot falsify a rational argument by character assasination.
Speaking for myself, my need for tea and ciggies is much greater than any need for speed and I do not consider myself to be lead footed, though my car is moderately powerful. (FWIW I do worry that I could have legally driven such a car an hour after passing my test, and might well have killed myself through lack of skill and experience since it handles like a greased cat when it's wet. Different issue though.) I tend to drive well within the speed limit on urban roads for safety reasons, and to behave myself on m-ways as I'm sure the police like to stop red sports cars . I'm reluctant to claim that my driving abilities are above average, since I don't know what average is. Hopefully that might convince you that my thinking is as rational as yours .
I mentioned falsification of an argument just now, and so I'd like to bring up another point. Let's say I believe in a theory and at the time I bought into it the evidence for it is pretty good. Every time anyone has ever tested the theory it has worked and those of us who believe it to be true become more and more convinced. Then you come along with new research that finds a gaping hole in the theory that had previously been overlooked. Now I'm faced with a choice. No matter how strongly we believe it only takes one set of results that disprove it to falsify the theory. So do I accept the new evidence at face value and stop supporting the theory or do I ignore/attack you and your findings? As far as the speed debate is concerned most of those in charge are blind to any new evidence that casts even the slightest doubt on the concept of "speed kills". Anyone presenting such evidence seems to be sidelined and ignored at best, or publicly attacked at worst. To use a cliche, this is no way to run a railroad.
Couldn't agree more. That would mean including car thieves and headcases in modded hatchbacks with Max Power stickers on the windscreens and stereos in the megawatt range. It would also mean including a whole load of other people who are clearly not qualified to assess a road and set a sensible limit. Oh hang on there's already unqualified people setting limits because they work at local councils . Or worse, qualified people setting arbitrarily low limits for political reasons, when they know full well that it's not necessary from a road safety point of view. I'm not saying this is always the case. Some roads have no doubt benefited from a reduction in limit. However, many have not, and since people are less inclined to obey when the law is clearly an ass I wonder what it's all supposed to achieve.

I'd just like to add that "mathematically" isn't the only way. Logic, evidence and analysis offer worthy alternatives.

_________________
Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Papaumau writes:

"OK...then: My argument is really quite simple.... "

IMHO too simple in fact. Here is the skeleton of your argument:

1. Momentum is proportional to the square of speed.
2. More momentum = more destructive energy in potential collision. Things are quite grim in fact - double the speed and potential desctructive enery released in a collision is quadrupled (this is physics, no one argues). Moreover, as Paul Smith points out, the 'deadliness' may increase proportionally with the 4th power of speed.
3. When a collision is imminent because driver(s) failed to avoid it speed becomes the deciding factor that will determine the outcome of that particular collision. Faster = deadlier (true and no one argues).
4. Therefore, you conclude from the above that 'speed kills' is a true statement when applied to the free travelling speed in excess of the posted speed limit

Is this not an unjustified leap of faith? Have you not ignored some rather inconvenient truths like DfT's own statistics? How about the law of unintended consequences? Do you disagree that travelling at sub-optimal speed may have a detrimental effect on driver response and attitude? Could it be that this detrimental effect outweighs any gain from lowering the speed?

I don't belive that you have even began to understand what Paul Smith and others here stand for. Top marks for attempting but I suggest you start again at the beginning - Paul Smith's Mission & Policy statement.

You write:
"just how far all of you law-breaking and lead-footed speeders will go to justify your need for speed". This kind of sweeping statement is inciteful rather than helpful. Actually, more like a small minority of all 'speeders'. Most are not well informed, believe the propaganda, speed every day and feel guilty when confronted about it but nevertheless they have not slowed down despite years of 'speed kills' campaign.

One last thing, whilst a debate is healthy, a battle of opinions only is a waste of everybody's time. Why not then, out of respect for your opponent(s) offer some evidence to support your arguments.

Regards
arthurdent

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DO NOT PANIC

Quite. Although the forums are only two months old the challenges have existed for far longer. I have also offered challenges directly to "important people" in writing and have published their flawed and inadequate responses. Follow the "letters" links in the "quick navigation" section on the first page of the web site.

_________________
Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Just to point out, momentum is proportional to speed, not the square of speed! Energy is proportional to the square of speed, however.

Momentum = m * v
Kinetic Energy = 0.5 * m * v^2

_________________
-mike[F]
Caught in the rush of the crowd, lost in a wall of sound..

Quite right - i meant kinetic energy (oops)
Cheers
arthurdent

_________________
DO NOT PANIC

True, but the beauty of maths is that it's much more difficult to argue against. Logic, evidence and analysis are more open to interpretation. I could argue that white is black, and I'd be right some of the time - like when it's pitch dark. But you can't possibly argue against 1+1=2 without resorting to some fairly devious trickery, like reducing one of the terms to zero.

It has been pointed out MANY times before, ( in fact there is a famous saying to cover it ).... that "There is lies, there is damn lies and there is statistics" !

As I am NOT a mathematician and even although I can understand a lot of it I would not be as arrogant as to quote mathematics on this NON-mathematics forum. I do not and have NEVER used statistics to support my theories - as has been also pointed out - statistics can be made to support any hypothesis.

I use common sense to come to my final decisions and common sense is something that I am afraid not everybody uses when debating. In fact I find that in many cases some dogmatic stances often throw common sense out of the window.

I do agree with the "mathematics" quoter above that speed at point of contact is important when damage and injury results. THIS is my stance in fact.

I do not accept that - what is it called? - "free travelling speed" is anything that is important in this discussion at all as free travelling speed on it's own and unrelated to all of the other causes for accident is an unreal factor and a factor of wishful-thinking !

Maybe if we all had collision-avoidance pressors or inertial dampening fields then "free travelling speed" would mean something. As we don't and in fact these ideas are pure science-fiction, then this imaginary free travelling speed must be dismissed as worthless !

The only figure that I care about is the speed that the object is travelling at point of accidental contact.

This point has already been proven by the mathematics above, ( even if a slight mistake displaced the kinetic energy factor ), as the sums are in fact corrrect !

All of the rest of it is pure speculation and fancy dressing !

_________________
Regards

Papaumau

http://www.rip-off.co.uk/index1.htm
http://www.network54.com/hide/forum/100558

One last try.



Disraeli meant that statistics are open to abuse. Indeed they are. However I wouldn't dream of abusing statistics. Neither am I a liar.



You have never used statistics? So the number of folk who die on the roads each year is of no concern to you? How bizarre.



One man's common sense is sometimes another man's irrational argument. Don't just spout "common sense". Show us exactly how your opinion is sense.



Impact speed is important, so is impact frequency.



The only sort of speed that might be altered by a speed camera is free travelling speed. I have shown you scientific proof that impact speed and free travelling speed are far far apart. It follows that speed cameras only have a tiny potential to mitigate impact speed.

Unfortunately, the side effects of speed cameras comprehensively swamp this tiny potential benefit.



OK. It's worthless. Then so are speed cameras.



And presumeably the frequency of accidental contacts?

Both are the direct result of degree of driver error.



Of course it is. Thank you so much for your great insight.

_________________
Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

Who mentioned statistics? I didn't.



Mathematics and statistics are NOT the same thing. As an aside, virtually all the Government-sponsored so-called road safety research relies heavily on dodgy statistics in an attempt to prove that speed kills.



I rest my case, m'lud



Nobody's arguing with that



So what exactly is your point then? Are you saying that a free travelling speed above the speed limit is unrelated to accidents?
If so, you're contradicting yourself.
If not, then how exactly does this speed relate to the speed at the point of accidental contact?

Paul, when you set up this forum, what did you expect? That everyone who is not sold on the SS mantras would challenge the argument with incisive comment, engaging perhaps in a battle of spreadsheets?
It's an emotive subject and some folks just have a gut feeling that breaking the speed limit is wrong, if only from a 'law obeyence' angle. You could just answer this with something like..."Well I accept that you have a point of view but I have mine and will continue to pursue it". But no, you get petulant and arrogant, almost as if you insist on forcing everyone who won't see things the SS way to coming around to your way of thinking? Tell me this isn't so please.



Interesting point, particularly when one notes the arguments often offered in favour of using trafpol over Gatsos i.e. "they can use their common sense". Or do we mean, we can try to make them see our version of common sense (and let us of).