Safe Speed Forums

A couple of years ago a scheme was introduced in London to reduce congestion, by using CCTV cameras to track down and fine drivers who clog box junctions.

It seems that, overall, this has actually made the congestion worse...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2217605,00.html

Not at all surprising really, anybody who thought about it properly could have predicted this happening before they spent loads of money on the camera system. It is just a shame that TfL don't appear to employ anyone with a single ounce of common sense.

Saw this on BBC1 this morning... and I'm not surprised. I only drive in London maybe twice a week on average, but that's enough to notice the change in behavior. On the one hand, blatent abuse of the boxes should result in a slap for the driver concerned, but when you know you could be fined even for just being a few inches over the box - despite it possibly not causing any disruption to the traffic flow in other directions across the junction - then you tend to be very wary about entering the box unless you're damned sure you'll clear it in time.




Don't be so quick to discredit them, there's a lot of very clever people at work there - their schemes to specifically make private car use within London increasingly unbearable, whilst making them appear to be ways of generally improving transport through the city, are the works of anti-car geniuses...

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Chris

Trying to reduce this 'result' to a simply expressed matter of principle, I'm coming towards this:

Optimal behaviour will be right at the edge of rules compliance. In the box junction case, we need to move vehicles into the box as soon as they know their exit will be clear. Excessive application of the rules means that many will leave a margin for error thus reducing throughput.

Looks like the basic principle will be extendable to other areas. I'm looking at anything it might tell us about speed limits...

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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

It even extends logically beyond legality. For example...

3 lane motorway with moderate traffic. There are road works and a two lane contraflow with a 50 limit. At the end of the roadworks there is a further restricted section where the contraflow traffic is filtered back into the correct carriageways and lanes. Eventually we are back to 3 normal lanes and can see that the road ahead is clear, and the 50 limit restriction ends in another 400 yards.

In this situation it is perfectly reasonable and in everyone's interests for the traffic to anticipate the forthcoming de-restriction and to start getting back up to cruising speed, reducing congestion and therefore increasing throughput of the bottleneck.

This is the typical behaviour we get in an unmonitored set of road works, with all the traffic fanning out and clearing before the end of the restriction.

But now introduce a SPECS system, with the last camera 50 yards from the end of restriction. What you now get is a ripple of additional congestion as people begin to spread out and speed up and then realise that this is going to take them over the average, so they brake back down to lower than the restriction in order to correct for their anticipation.

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CSCP Latin for beginners...
Ticketo ergo sum : I scam therefore I am!

I've got a feeling that there's a huge point of principle here, but I haven't quite focused in on it yet. I've got these fragments:

- social behaviour tends to be self optimising
- most people do the right thing irrespective of the rules
- rules give information to most and only usefully peanalise a small percentage
- we need to avoid negative impacts of rules on the majority and instead focus on minority sub-optimal behaviours

I've got a feeling it all boils down to once sentence.... Help!

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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

Now for some light-hearted Friday frivolity.......


What they should have said many years ago:


CAMERAS that detect speeding are increasing danger rather than improving safety, a study has found.
Motoring groups believe that increased danger is caused by drivers being distracted and relying upon the posted limit because they fear they will be fined £60.



More than 100,000 drivers have received penalties in the past two years for speeding. They were caught by speed cameras, which were introduced in London in 1993 and are installed nationwide to record minor traffic offences.

The cameras were supposed to reduce accidents but Transport for London (TfL) has now admitted that accidents have risen where the cameras were installed when effects of RTTM and bias-on-selection are accounted for.

Many drivers brake at the camera, or fail to drive at an appropriate speed even when it is not clear for the driver in front.

Some of the camera sites in the study showed an improvement of speed adherence but overall accidents were 4 per cent worse. The cameras did, however, reduce by 23 per cent the number of drivers speeding at the cameras.

Jeroen Weimar, TfL’s director of transport enforcement, said: “We are concerned by the results because the justification for the cameras was that they would improve safety.”

Further monitoring would be carried out this summer to confirm the findings. If it was clear that the cameras were not working, TfL would consider redesigning the roads and removing the cameras.

Kevin Delaney, the RAC Foundation’s road safety manager, said: “Before the cameras went up, people were more willing to use their judgement to drive at an appropriate speed.

“Now many will use the speedo as the guide and will watch it until they are absolutely certain they will be able to drive without being fined.”

He said many junctions were badly designed, which made it difficult for drivers to avoid being caught in accidents.

Cameras are not used to detect drivers who drive drunk, have poor lane discipline, drive aggressively or without consideration to other road users.

The cameras, which are often erected on buildings or poles above a driver’s field of vision, have been criticised for being difficult to see.

This is seriously good, and strikes me as an excellent vehicle for sharing the message with certain groups of people - like the 90% of the population with the ability to think independently and just a smidgeon of humour.
This should be in Private Eye, Viz (does it still exist?) and other (partially) satirical publications "as is", and in a bunch of other mainstream press and magazines etc. with an appropriate editorial introduction.

Hats off to you, Mr. Smeggy

Safespeed wrote

Rather than thinking and driving at thier best, drivers drive in an intimidated way, throwing away what they instinctivly learned about making these junctions flow because they were threatned by big big brother.

The same way that drivers drive at 35 every where because they fear a sneaky camera even when the limit is 50. they drive in a slower, less attentive state.

The reaction to the cameras is similar to sheep running from a sheep dog. ?

Lemmings jumping over a cliff?

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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

The Highway Code states exactly how you should treat box junctions. I might agree with the purpose of these cameras. BUT, do these cameras detect the learner driver further up the road who has stalled and can't change gear, causing the obstruction in the box junction?

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Anyone who tells you that nothing is impossible has never bathed in a saucer of water.

Have we got any behavioural psychologists? I want to talk to one about this.

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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

It was Plato who said,

The snappier derivative, variously attributed to Douglas Bader (WW2 pilot) and David Ogilvy (founder of ad firm Ogilvy & Mather) is,

By enforcing blind obedience to the rules at all times, we are reducing all the wise men to fools, whereas we should be educating the fools in the hope that a number of them may become wise.

I'm good friends with an engineer who retrained as a psychologist who now teaches soft skills - bloody well. He "owes" me at the moment . Want me to put him in touch?

Super. Yes please.

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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

Ok. He's only just back from hols and no doubt with a backlog of stuff. I will be seeing him in a couple of weeks though and I'll han him printouts of this thread, the referred article(s) and your phone number/e-mail. I expect he'll follow it up soon after.