Some bedtime reading for those "speed freaks".

tomstickland

Just found this on a Telegraph discussion. not read most of it yet, but looks interesting.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/11/21/do2103.xml

PS to my 12.18 pm comment

Many reports and comment are singularly ill-informed about the real evidence - though few are as ill-informed as the Ministers who form policy. Hence:

Transcom's new report including my submission pg EV272 onwards
https://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmselect/cmtran/460/460.pdf

A more detailed version of my submission

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/exit.jhtml?exit=http://www.abd.org.uk/downloads/RoadSafetyTragedy.doc

My critical response to Transcom over their errors and omissions

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/core/exit.jhtml?exit=http://www.abd.org.uk/downloads/Response_to_Transcom_Report.doc

From 1995 to 2005 % falls in fatalities included 7 (Estonia, the Netherlands, Switzerland, France, Portugal and Korea and Germany) with reductions of 40% or more. 6 (Japan, Austria, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Slovenia and Greece) 30% to 39%, 8 (Belgium, Latvia, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Italy, Spain, Poland and Hungary and the Czech Republic) 20% to 29%, 6 (the Czech Republic, Australia, Slovakia, Cyprus, Finland and Canada) 13% to 19%.

Britain – 28th in a list of 33 - achieved only 12%, an average of 1% pa compared to the 3% pa routinely achieved in earlier decades. Only 5 countries (the Irish Republic, Iceland 4%, the USA, Lithuania and Malta did worse – and 4 of those 5 are small or very small countries).

In response to points made - yes, driving at the limit is often more dangerous than driving slightly above the limit, and research proved this years ago.

It also showed that unrealistically low speed limits lead to higher speeds, higher speed differentials and more crashes - yet councils and the DfT are now basing speed limits on the average speed rather than the 85th perecentile speed (the speed than 85% of drivers would not exceed were there no limit)

Policy is being driven by people who simply do not know what they are doing, and cannot even report honestly what has happened. They clearly prefere to save face than save lives, and should be fired.

Conor_3

The IAM have made a statement about speeding which is completely illogical and how it's dangerous to speed. Most statements are.

Take for example a road near me. It was NSL and then reduced to a 40 limit for some unknown reason. After 2 years, it was returned to NSL. Why?

tomstickland

The man who wrote that article wrote to various select commitee members several times pointing out incorrect data and calculations but they essentially ignored him. It tends to reinforce the suspicion that they started out with an assumption or goal and then were desperate to make the data fit. For whatever reason, with Blair, someone was probably mates with Gatso.

hewhoisnotintheknow

the majority of problems on the roads are women in 4x4's who think they are important and rep man

AliceBanned

hewhoisnotintheknow wrote: »

the majority of problems on the roads are women in 4x4's who think they are important and rep man

That's why women pay less for car insurance. Those companies must be losing a lot, shame they don't look at the facts like you did.

moonrakerz

The whole debate on speeding hinges on the disingenuous use of the word "speeding".

The Government and senior police officers (with one eye on the forthcoming job at the Met) claim (on the BBC TV news yesterday - yet again!) that 30% of road accidents are caused by "speeding".

What does "speeding" mean ? As the Government's response appears to be to put up more and more speed cameras it must mean "exceeding the speed" limit.
But the Government's own figures actually show that less than 5% of accidents involve vehicles that are exceeding the speed limit at the location of the accident.

I don't disagree that many accidents are caused by "excessive" speed, or "inappropriate speed" - but those terms could apply to someone driving on a motorway (quite legally !) in thick fog at 50mph when they should be doing 30mph - all the speed cameras in the world won't stop that !

Britain's road are amongst the safest in the world and the speed cameras contribution to that is miniscule. Get rid of the cameras and get more traffic police on the roads.

If you really want to cut the number of deaths on Britain's road make the minimum age to get a driving licence 30 years of age !!! THAT would work.

No - I've never had a speeding ticket before anyone asks !

Happychappy

moonrakerz wrote: »

If you really want to cut the number of deaths on Britain's road make the minimum age to get a driving licence 30 years of age !!! THAT would work.

As long as people had to surrender their licence at 65 ! that would work too :rolleyes:

What about that foreign Swiss gyser ? Hambleton or something, does he have to wait another 7 years before joining the mayhem :rotfl:

michaels

Sadly the teaching of maths is so poor in this country that people in senior positions often have no understanding of statistics and are thus happy to listen to 'experts' as long as their opinions match with the perceived problem whilst ignoring others who have done a proper analysis that does not support the 'message'

I have seen many examples within govt of very poor analysis performed merely to support an already decided objective rather than an independent analysis of the data. Generally the required result is known before the analysis is started and analysis continues until figures supporting that outcome are found.

DirectDebacle

1. Speed in itself is not dangerous

2. Any fool can drive fast enough to be dangerous.

Since 1997 fatal accidents have flat lined at around 3000 p.a. following year on year falls. This is in the main due to technological advances in vehicle design and safety features.

1997-No. of speeding fines about 650000

2006 No. of speeding fines around 2.1 million. Speed related accidents-flat lining.

Main causes of accidents-Overtaking and turning right i.e. driver error.

Conclusion. Speed restrictions and speed cameras have more value as revenue raising exercises than as road safety measures. Further reductions in accidents will only be achieved by improved driver training which has changed little for decades. Raising the basic pass standard to I.A.M. and including night driving and motorway driving will be of significant benefit to road safety.

The disadvantage is that it takes a little thought to design the driving course and ensure the instructors are capable of delivering it. It doesn't raise nearly as much revenue as increasing fines, lowering speed limits and installing a camera if there is still room for one.

Go to the ONS website for the most detailed road Traffic Stats you could ever want.

tomstickland

The new Road "Safety" Bill seems just be a list of easier to administer punishments.

moonrakerz

Happychappy wrote: »

moonrakerz wrote: »

As long as people had to surrender their licence at 65 ! that would work too :rolleyes:

Not as effective - look at the ages/numbers of road fatalities.

I read somewhere that there are over 500 people in UK aged 100+ who still have driving licences !