SPEED CAMERAS

Paul_Herring

Take two scenarios.No.1 Young child crosses road in 30 mph limit without looking ,car travelling at 40mph goes through speed camera gets booked for speeding just before hitting child.child dies.
No.2 young child crosses road in 30mph limit without looking, car driver sees road sign warning of active speed cameras ahead, car slows to 25mph just before hitting child child survives!
The difference between the two apart from the obvious[...].

The obvious being that both kids haven't been educated to cross the road safely by themselves? Are kids really that ignorant these days? ::: memories of Tufty and the Green Cross Man :::

Yes I was taking this off at a tangent

IvanOpinion

The obvious being that both kids haven't been educated to cross the road safely by themselves? Are kids really that ignorant these days? ::: memories of Tufty and the Green Cross Man :::

Up round our way the kids are definitely that ignorant. They run out in front of the cars regularly. I have said several times that it is not a case of 'if, but or maybe' it is a case of 'when' one of them gets knocked down - and the worst offenders ... the kids in the care of a local childminder ... work that one out.

Ivan

marvin

I see no problem with speed cameras where they do good, outside every school as an example catching people speeding where there are likely to be distracted children etc. (So long as there is another one catching all those ignorant parents who park on the zig zags saying school no parking!)

But why are there so many on motorways?

I recently got flashed at on the M42 in a roadwork's section and I await to find out if I actually get a fine or not.

Now from what I have heard from the police etc in the past the cameras and the speed restrictions are there too protect the workers on the roadwork's. Fine I have no problem with that and where the road width is restricted or there are likely to be workers I stick well below 50 or what ever.

But this was 5 am not a worker in sight, the cones were all on the hard shoulder the road width was not restricted and I was doing just 60 miles an hour in the middle lane over taking a lorry.

hardly crime of the century and as far as I see putting no-one at risk certainly no more risk than doing 70 on a motorway with no cones on the hard shoulder.

Sorry the authorities have gone revenue mad with cameras seeing it purely as a fairly painless way of raising money.

Put the cameras where they belong and make them operate at a time they will do what we are told they are for, accident prevention.

On a motorway (with or without roadwork's) you are unlikely to be putting pedestrian's in danger. The biggest danger on a motorway are those who drive without due care and attention, change lanes without looking, without signalling or those who force all the traffic into the far right land cos they want to drive in the middle one despite the left lane being empty.

Fran

HB - I know what you mean about the inflexibility of speeding fines. A few years ago I got two speeding endorsements, one for going out of Glossop at 45mph just before end of speed limit sign at midnight and another for going up a very steep hill a bit over the limit on a quiet Sunday.

Re M42 however, I have used it loads and there are a lot less accidents on it than other motorways (this is just my opinion from hearing travel news over the years), so they must be getting something right. The M4 near Newport in S.Wales however is always having accidents at least one a week if not more, and that's just what I pick up from national travel news when the radio happens to be on. They are getting something very wrong.

scheming_gypsy

Strange one now..

According to Top Gear there have been more deaths after the introduction of the stupid amount of speed cameras.
According to the government there's less.

Who do we believe? a bunch of motoring experts or a bunch of clowns in suits that want us to believe any old crap they tell us.

Paul_Herring

Strange one now..

According to Top Gear there have been more deaths after the introduction of the stupid amount of speed cameras.
According to the government there's less.

Who do we believe? a bunch of motoring experts or a bunch of clowns in suits that want us to believe any old crap they tell us.

Depends in which set of statistics you look at. From Camera Statistics:

In all, seventy-seven more people died on Britain's roads last year but for motorcyclists the increase was higher still - 84 more deaths in 2003 than in 2002.

While figures released earlier this month by the government showed an overall 40 per cent reduction in fatal and seriously injured casualties at camera sites,[...]

Emphasis mine.

scheming_gypsy

it's still that 'the government says' bit that gets me, we all know politicians are lying !!!!!! who twist everything so they don't have to apologise and admit they're wrong.
40% less could be down to speed cameras, or 20% down to speed cameras and 20% down to the fact that it was just less than last year..

Although there does appear to be hope against losing your license due to speed cameras.

http://www.protection-insurance.com/loss-of-licence-insurance.htm

peterbaker

Yeah .. as any regular runner of the A12 speed camera alley will tell you, it seems the motorcyclists who cannot bear the stop start flow characteristics of the alley are the ones who get topped when they risk one hop too many.

I am convinced it's dead motorcyclists which keep the "accident blackspot" myth going which supports the continued siting of cameras along the alley.

Anyone...?

System

I cant believe stupid ppl sometimes

if the limit says 30 - its 30 not 31 not 35

ppl die because of the idiots who speed

I think we need many more cameras the the fine should be £100 for the first £200 for the second and an instant ban for 3 or more in 1 year.

if you have kids you will understand

locally there is a school and the idiots used to get so fast on the dual carriage way I ofetn used to see school kids run as the boy racers couldnt stop in time.

then some idiot killed himself by driving like a nut

since the camera went up it has helped but if you sit & watch - an idiot still gets flashed ever other min

come one nutters - wake up



Nik

Raggie

"I am convinced it's dead motorcyclists which keep the "accident blackspot" myth going which supports the continued siting of cameras along the alley. ",,,,

OK.. not wanting to change the subject,, but a very high proportion of motorcycle deaths are NOT related to excessive speed.. but because a car driver.. as hit em..yes you are at increased risk of death on a bike.. but only because of fellow road users...

Motorcycles deaths hit the headline.. where often the story that is told involves a car/truck.bus.. and not excessive or even illegal speeds....