Online petition against speed cameras

[Trevor]

All of the comments against the illogical but profitable application of the law apply exactly to this country. The band wagon is rampant. It has also come to light that our police have a allocation as to the number of tickets they issue in a given work time. The law has been made a heehawing ass (arse ?)

[b3lha]

Originally Posted by RSVX

A lot of it could easily be corrected by the tolerances set in the equipment. If its set so tight that you get a ticket at 24MPH, in a 20 zone, that is absolutely insane.

The recommended tolerance is the speed limit + 10% + 2mph, hence 24 in a 20 limit. But the operators are not under any obligation to adhere to that recommendation. As you said, if the cameras were used sensibly then there might be a valid place for them in road safety policy. However, the vast sums of money these things collect has completely corrupted the process. The cameras are installed and operated by private companies who have a financial interest in catching as many people as possible rather than improving road safety.

Originally Posted by RSVX

We all know its not that hard to maintain a steady speed in a car. Any somewhat experienced driver should be able to get to the desired speed and maintain it (within reason; read: tolerances). If you cant maintain speed without taking your eyes of the speedo, when you're in a car, you need to be in the left seat (in the UK of course).

Yes, of course drivers can maintain approximately the desired speed without taking their eyes off the speedo. But in reality drivers DO constantly look at the speedo when they are in the proximity of speed cameras. The millions of motorists who have been stung by these machines while driving perfectly safely don't want to get caught again.

This effect is seen most clearly in the areas covered by the average speed cameras that time you between cameras a set distance apart. You get three lanes of bunched up traffic travelling at exactly the speed limit and everybody is concentrating on their speedo. Nobody is looking at the traffic around them or checking their mirrors! It's absolutely insane.

[svxistentialist]

Originally Posted by Trevor

All of the comments against the illogical but profitable application of the law apply exactly to this country. The band wagon is rampant. It has also come to light that our police have a allocation as to the number of tickets they issue in a given work time. The law has been made a heehawing ass (arse ?)

I believe that in Australia also Trevor that police are very heavy-handed about speeding, a very jack boot and SS approach is taken with those who stray over the limits. Hee Haw is right

We here in Ireland have already sent groups over to study this Australian "success" over speeders and drink drivers. One direct result, our laws have been recently changed to allow random testing for drink-driving [as opposed to the police forming an opinion based on observed driving faults].

No true SVX fan will shed a tear for anyone caught driving over the limit. The problem that I see coming, it is a foot in the door. They will use the justification for more cameras[read;more revenue] GPS spy in the cab, speed delimiters for everybody.

I believe that this current police focus on speeding is actually a psychological response to their inability to control crime, the job they were hired to do. They are frustrated that ordinary crime, robberies, muggings, stabbings, shootings, burgulary, car theft,[ a normal weekend here in Limerick ], all of this real crime as most of us see it, they are ineffective or powerless or useless to stop it, depending on your point of view.

So rather than feel as useless as most of us see them, they turn their attention to something they CAN show results for. Targeting the population at large for speeding on the roads.

If they actually got rid of all the speed cameras, and used the money to put more police cars out there to apprehend all the dangerous driving jerks we have on the roads, that might actually DO something to cut down on the bad driving, which would help with accident statistics.

They tend not to take this approach, because it costs too much money.

Joe

[RSVX]

Originally Posted by b3lha

This effect is seen most clearly in the areas covered by the average speed cameras that time you between cameras a set distance apart. You get three lanes of bunched up traffic travelling at exactly the speed limit and everybody is concentrating on their speedo. Nobody is looking at the traffic around them or checking their mirrors! It's absolutely insane.

Wow.

[ItsPeteReally]

Just an example from the county I live in, of believing in the mantra that "speed kills". http://www.abd.org.uk/suffolk_accident_trends.htm Many of these limits are backed up by the use of mobile speed cameras.

Despite the evidence that these lower speed limits have done no good at all, yet more roads have had arbitrary limits set on them, roads have been deliberately re-engineered to sharpen corners, and reduce sightlines too.

The cheapest re-engineering has been to add miles of double white line road centre markings to prohibit overtaking (passing). Consequently, when a 'legal' opportunity to pass eventually appears ......

Yet such actions seem to be accepted, and perhaps even welcomed, by the local electorate.

[NeedForSpeed]

Britain is becoming a "surveillance society," where CCTV cameras, credit card analysis and travel movements are used to track people's lives minute by minute, a report suggested

[NeedForSpeed]

Britain is becoming a "surveillance society," where CCTV cameras, credit card analysis and travel movements are used to track people's lives minute by minute, a report suggested:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20061102...insecuritycctv

[svxistentialist]

It's interesting to see the article reflects the paranoia that people are expressing about the cameras.

It reminds me of the old saying; "Just because you are are not paranoid, this is no guarantee that they are NOT out to get you"

Look on the bright side. When we get senile, we will never get lost. Big Brother will have us on camera, 24/7.

The Truman show gets more real every day. And we are letting them put the infrastructure in place in the interests of "road safety"

Joe

[ItsPeteReally]

I have now looked at "The National Safety Camera Programme - Four Year Evaluation Report"
http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/group...ety_610816.pdf.

It's 164 pages of densely packed prose, showing that:

* speed cameras do in fact reduce the speed of vehicles, which is hardly a surprise!
* speed cameras make a lot of money.
* speed cameras reduce accidents - but perhaps not as much as the speed camera partnerships claim.

The major error in the accident reduction figures is called 'regression to mean'.

I will try to explain by a little story/joke that we perhaps remember from our childhood.

It appears that there was this man who was worried about being trampled by marauding elephants.
So some spiv/shyster bloke sold him a box of "magic powder" which, he guaranteed when sprinkled on the ground, would repel any elephants.
His friend tried to remonstrate with him, saying unto him, " But there aren't any elephants around here".
To which our poor deluded dupe replies, "Yes, its bloody good stuff, isn't it!".

Road accidents are, thankfully, rare events, and they do not occur regularly or predictably, being involved in one is somewhat akin to seeing an elephant on the highway.
Rare though accident occurrences are, that does not preclude them from turning up in clumps. If the speed camera partnership spots a clump of accidents, which may well have occurred on a stretch of road that hadn't previously seen an accident in years, and installs a speed camera, what happens?
The number of accidents, not surprisingly, returns to the mean value (i.e. zero).

Is this a justification for the speed camera?
Or perhaps we should have bought some magic powder!

To their credit, the evaluation report attempts to account for this, for cameras in urban locations, where the accident rate is higher and statistics have been available for many years. They admit that for rural locations, they frankly do not have a clue, the data is too sparse, and therefore they exclude these cameras from any farther analysis whatsoever.

When they attempt to compensate for 'regression to mean' error they calculate that the benefit is probably around half what is claimed, and also that, somewhat counter-intuitively, that mobile cameras are about twice as effective as fixed ones in reducing accidents!

Finally take pity on those in the Grampian area, where accidents went up 36.5% after the installation of speed cameras (must be some kind of sampling error, don't you know).

[b3lha]

Originally Posted by ItsPeteReally

mobile cameras are about twice as effective as fixed ones in reducing accidents!

Sounds right to me. Driver's don't know the camera is there, so they don't make sudden braking manouvers. They look where they are going instead of fixating on their speedo and therefore they have less accidents. Then a week later they get fined 60 quid and 3 points.

For the same reason, I would expect that Mobile cameras are more profitable than fixed cameras.

[Trevor]

Originally Posted by b3lha

Sounds right to me. Driver's don't know the camera is there, so they don't make sudden braking manouvers. They look where they are going instead of fixating on their speedo and therefore they have less accidents. Then a week later they get fined 60 quid and 3 points.

For the same reason, I would expect that Mobile cameras are more profitable than fixed cameras.

Phil,

I was caught by one from an immense distance, while overtaking another obstructive driver who had been holding up traffic for miles. The police car made a dangerous u turn amid the traffic to later come up behind me with flashing lights. I thought he was trying to get past me to get to urgent business ahead, so did not stop for some distance.

After he had issued me with an offense notice, I told him in strong language, that no matter if the law put me in jail or whatever, I would continue to use the absolute maximum speed available from any car I was driving, in order to complete passing ASAP.

I wrote regarding the offense and received a computer generated letter advising that one must not exceed the speed limit while overtaking under any circumstance.

We all must somehow keep out hair on.

Special regards, Trevor.

[Trevor]

Originally Posted by svxistentialist

I believe that in Australia also Trevor that police are very heavy-handed about speeding, a very jack boot and SS approach is taken with those who stray over the limits. Hee Haw is right

We here in Ireland have already sent groups over to study this Australian "success" over speeders and drink drivers. One direct result, our laws have been recently changed to allow random testing for drink-driving [as opposed to the police forming an opinion based on observed driving faults].

No true SVX fan will shed a tear for anyone caught driving over the limit. The problem that I see coming, it is a foot in the door. They will use the justification for more cameras[read;more revenue] GPS spy in the cab, speed delimiters for everybody.

I believe that this current police focus on speeding is actually a psychological response to their inability to control crime, the job they were hired to do. They are frustrated that ordinary crime, robberies, muggings, stabbings, shootings, burgulary, car theft,[ a normal weekend here in Limerick ], all of this real crime as most of us see it, they are ineffective or powerless or useless to stop it, depending on your point of view.

So rather than feel as useless as most of us see them, they turn their attention to something they CAN show results for. Targeting the population at large for speeding on the roads.

If they actually got rid of all the speed cameras, and used the money to put more police cars out there to apprehend all the dangerous driving jerks we have on the roads, that might actually DO something to cut down on the bad driving, which would help with accident statistics.

They tend not to take this approach, because it costs too much money.

Joe

Sorry Joe, I am rather late in reading your post, to which I now say, here here, hear hear. Here you can forget reporting a burglary, no point. The problem is universal.

Cheers, Trevor.

[svxistentialist]

Originally Posted by Trevor

Phil,

I was caught by one from an immense distance, while overtaking another obstructive driver who had been holding up traffic for miles. The police car made a dangerous u turn amid the traffic to later come up behind me with flashing lights. I thought he was trying to get past me to get to urgent business ahead, so did not stop for some distance.

After he had issued me with an offense notice, I told him in strong language, that no matter if the law put me in jail or whatever, I would continue to use the absolute maximum speed available from any car I was driving, in order to complete passing ASAP.

I wrote regarding the offense and received a computer generated letter advising that one must not exceed the speed limit while overtaking under any circumstance.

We all must somehow keep out hair on.

Special regards, Trevor.

Trevor, I'm sorry to hear that you got nailed, even worse that your policeman did not use the discretion that we generally value them for over here, the sort of situational discretion that a camera can't do.

My friends go on motorcycle tours each summer. One of my pals Mike is unhappy with breaking the law in an overtake. If the limit is 70 and he overtakes someone doing 69, yep, he used to take a week to get past.

He did an advanced riding course and his tutor was a police motorcyclist. The tutor lashed him for overtaking slowly. Staying too long on the "wrong" side of the road while overtaking, he was increasing the danger of an incident involving himself, the cars around him and oncoming vehicles.

The police rider says that safety is paramount over the rule of law in that situation. Further, he said that no police bike or car would pull a rider or driver for breaking the speed limit for a short distance in the interest of safety.

Sadly, this wisdom seems not to be applied in your neck of the woods.

[BTW, we are not a bunch of looney bikers burning up the roads. We drive positively and safely. The letter of the law won't always keep you alive, but the spirit of the law is there to be respected]

Joe

[b3lha]

Originally Posted by svxistentialist

The police rider says that safety is paramount over the rule of law in that situation. Further, he said that no police bike or car would pull a rider or driver for breaking the speed limit for a short distance in the interest of safety.

Experienced motorcyclists tend to be far more aware of safety than car drivers. It's a fine practical example of Darwin's theories.

I'm with Trevor on the overtaking technique. I cannot comprehend anybody who would even think to look at their speedometer while overtaking. My pedal remains floored until I'm back on the correct side of the road and I neither know nor care how fast I am going for those few seconds.

Unfortunately for Trevor, not all police are as smart as your motorcycle instructor - and automated camera devices are the dumbest cops of all.

Never figured you for a "hell's angel" Joe, you keep the tattoos well covered.

[svxistentialist]

Originally Posted by b3lha

Experienced motorcyclists tend to be far more aware of safety than car drivers. It's a fine practical example of Darwin's theories.

Wow! Phil, you are a mountain of information. This is the first time I had any inkling that Charles Darwin rode a motorcycle

Never figured you for a "hell's angel" Joe, you keep the tattoos well covered.
I got everything covered Phil. Next time we have a session, my checkered past can be unveiled. Well, some of it, maybe.

........Joe