8 hours ago, KenONeill said:

Further to this there is a piece of statistics regarding speed limit assignment called the "85th Percentile Rule". In plain English, this states that the correct speed limit for a road is the speed that 85% of drivers self-select to drive at or below in free flowing traffic and given immunity from prosecution.

But Ken-you & Iknow  that the 85th is not a safe speed ( those in SCP/WRI / County officers say so ). What is safe is a speed that makes us so dumbed down that getting past that prat braking for every corner and every car coming toward them makes us want to get past as soon as possible to ease BP. And when it's safe to get past -YEP- that's where the camera will be sited, not on the tightest of bends, as there's little chance of making some cash. Local SCP motto now is flash for the cash , as flashes mean a way of getting folks on the lifesaving ( for the speed industry) SAC courses. IF the speed prevention industry was so keen on safety and educating for it, then it would revert to the old & trusted (pre Brown ) days of blokes in cars stopping drivers who offend and either giving words of "advice" with or without a ticket.

I know for a fact the next I take the car out at some time I will exceed the speed limit ,like most drivers will, it’s just a matter of by how much and will I get caught and that’s the reality (for me ) as a motorist and for most others and that’s why many  cars are produced and bought because of their performance ,how many modern cars will exceed 70 mph or perhaps how many WONT exceed 70 and in what volume do the sell,30 years ago with the same speed limits on main roads a hot hatch  was a car with 100bhp ,to day with the same speed limits a hot hatch is now about 300 bhp so what does that tell us,we don’t want motorist to speed?

Problem is that we have too many PR gurus coming up with slick ( and totally inaccurate ) slogans - "speed kills" is one, Perhaps someone might have tipped off the American space program, or did they just ignore it as the speed of their rockets never killed anyone. Similarly with one of the Concord accidents .The Aeroplane could achieve mach 2, but it was the sudden stop in Paris that killed passengers. Similarly , where I first drove was one of the last single track  A roads in the UK. Most of it was NSL. But the accidents were caused by vehicles failing to stop or going too fast round bends. Not speeding, as the limit was 60, but INNAPROPRIATE SPEED, as not driving at a speed where vehicle could stop in the distance seen to be clear, or going too fast to safely negotiate corner, as most accidents were low speed accidents.

oh- "speed" and many other drugs do kill, but from experience, I've seen Police take more action over a few folks moan about unsubstantiated claims about speeding cars, than about accurate reporting of dealing from a house by several persons .

Anyone driving the A90 these days from Dundee to Stonehaven or onto Aberdeen will know there are Average speed cameras and the NSL for cars is 70 mph.

 

Modern cars and even older ones heading north & coming down towards bypassing Forfar and Stonehaven and at other places & if the driver takes their foot off the accelerator will still quite likely exceed 70 mph requiring the diver to use their brakes or drop a gear or 2 or even 3, especially with the likes of cars with 'coasting function'

 

Technology moves on and vehicles are designed towards efficiency and economy and might 'freewheel' / 'coast' as designed at over 70 mph easily and you have to reign that in even though on a dual carriageway or motorway with clear dry roads with the very occasional minor junction that might or might not get used a few times an hour or even a day.

12 hours ago, VWD said:

but INNAPROPRIATE SPEED, as not driving at a speed where vehicle could stop in the distance seen to be clear, or going too fast to safely negotiate corner, as most accidents were low speed accidents.

"INAPPROPRIATE SPEED" can also mean going too slow, which is why one factor in passing the Driving Test is driving at a speed that doesn't hold up other traffic unnecessarily by travelling too far below the speed limit.

 

To illustrate this applies to experienced drivers too - almost every time I drive on the single carriageway A361 North Devon link road I see someone (not me as I just chill out on that road) attempting or carrying out a very risky overtaking manoeuvre (sometimes leading to oncoming traffic having to take avoiding action, and causing several deaths on this road in the last year) where they don't have enough visibility or space - why? because they've got frustrated at being behind someone driving well below the NSL for mile after mile. Yes, the driver should not have tried to overtake, but human behaviour being what it is they will and the root cause of any accident would be a combination of BOTH slow driving by the car being overtaking and frustration by the overtaking car (don't tell me you've never been frustrated whilst driving?).

3 hours ago, SWBoy said:

"INAPPROPRIATE SPEED" can also mean going too slow, which is why one factor in passing the Driving Test is driving at a speed that doesn't hold up other traffic unnecessarily by travelling too far below the speed limit.

 

 

Agreed..... it’s an annoyance of mine that the driving instructors around Bristol seem to not care about this. Plenty of them driving around doing 15 in a 30 because they have not increased their speed as they move from one zone to another, which I simply did not see before the introduction of 20 zones.

 

I use the North Devon link road and there is simply no need for dangerous monevouers like you describe. A bit of patience and well timed overtake and all is good in the hood. 

 

Personally, the standard of driving is getting worse, much of it down to the poor me generation and (IMO) change in the way new drivers are taught. (I say this as when I started to learn to drive all those years ago my instructor was always on my case to get up to the limit of the road safely but quickly.) 

1 hour ago, jars said:

I use the North Devon link road and there is simply no need for dangerous monevouers like you describe. A bit of patience and well timed overtake and all is good in the hood. 

Some people just don't have the patience to wait until the next two lane section, especially between South Molton and Barnstaple where there is a stretch of almost 10 miles of spline curved single carriageway (with poor sight lines) and no two lane sections.Human nature being what it is some plonker will attempt a risky overtake in an underpowered car and sooner or later a fatal accident happens - in fact that happens every few months. IMHO the North Devon link road is  classic case of a dangerously designed road that doesn't take into account human factors.

 

I've become a very patient driver since moving to Devon!

19 hours ago, jars said:

 

Personally, the standard of driving is getting worse, much of it down to the poor me generation and (IMO) change in the way new drivers are taught. (I say this as when I started to learn to drive all those years ago my instructor was always on my case to get up to the limit of the road safely but quickly.) 

 

I totally agree that the standard of driving is dropping but I don't see any particular age group at fault. It's universal.

I think speeding is less prevalent now than ever owing to the sheer amount of cameras. 

 

I would certainly not like to return to my old 450 mile each way weekend commute

given that it would take me 2 hours longer each way today compared with 10 years ago.

 

 

Edited 23 July, 20187 yr by camelspyyder

On 22/07/2018 at 14:21, jars said:

Personally, the standard of driving is getting worse, much of it down to the poor me generation and (IMO) change in the way new drivers are taught. (I say this as when I started to learn to drive all those years ago my instructor was always on my case to get up to the limit of the road safely but quickly.) 

I've seen a gradual decline in the standards of driving. I put it down to the production line driving techniques, where it's all about passing the test. No effort seems to be given to teaching new drivers to plan ahead. Or perhaps this is down to the examiners, who IMHO expect drivers to keep moving with no thought to the possible consequences.

Well, I tried a beta test version of the hazard perception test, which expected you to drive up to a hazard then react rather than see the hazard a couple of hundred yards out and ease off (in which case it might no longer be a hazard when you got there).

'Police appeal over 140 mph car convoy on the M74.'

 

I would think plenty caught them on dash cams.

http://bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-south-scotland-45097300 

That article says more about the effectiveness of PS than it does about the recklessness of the drivers of the four vehicles. 

 

Would they have attempted to do this if they seriously considered they would get caught? 

 

I'm surprised PS haven't considered making every driver with a dashcam a PCSO. 

 

 

They were busy on Sunday.

There was the European Championships and a bike race going on around Glasgow for hours and needed most of their marked and unmarked cars and bikes.

 

It was a great day for speeding and obviously the ANPR cameras were undergoing maintenance.  Not an unusual it would seem.

 

The Police South of the border were maybe occupied with something special as well.

Edited 7 August, 20187 yr by Offski

Yeah, but do you have an evidential quality dashcam that logs the speed of overtaking traffic?

They might not use it for prosecuting,

just to make sure that the Registered Keepers if asked are declaring who the drivers were so that maybe they will just admit to what ever offence the Police suspect & are going to submit a report about to the Procurator Fiscal, if there is something to report.

 

If someone that is above the national speed limit as shown on their dash cam / GPS figure showing are Police Scotland going to ignore that just to get picture evidence of others going quicker?

1 hour ago, Offski said:

They might not use it for prosecuting,

just to make sure that the Registered Keepers if asked are declaring who the drivers were so that maybe they will just admit to what ever offence the Police suspect & are going to submit a report about to the Procurator Fiscal, if there is something to report.

 

If someone that is above the national speed limit as shown on their dash cam / GPS figure showing are Police Scotland going to ignore that just to get picture evidence of others going quicker?

 

You would have thought anyone handing in dash cam evidence would ensure they had suitably edited the contents. 8-)

2 hours ago, KenONeill said:

Yeah, but do you have an evidential quality dashcam that logs the speed of overtaking traffic?

Some dashcams embed the speed onto the recorded image. I can only display the speed I was traveling at in the supplied software.  If you can show the speed you were travelling at, you can roughly work out the speed of the overtaking vehicle or vehicles. 

4 minutes ago, Jfhuk said:

 

You would have thought anyone handing in dash cam evidence would ensure they had suitably edited the contents. 8-)

If they intended to use the footage as evidence they would have to declare all the footage they had of the incident. If they edited one part, who is to say they didn't edit other segments. 

 

For example, you can show selected photographs of a particular crime scene as evidence in your Photographic Supplement, but you have to make all the photographs you took available for examination, even the out of focus, and fingers over the viewfinder ones. Any missing camera sequence numbers (001, 002, 004, 005 etcetera) could provide a doubt for the defence. 

The dashcam I have stores pictures in a series of files on a memory card, so if the constabulary requests footage it’s sounds like you’d have to give them either the card or a certified copy of it?  I can download individual files to a mobile device using the cameras app, but that sounds like it wouldn’t satisfy the legal needs.

17 minutes ago, Fin69 said:

Some dashcams embed the speed onto the recorded image. I can only display the speed I was traveling at in the supplied software.  If you can show the speed you were travelling at, you can roughly work out the speed of the overtaking vehicle or vehicles. 

 

My Sandisk camera embeds, GPD, speed and time into the recording.

 

One dashcam probably wouldn't be evidence enough to convict but a serious of dash cams all showing the same or similar things would probably prove beyond reasonable doubt to a courtroom that the cars were breaking the law.

 

The GPS location and times on something like the sandisk could give a reasonably indication over average speed as well if you got a few on the same route. The GPS data is also accurate and reliable. I suspect it would be trusted if it was across several sources. With the Cars ID oyu'd probably find they will have logged their movement across the cellular phone network. This would all be recoverable if plod felt it was worth the effort.

Today is maybe a good 'Sporting Driving Day'. 

 

European Championships taking up lots of Police Scotland man / women power again.

Open Swimming at Loch Lomond, Time Trial Cycling from Glasgow out and back, Golf at Gleneagles etc.

(Then the Edinburgh Festival is on, in Edinburgh obviously...)

 

Choose a good drivers road not near the event locations, no average speed cameras and check the internet for the Safety Partnership Mobile Van locations.

Border area not on the M74 might be a good shout.

Edited 8 August, 20187 yr by Offski

If only this guy had taken your advice, George. 

 

http:www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-45119366

 

 

I like the defence his brother put forward for him for doing over 200kph! 

http://bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-45119366 

 

 

First pic of British tourist who racked up £36k fines in a £270k Lamborghini in Dubai… as it’s revealed he normally drives a Vauxhall Corsa mobility car.mhtml

Edited 8 August, 20187 yr by Offski

Waiting on a penalty notice or 2 right now. 

Accelerating out of a market town after the through road rejoins the trunk road, suddenly realised it's still a 30 and there's a camera van a couple of hundred yards up the road. Try to phone SWMBO who's a few minutes behind, but by the time I get through she's passed the van as well. Dammit. 

 

Maybe we'll go to "bad drivers" class together.

 

 

 

Edited 9 August, 20187 yr by camelspyyder