Speed Camera Rant

[Darren]

Hoorah for common sense (at least in Scotland)
_________________
Darren Griffin

[Skippy]

What I find interesting is that APCO (Association of Chief Police Officers) claim 69% of people speed in a 30MPH limit and 29% in a 40 limit.

So, pretty much everyone speeds, how come speed is a factor in only one third of crashes?

The other thing they gloss over is that in a fair percentage of the crashes where speed is a factor, the vehicles involved were not actually exceeding the speed limit, just traveling too fast for the conditions.

So, in the year 2000 3409 people were killed in crashes. Lets say that in 1/3 of these, speed was a factor (not the only factor, but a factor none the less). So that makes 1,136 killed in speed related crashed.

Now if in half of these crashes, the speed was not in excess of the speed limit but was too fast for the conditions. So, even if there was a speed camera at the crash site, the vehicle would have still been traveling at the same speed as it was within the speed limit.

So that makes 568 killed while exceeding the speed limit. So, is this is a serious problem which we need to throw all of our policing resources at?

Well, consider that 761 people were murdered in 1999. That's more than were killed while exceeding the speed limit! So, you have more chance of being murdered than being killed while speeding.

So, what are we doing about all these murders taking place then?

[Darren]

[phil4]

Have you seen this camera:

http://www.abd.org.uk/pr/381.htm

If that's not there to tax anyone who's never driven on the road before, I don't know what is.

I always try and slow to the speed limit at or before it starts, but I know most people don't... and so they'd get taxed. Not good.

Like other's above I always feel horribly unsafe slowing for some speed limits. The worst is when I slow for temporary speed limits on the motorywas during roadworks. Like the M42 at the moment. 50mph that noone seems to stick to, including truck drivers (some of whom seem to get annoyed when you do stick to the limit). Feels mighty unsafe then.

The ABD site linked to above is very anti-camera, worth a read.

[RickyTwoShirts]

I was caught by a mobile set up on the edge of 40mph / derestricted zone where all signs of civilisation had long since disappeared. I was offered a £60 fixed penalty and three points. Unfortunately, I was on my way to France and the policeman suggested that I ought to hold onto my licence. As a result the magistrate court took £130 from me and FOUR points and took so long to return my licence that I din't have it with me for my next trip to France. Must be a moral here somewhere

It's OK by me if the government wants to collect revenue in this way but they really should drop all the pretence of it being a safety measure. Perhaps they are really trying to reduce the congestion on our roads by banning all motorists under the topping up procedure. If it's the money they want they should forget the points; if it's an empty roads policy then forget the money. But I suppose they want it all ways.

If they really want to reduce accidents at black spots I am sure that suitable signage would be most effective, perhaps coupled with the odd traffic policeman in a brightly marked car.

The more signs, cameras and changing speed limits there are the more difficult it is to concentrate on driving the car. It is often difficult to see why a dual carriage-way road almost to motorway standards needs a 40 mph limit. Similarly 30 mph might be dangerous at 10:00 am but not 10:00 pm. I'm all for speed limits being advisory with traffic cops looking out for dangerous behaviour.

[chris.hevey]

The 10% thing was in ACPO (Assoc. of Chief Police Officers) guidance to forces and was voluntary.

The important definitions are in the Road Traffic Act and are less generous than the ACPO guidelines. I forget what they are but it was something like speedlimit + 2 mph + 4% of speedlimit to make allowance for inaccuracy of speedometers?

[Skippy]

[chris.hevey]

Like a lot of our legislation, our dear old Road Traffic Act has it roots in the Horse and Cart days when speedos were just a magnet whirling round in a tin box in the dash giving out fairly arbitrary readings - and that's the Act they use to nick you. Nice. I think London cabbies can still get nicked if they don't have a bale of hay in the boot for their horse, but by the same token they are allowed to get out and pee up against one of their wheels - although that could just be an urban myth.

The whole trouble is that the entire subject is dominated by outdated and misguided eutopian thinkers who are motivated enough to get up in their homespun cardies and sandals and lobby people who don't understand or care. Two-Jags for Chrissakes. Just like the anti-smoking lobby (let's not get into that one!) Us ordinary joes just complain a bit and pay the fines. And the road tax. And car purchase tax. And the insane fuel prices. And sit in jams on Victorian roads. And pay ludicrous insurance. And.. err... whinge in web forums.

I saw the most wonderful thing the other day. We had three cameras here in Bletchley, none of which were in a particularly dangerous location. I drove past the one in Fenny Stratford and someone had cut its head off with a blow torch or something. A little tear of joy came to my eye. Some ordinary Joe had just got a little too off and gone out and done something about it. A Robin Hood. A Johhny Wilkinson. Something brave and extraordinary that I would love to do if I had the bottle. One of us. Like Spitfire pilots. Or the "Clamp Fairies" who used to go around London removing wheel clamps. Top Lads All*. Turns out whoever it was cut all three cameras down. YES!!!!!

*and lasses!

[Dave]

Perhaps you should get your camrea out quick and post some pics to this site http://www.speedcam.co.uk/gatso2.htm

[chris.hevey]

Excellent idea. Regrettably the Police, or whoever, have taken the posts down. Doh! Probably on 'elf an' safety grounds - of course, nothing to do with them being a daily reminder of their shame - that might incite others to do same.

I assume this is while they wait for their other cameras to raise enough revenue to buy new ones. I think a post with camera box costs less than £10,000 inc. labour, so I suspect they'll be back in about 20 minutes or so. (Actually, they probably get bulk discount - make that 15 mins.) (Anyway, why bother paying insurance premiums when you have your own pots of gold?)

I do hope our heroes managed to bag a head that actually had a camera in it. I believe the actual working parts of a GATSO are the seriously expensive bits, not the posts which are realtively cheap.

[Darren]

A 20yr old man was recently convicted of criminal damage to a Gatso camera and received a 12month custodial sentence.
_________________
Darren Griffin

[chris.hevey]

Poor sod. The establishment does not like this kind of behaviour. Rightly I suppose, otherwise we'd have anarchy. I'd imagine the judge had some very stern things to say - the summing up probably went a bit like this :

Vengance Link

Scary

[jaguar]

Surely the most intelligent way to disable a Gasto camera is to spray black paint carefully (so as not to make it obvious) onto the lens, not onto the flash. That way it will appear to the tax collectors that it's working but it won't render any usable pictures.

Of course I'd never have the guts to do this myself but I'd gladly stand a few rounds at the pub for anyone who did. :D

Jaguar

[Dave]

You have to be careful regarding paint, because don't forget at how bright the flash becomes, the number plate reflects, and although it may make it look like it's pitch black out there, you may still see a number plate. Putting a piece of gray card up against the lens would probably work better and not be as messy.

[Skippy]

Putting something over the camera window would work just as well as spray painting the camera. They could convict you of "criminal damage" either since you wouldn't actually damage the Gatso.

I remember there was a case years ago where someone removed a local authority wheel clamp from his car. They council tried to charge him with criminal damage but the bloke had dismantled the car's suspension to remove it and since he had not damaged the clamp they couldn't do anything about it.

We see you’re using an ad-blocker. We’re fine with that and won’t stop you visiting the site.
Have you considered making a donation towards website running costs?.
Or you could disable your ad-blocker for this site. We think you’ll find our adverts are not overbearing!