Just followed trafpol at a constant 90-100mph!
Discussion
justinp1 said:
I think in years to come, the real effect of this war on speed will really come to fruition. The trust eroded in the system and the police greatens each year.
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:14
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:17
Is greatens a real word?
more editing required?
hedders said:
I think in years to come, the real effect of this war on speed will really come to fruition. The trust eroded in the system and the police greatens each year.
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:14
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:17
Is greatens a real word?
more editing required?
Definitions from The Online Plain Text English Dictionary:
Greaten
(v. i.) To become large; to dilate.
(v. t.) To make great; to aggrandize; to cause to increase in size; to expand.
Nah, two edits for punctuation and spelling was quite enough!
justinp1 said:
I think in years to come, the real effect of this war on speed will really come to fruition. The trust eroded in the system and the police greatens each year.
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:14
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:17
Is greatens a real word?
more editing required?
Definitions from The Online Plain Text English Dictionary:
Greaten
(v. i.) To become large; to dilate.
(v. t.) To make great; to aggrandize; to cause to increase in size; to expand.
Nah, two edits for punctuation and spelling was quite enough!
Thats greaten....Do they include 'greatens' as an accepted variation of greaten ?
god, i hope not...
hedders said:
Thats greaten....Do they include 'greatens' as an accepted variation of greaten ?
god, i hope not...
Yes, that is a tense of the verb to greaten, as it says on the last line.
Would have been nicer to perhaps comment on the subject I spent some time writing rather than to wrongly have a snide dig at someones spelling ability of a single word out of a few hundred?
Once and for all though: www.answers.com/greatens&r=67
Back to subject now?
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 15:04
justinp1 said:
...in a convoy of 3 Trafpol cars ...in lane 3 travelling at about 115.... ...off duty...
Sadly, there are other people out there that think like this
Can I ask when he is seeing this happen, what the **** is he *supposed* to think!?
Can I ask what he was doing that you were not? That is apart from he was observing correct lane discipline?
Seondly, is there a legit part time or voluntary police work I can sign up for which means I can do this when off duty?
I do support the work of the traffic police, however in this situation, I can kind of see his point. I have also has contact with a 'convoy' of unmarked cars in the outside lane. I was proceeding in the outside lane (as I was overtaking the first two lanes) where speeding up behind me became a dark car which sat about 3 car lengths behind me. I know that the stopping distance figures are outdated, but that is clearly dangerous. I looked for the first place to move out of the crazy sods way into a gap into the middle lane. I obviously wasnt quick enough as I was then surprised to see blue flashing light come from behind the grille. However, this still did not mean I could magic a way in between tightly packed cars in the middle lane. So I thought 'sod it' and booted it until I found a gap a few hundred yards ahead. When I slowed down to let them past, the three unmarked cars were in convoy at maybe 90mph with what was no more than one to one and a half car lengths gap between them.
Again, I do support the work of traffic police, but if they were really on a call, I am an observant driver so I would have seen the flashing lights 100 yards before they got near me and would have moved out of the way. If the convoy was really trying to be covert and looking like normal traffic, firstly the public has no warning that they may have been the police performing such manouvres and secondly travelling with such disregard to safe stopping distances.
The guy on the Mondeo may have been a nob, however I do sympathise with his points. If off-duty police in unmarked cars can safely travel at 115mph, in convoy (implying perhaps at less than the exact stopping distance) on a quiet road. Then why shouldnt I?
Unfortunatley the powers that be through covert marketing and manipulation in the media have linked 'Speed kills' and 'Police' in the same cognitive area. To half of the country, they fall for it anyway without thinking, but for the other half who know it isnt really 'speed' that kills, things like this just really boil their blood and give them even less respect for the system. However the effect to the whole driving population is that the powers that be (and the police) do not even follow their own rules, so they think why the **** should they!? Then they see the number of speeding convictions handed down to Essex police in a year... 500 accusations... no convictions then on their way to work they fail to spot the hidden mobile speed trap which clocks them for doing 36 in an area which used to be a 60, and in fact within 20 yards would have been a 60 anyway...
I think in years to come, the real effect of this war on speed will really come to fruition. The trust eroded in the system and the police greatens each year.
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:14
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:17
I suggest that you read and digest my post again as i dont make a habit of driving marked Police cars Off duty......i dont love the job that much
I always thought that it was a rule of the Forum NOT to alter someone elses post. Somehow defeats the whole point really !
Tonyrec said:
I suggest that you read and digest my post again as i dont make a habit of driving marked Police cars Off duty......
Thank gawd, I thought it was me who had read it wrong.
Anybody who deliberately "noises up" marked trafpol deserves a bollocking (at least), just for taking the piss. What's the point in pushing to the very egde of the law, when you don't have to? For all but a few, the trafpol will know the law better than you do...
Tonyrec said:#
...in a convoy of 3 Trafpol cars ...in lane 3 travelling at about 115.... ...off duty...
Sadly, there are other people out there that think like this
Can I ask when he is seeing this happen, what the **** is he *supposed* to think!?
Can I ask what he was doing that you were not? That is apart from he was observing correct lane discipline?
Seondly, is there a legit part time or voluntary police work I can sign up for which means I can do this when off duty?
I do support the work of the traffic police, however in this situation, I can kind of see his point. I have also has contact with a 'convoy' of unmarked cars in the outside lane. I was proceeding in the outside lane (as I was overtaking the first two lanes) where speeding up behind me became a dark car which sat about 3 car lengths behind me. I know that the stopping distance figures are outdated, but that is clearly dangerous. I looked for the first place to move out of the crazy sods way into a gap into the middle lane. I obviously wasnt quick enough as I was then surprised to see blue flashing light come from behind the grille. However, this still did not mean I could magic a way in between tightly packed cars in the middle lane. So I thought 'sod it' and booted it until I found a gap a few hundred yards ahead. When I slowed down to let them past, the three unmarked cars were in convoy at maybe 90mph with what was no more than one to one and a half car lengths gap between them.
Again, I do support the work of traffic police, but if they were really on a call, I am an observant driver so I would have seen the flashing lights 100 yards before they got near me and would have moved out of the way. If the convoy was really trying to be covert and looking like normal traffic, firstly the public has no warning that they may have been the police performing such manouvres and secondly travelling with such disregard to safe stopping distances.
The guy on the Mondeo may have been a nob, however I do sympathise with his points. If off-duty police in unmarked cars can safely travel at 115mph, in convoy (implying perhaps at less than the exact stopping distance) on a quiet road. Then why shouldnt I?
Unfortunatley the powers that be through covert marketing and manipulation in the media have linked 'Speed kills' and 'Police' in the same cognitive area. To half of the country, they fall for it anyway without thinking, but for the other half who know it isnt really 'speed' that kills, things like this just really boil their blood and give them even less respect for the system. However the effect to the whole driving population is that the powers that be (and the police) do not even follow their own rules, so they think why the **** should they!? Then they see the number of speeding convictions handed down to Essex police in a year... 500 accusations... no convictions then on their way to work they fail to spot the hidden mobile speed trap which clocks them for doing 36 in an area which used to be a 60, and in fact within 20 yards would have been a 60 anyway...
I think in years to come, the real effect of this war on speed will really come to fruition. The trust eroded in the system and the police greatens each year.
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:14
>> Edited by justinp1 on Sunday 18th December 12:17
I suggest that you read and digest my post again as i dont make a habit of driving marked Police cars Off duty......i dont love the job that much
I always thought that it was a rule of the Forum NOT to alter someone elses post. Somehow defeats the whole point really !
I apologise for this, I merely wanted to make reference to exact points your post so that yourself and other readers could understand which sections I was referring to.
Are you saying that 'this is not something you would do off duty' to the fact that you would not drive like the guy in the mondeo off duty, or you would not pull him over off duty?
I assumed from your post that you were referring to the latter.
The rest of the points I make still stand though:
He was in court due to his 'bending' of the traffic rules. In fact his defense (although no excuse whatsoever) was that police if they are on an emergency should be using their flashing lights, especially if they are breaking the speed limit.
Can I ask what the emergency that needed the speed of 115 to get to it? If so, why it was the case that the 'flashing lights' were not needed? Whatever the emergency was, it is obvious that any benefit of the increased speed was more than lost when you stopped to pull the guy over. Someone who until that point was driving more slowly than you, and you make no reference to him driving dangerously.
I am not trying to have a dig, and his defence was obviously a load of rubbish in a legal sense. I just feel that perhaps he was seeing something I have also seen as quite hypocritical: The goverments war on 'speed' using the Police as its front, with actions on the road and in the media really showing us it is one rule for us and another for 'them'.
justinp1 said:
showing us it is one rule for us and another for 'them'.
The difference being that the police are legally allowed to exceed the speed limit if they need to, the public are not. Personally I don't have a problem with that - the police go through more stringent training and testing than the average motorist because they need to get about quickly in order to do their job.
Tonyrec said:
Afew years ago i was travelling in a convoy of 3 Trafpol cars north on the M1 early one saturday morning on route up north. All were in lane 3 travelling at about 115. We then noticed a Mondeo in lane 1 matching our speed.
This is not something that i would do off duty but each to their own.
He was pulled over and it was a lad aged about 25. When questioned he said that he was told by his dad that if the Police vehicles were travelling at speed without their blue lights etc that they were breaking the law and as such he could do the same.
The result was that he got a 6 month ban at Hemel Court for basically being a nob.
Sadly, there are other people out there that think like this
That's the full quote. They weren't off duty.
purpleheadedcerb said:
Afew years ago i was travelling in a convoy of 3 Trafpol cars north on the M1 early one saturday morning on route up north. All were in lane 3 travelling at about 115. We then noticed a Mondeo in lane 1 matching our speed.
This is not something that i would do off duty but each to their own.
He was pulled over and it was a lad aged about 25. When questioned he said that he was told by his dad that if the Police vehicles were travelling at speed without their blue lights etc that they were breaking the law and as such he could do the same.
The result was that he got a 6 month ban at Hemel Court for basically being a nob.
Sadly, there are other people out there that think like this
That's the full quote. They weren't off duty.
Nor does it say they were unmarked.
I don't know about anyone else, but when I have three marked up trafpol in convoy sneak up behind me at that sort of speed, I initially crap myself as I think I've done something wrong (who? me? surely not?!) and then get the hell out of their way, and then breathe a big sigh of relief and potter for a while.
I think the charge of being a nob, was well presented to and acted upon by the JPs of Hemel.
I think the charge of being a nob, was well presented to and acted upon by the JPs of Hemel.
justinp1 said:
I apologise for this, I merely wanted to make reference to exact points your post so that yourself and other readers could understand which sections I was referring to.
Are you saying that 'this is not something you would do off duty' to the fact that you would not drive like the guy in the mondeo off duty, or you would not pull him over off duty?
Apology accepted.
Everyone speeds to some degree but i know that when im off duty i do stay clear of Police cars in general and would certainly not follow 3 Trafpol cars at that sort of speed.
In answer to your question, i cant say what we were doing, but if i had to be 'somewhere' sooner, firstly, i would have been doing about 150 (in those circs),secondly i may have had my Blue lights/sirens etc on and thirdly, i wouldnt have considered stopping.
As it happens, i didnt do anything aprt from make progress for Police purposes.
Hope that this goes someway to answering your question.
>> Edited by Tonyrec on Sunday 18th December 23:45
Tonyrec said:
I apologise for this, I merely wanted to make reference to exact points your post so that yourself and other readers could understand which sections I was referring to.
Are you saying that 'this is not something you would do off duty' to the fact that you would not drive like the guy in the mondeo off duty, or you would not pull him over off duty?
Apology accepted.
Everyone speeds to some degree but i know that when im off duty i do stay clear of Police cars in general and would certainly not follow 3 Trafpol cars at that sort of speed.
In answer to your question, i cant say what we were doing, but if i had to be 'somewhere' sooner, firstly, i would have been doing about 150 (in those circs),secondly i may have had my Blue lights/sirens etc on and thirdly, i wouldnt have considered stopping.
As it happens, i didnt do anything aprt from make progress for Police purposes.
Hope that this goes someway to answering your question.
>> Edited by Tonyrec on Sunday 18th December 23:45
Cheers, it does. I am not defending the actions of the Mondeo driver, his defence was stupid to say the least.
However, the fact remains whilst I understand that the Trafpol cars were not called to an emergency, but were travelling in convoy 45mph in excess of the speed limit in the outside lane.
Whilst I understand you may have been making progress for police purposes, that could be said of any police officer on duty, as if nothing else, it gets him to his destination quicker! The second point is that it sound like whilst the guy was keeping pace with you in lane one, unless he was undertaking other cars whilst you were overtaking, it does not explain why the convoy needed to use the outside lane.
Whilst I understand the use of the lights when exceeding the limit is not necessary, was there a particular reason that you couldnt have observed the speed limit on that occasion?
Again, please dont take this as a dig, it is not. Neither is it an accack on the police as if you have read any other related threads I have commented on I support the action and use of Traffic policing and the police in general. I do feel however, this does give out a mixed message to the general public. Not least of cause, however stupid the guy was, the Mondeo driver, as it sounds like he sped up just to keep pace with you!
justinp1 said:Justin, Police (traffic or otherwise) don't need to be going to an emergency to exceed the speed limit. Oh, and think about it for a bit, when was the last time you saw several marked cars full of plod in convoy? I'd suggest a wise guess to be that they were on an oppo rather than heading to Alton Towers for the day
However, the fact remains whilst I understand that the Trafpol cars were not called to an emergency, but were travelling in convoy 45mph in excess of the speed limit in the outside lane.
IIRC it needs to be not just for police purpose, but also that observing the speed limit would inhibit that purpose in some way.
That's a rather loose phrase (being late for a meeting does inhibit it, as does turning up after the bad guys have been bad and scarpered). AIUI, it's up to the Force to define when the exemption can be used (which is where the case against the 156mph driver testing his car fell over -- the Force did not have good definitions).
That's a rather loose phrase (being late for a meeting does inhibit it, as does turning up after the bad guys have been bad and scarpered). AIUI, it's up to the Force to define when the exemption can be used (which is where the case against the 156mph driver testing his car fell over -- the Force did not have good definitions).
sheepy said:
However, the fact remains whilst I understand that the Trafpol cars were not called to an emergency, but were travelling in convoy 45mph in excess of the speed limit in the outside lane.
As 7db has pointed out, whilst I know they do not have to be on an emergency, what I understand from the relevant Act is that they should have been observing the speed limit, unless what they were physically doing would have been hindered by the fact that they were.
Tony has neot been able to tell us the whys and wherefores of why they had to break the speed limit by 45mph in what they were doing, had to use the 3rd lane and not the second, and not use the blue lights. Frankly though this is not the point. Tony was surprised by the comments that the Mondeo driver made, and whilst he may have been a 'nob' on the day, had his principles wrong, was very stupid in using this to 'chase' after the police and even more so for using this as a defence, I was hoping that I could shed some light into where his ideas may have come from.
Whilst Joe Public does not know the exact letter of the law, mostly they know the basics:
They assume that the police should uphold the law yet not be above it.
They assume that the police should be an example of how to drive correctly.
They assume that when the first two above dont happen there is an emergency to get to, where it is assumed that blue lights (and maybe sirens) will alert the public to their presence and get out of their way.
I must also say, that I am guessing that the Mondeo driver committed this offence and gave his defence relatively recently, as 10-15 years ago, the situation was different for the following reasons:
The government and the SCPs and the ilk have increased their use of the mass media to promote the 'speed kills' soundbite and have twisted results of deaths in a way which shows that an increase in peoples driving speed *actually equals* more people dying.
A lot of us can read between the lines here, and with the help of a few people (Safe Speed most definately) the spin can be read through, and we can continue in the safe way we have always driven. However, for the average guy who may read the Sun, Star, Mirror or even the Mail they may not have the intelligence or inclination to study the situation past the soundbite. The unfortunate twist is that the goverment have chosen the police to implement this policy, so the police officers sometimes wrongly take the rap, just because they are the very public face of the policy. An example of may I have seen is a new sign which warns motorists of 'Police Cameras' - I guess they dont even have to mention speeding or safety any more!
The unfortunate result of when 'speed' is now affecting many peoples lives which it did not before, and the mass media is also used to transmit the message, it is front page news when there is any inkling of hypocracy in the message by the government or police. Everyone remembers the stories of the head of a large traffic police area having his case dropped for doing 100 on the M6 toll, as he was driving in convoy with other civilians too. Everyone remembers the officer 'testing the performance' of the new car whilst off duty. Everyone remembers Essex police having 500 incidences of police cars breaking the limit, but no NIP's.
I am not for one second passing judgement on Tony, he has his job to do, and from what he is saying he is doing it well. Similarly I am not in any position to say that any of the above people are guilty either. That is not my point, and secondly whether any of these people are right or wrong, this will have little actual difference to public opinion. My overall point is that sometimes the public receive a mixed message, especially over the scenario of speeding and speed kills. It is the unfortunate situation that speed=death is so widely promoted without clarification or reference to safe driving, then the public can also not see past the same soundbite when it comes to the police being in the public eye.
justinp1 said:
Cheers, it does. I am not defending the actions of the Mondeo driver, his defence was stupid to say the least.
However, the fact remains whilst I understand that the Trafpol cars were not called to an emergency, but were travelling in convoy 45mph in excess of the speed limit in the outside lane.
Whilst I understand you may have been making progress for police purposes, that could be said of any police officer on duty, as if nothing else, it gets him to his destination quicker! The second point is that it sound like whilst the guy was keeping pace with you in lane one, unless he was undertaking other cars whilst you were overtaking, it does not explain why the convoy needed to use the outside lane.
Whilst I understand the use of the lights when exceeding the limit is not necessary, was there a particular reason that you couldnt have observed the speed limit on that occasion?
Again, please dont take this as a dig, it is not. Neither is it an accack on the police as if you have read any other related threads I have commented on I support the action and use of Traffic policing and the police in general. I do feel however, this does give out a mixed message to the general public. Not least of cause, however stupid the guy was, the Mondeo driver, as it sounds like he sped up just to keep pace with you!
Justin,
The point of the matter does not revolve around the fact that this Mondeo driver was driving dangerously or not, it is that he was exceeding the speed limit, not merely nibbling at it but taking big chunks out of it.
I wish that i could tell you the reason for the high speed convoy but i cant, but as Sheepy pointed out we werent going to Alton Towers (mores the pity).
For the record, we would have been more than justified at traveling at max lash but as we had a long way to go i decided to set a medium pace taking up the safest position on the road at that speed and to not alert Members of the public. This comes from experience. In fact, as i recall, the only people that we came up against in lane 3 were people travelling over the limit (90ish). They werent stopped for obviuos reasons but the chap in the Mondeo was a different case and had to be spoken too.
TonyRec said:So the urgency that required the excess speed was not so urgent that you could spend a few minutes writing a ticket. I see the logic there.
Cheers, it does. I am not defending the actions of the Mondeo driver, his defence was stupid to say the least.
However, the fact remains whilst I understand that the Trafpol cars were not called to an emergency, but were travelling in convoy 45mph in excess of the speed limit in the outside lane.
Whilst I understand you may have been making progress for police purposes, that could be said of any police officer on duty, as if nothing else, it gets him to his destination quicker! The second point is that it sound like whilst the guy was keeping pace with you in lane one, unless he was undertaking other cars whilst you were overtaking, it does not explain why the convoy needed to use the outside lane.
Whilst I understand the use of the lights when exceeding the limit is not necessary, was there a particular reason that you couldnt have observed the speed limit on that occasion?
Again, please dont take this as a dig, it is not. Neither is it an accack on the police as if you have read any other related threads I have commented on I support the action and use of Traffic policing and the police in general. I do feel however, this does give out a mixed message to the general public. Not least of cause, however stupid the guy was, the Mondeo driver, as it sounds like he sped up just to keep pace with you!
Justin,
The point of the matter does not revolve around the fact that this Mondeo driver was driving dangerously or not, it is that he was exceeding the speed limit, not merely nibbling at it but taking big chunks out of it.
I wish that i could tell you the reason for the high speed convoy but i cant, but as Sheepy pointed out we werent going to Alton Towers (mores the pity).
For the record, we would have been more than justified at traveling at max lash but as we had a long way to go i decided to set a medium pace taking up the safest position on the road at that speed and to not alert Members of the public. This comes from experience. In fact, as i recall, the only people that we came up against in lane 3 were people travelling over the limit (90ish). They werent stopped for obviuos reasons but the chap in the Mondeo was a different case and had to be spoken too.
TonyRec said:
Cheers, it does. I am not defending the actions of the Mondeo driver, his defence was stupid to say the least.
However, the fact remains whilst I understand that the Trafpol cars were not called to an emergency, but were travelling in convoy 45mph in excess of the speed limit in the outside lane.
Whilst I understand you may have been making progress for police purposes, that could be said of any police officer on duty, as if nothing else, it gets him to his destination quicker! The second point is that it sound like whilst the guy was keeping pace with you in lane one, unless he was undertaking other cars whilst you were overtaking, it does not explain why the convoy needed to use the outside lane.
Whilst I understand the use of the lights when exceeding the limit is not necessary, was there a particular reason that you couldnt have observed the speed limit on that occasion?
Again, please dont take this as a dig, it is not. Neither is it an accack on the police as if you have read any other related threads I have commented on I support the action and use of Traffic policing and the police in general. I do feel however, this does give out a mixed message to the general public. Not least of cause, however stupid the guy was, the Mondeo driver, as it sounds like he sped up just to keep pace with you!
Justin,
The point of the matter does not revolve around the fact that this Mondeo driver was driving dangerously or not, it is that he was exceeding the speed limit, not merely nibbling at it but taking big chunks out of it.
I wish that i could tell you the reason for the high speed convoy but i cant, but as Sheepy pointed out we werent going to Alton Towers (mores the pity).
For the record, we would have been more than justified at traveling at max lash but as we had a long way to go i decided to set a medium pace taking up the safest position on the road at that speed and to not alert Members of the public. This comes from experience. In fact, as i recall, the only people that we came up against in lane 3 were people travelling over the limit (90ish). They werent stopped for obviuos reasons but the chap in the Mondeo was a different case and had to be spoken too.
Thats cool Tony, I agree he was a prat.
Unfortunately the more you mention about the high speed convoy, the more I am intruiged to the reason!
Guess I shall have to live with that one though.
It wasnt taking those terror suspects to the secret airports was it? Only joking!
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