Speeding - Sometimes safe but not according to Plod....
Discussion
Phatboy317 said:
Why do you assume that there were a lot of riders, or indeed any riders or other traffic at all, on that stretch at the time the OP was caught?
He doesn't assume. Hence the use of the word "sometimes". If he had assumed they were using at the time he would have said riders WERE using the road...He was making a point. A valid and fair one at that.
Phatboy317 said:
Lightning sometimes strikes. Therefore it's not safe to venture outdoors.
He was trying to make a spurious connection between the OP and "terrified riders".
It's not spurious if someone has specific knowledge about a specific stretch of road. He happened to know that the particular stretch of road mentioned is regularly used by riders who are vexed by cars driving at excessive speed. It wasn't a sweeping comment, it was specific.He was trying to make a spurious connection between the OP and "terrified riders".
Mk3Spitfire said:
It's not spurious if someone has specific knowledge about a specific stretch of road. He happened to know that the particular stretch of road mentioned is regularly used by riders who are vexed by cars driving at excessive speed. It wasn't a sweeping comment, it was specific.
It's reasonable to assume that there weren't any riders on that stretch of road at the time, just as it's reasonable to assume that he may not have been doing that speed otherwise.And, as a part-time cyclist myself, I would much prefer to be passed at 80 by someone giving me a wide berth than to be almost pushed off the road by someone doing 60 (which is effectively not much slower than 80) or by a lorry at 40.
It may surprise some people, but drivers - by and large - do actually slow down for hazards and potential hazards, when and where they exist, and the few who don't are unlikely to be fazed by speed limits.
It doesn't really matter, the OP is looking for some fantastically complicated system where the road, time of day, weather, car, drivers ability, other toad users and so on are all magically calculated to determine a suitable speed limit. I think we're a long way from that ever being the case.
Phatboy317 said:
It may surprise some people, but drivers - by and large - do actually slow down for hazards and potential hazards, when and where they exist, and the few who don't are unlikely to be fazed by speed limits.
But this is what authorities cannot comprehend.In their view any member of the public at any given moment is either:
A) Following orders blindly and without question.
Or
B) Acting recklessly on the whim of the moment with no thought of the consequences
The notion of drivers assessing hazards for themselves and avoiding danger on their own initiative is virtually the definition of safe driving, but anathema to the government.
Jon1967x said:
The arrow straight piece of road but one that's still possible to have a hidden camera? Replace camera with 4 year old child playing with a ball that bounces into the road.
That is a stupid argument. That is not how speed limits are set. This would still be fatal if the speed of the vehicle was 40mph. OTBC said:
LEJOG riders sometimes use the A82, if you Google the road you see a lot of riders who say they are terrified by the behaviour of drivers along that stretch. Drivers like the OP. Remember, there does not have to be a fatality on a road for speeding drivers to be intimidatory, aggressive and anti-social (although there have been four fatalities on the road in the last 12 months.
Genuine question, why not leave earlier, leave more time for your journey, that way you won't break the law, won't scare other road users and won't get a fine? Other people manage it, why not you?
I'm assuming you would be quite OK then with someone with a loud but legal exhaust overtaking with 1 metre clearance at 60mph?Genuine question, why not leave earlier, leave more time for your journey, that way you won't break the law, won't scare other road users and won't get a fine? Other people manage it, why not you?
I don't see how 80mph, which is unlawful, is intimidatory when there are no other road users to intimidate but a lawful 60mph in the situation I described above is ok?
Dr Jekyll said:
But this is what authorities cannot comprehend.
In their view any member of the public at any given moment is either:
A) Following orders blindly and without question.
Or
B) Acting recklessly on the whim of the moment with no thought of the consequences
The notion of drivers assessing hazards for themselves and avoiding danger on their own initiative is virtually the definition of safe driving, but anathema to the government.
It's not a question of "the authorities" struggling to comprehend anything. Its the fact that there are laws in place, and it is the authorities job to make sure they are adhered to. That's why limits are set, so that it is much easier to enforce those laws. In their view any member of the public at any given moment is either:
A) Following orders blindly and without question.
Or
B) Acting recklessly on the whim of the moment with no thought of the consequences
The notion of drivers assessing hazards for themselves and avoiding danger on their own initiative is virtually the definition of safe driving, but anathema to the government.
thatguy11 said:
Obviously a penalty system that took into account all the above factors would be horribly convoluted and littered with mitigating circumstances, so such a thing will never be implemented. And I can't help but feel that the current system, although occasionally perfectly fair, also punishes a large number of drivers who, looked at objectively and logically, were no danger to themselves or others.
Yes, it's crude risk-management but it's not practical to have any greater finesse. The roads are here to facilitate people getting from A to B, not a minority of people getting from A to B little bit quicker. Mk3Spitfire said:
Still bringing this one up eh....
Top work, isn't it? After all the millions of times exemptions are used (in marked, unmarked and plain) each year, geniuses bring up one extreme controversial case as if it means anything. Jon1967x said:
It doesn't really matter, the OP is looking for some fantastically complicated system where the road, time of day, weather, car, drivers ability, other toad users and so on are all magically calculated to determine a suitable speed limit. I think we're a long way from that ever being the case.
That's just the point. It's impossible to set a speed limit which caters for all eventualities, at all places and at all times, so speed limits are, at best, arbitrary, and, all in all, not very good tools for road safety. From when man first started travelling, we have always slowed down and exercised more caution in places and at times where and when danger, or perceived danger, exists - when there are a lot of hazards around, where there's little space to manoeuvre and where things can happen very quickly. We slow down in an attempt to mitigate the danger.
This natural behaviour gave rise to the somewhat distorted idea that "slow is safe", even though slowing down doesn't remove the danger but, at best, mitigates it. We slow down because of the danger, the danger doesn't go away because we slow down. In fact, if people are lulled into a sense of false security by low speeds, the danger may even increase.
But this idea gradually morphed from "slow is safe" into "speed kills", creating the impression that it's speed itself that creates the danger, when in fact there's no safety benefit whatsoever in driving at low speeds in places and at times where and when no dangers exist.
Note that I'm not talking about speeds so high that they're likely to lead to loss of control, nor am I talking about joyriders and the like barrelling through estates at insane speeds - those are different matters entirely
Mk3Spitfire said:
Dr Jekyll said:
But this is what authorities cannot comprehend.
In their view any member of the public at any given moment is either:
A) Following orders blindly and without question.
Or
B) Acting recklessly on the whim of the moment with no thought of the consequences
The notion of drivers assessing hazards for themselves and avoiding danger on their own initiative is virtually the definition of safe driving, but anathema to the government.
It's not a question of "the authorities" struggling to comprehend anything. Its the fact that there are laws in place, and it is the authorities job to make sure they are adhered to. That's why limits are set, so that it is much easier to enforce those laws. In their view any member of the public at any given moment is either:
A) Following orders blindly and without question.
Or
B) Acting recklessly on the whim of the moment with no thought of the consequences
The notion of drivers assessing hazards for themselves and avoiding danger on their own initiative is virtually the definition of safe driving, but anathema to the government.
mph1977 said:
Mk3Spitfire said:
voyds9 said:
Speeding - Sometimes safe but not according to Plod....
Unless of course it is the police speeding in a new car learning its abilities. Note that excuse is only believable for a policeman.
Still bringing this one up eh....Unless of course it is the police speeding in a new car learning its abilities. Note that excuse is only believable for a policeman.
The police want to hold the public to a standard they are willing to ignore when it suits them.
voyds9 said:
mph1977 said:
Mk3Spitfire said:
voyds9 said:
Speeding - Sometimes safe but not according to Plod....
Unless of course it is the police speeding in a new car learning its abilities. Note that excuse is only believable for a policeman.
Still bringing this one up eh....Unless of course it is the police speeding in a new car learning its abilities. Note that excuse is only believable for a policeman.
The police want to hold the public to a standard they are willing to ignore when it suits them.
Phatboy317 said:
Jon1967x said:
It doesn't really matter, the OP is looking for some fantastically complicated system where the road, time of day, weather, car, drivers ability, other toad users and so on are all magically calculated to determine a suitable speed limit. I think we're a long way from that ever being the case.
That's just the point. It's impossible to set a speed limit which caters for all eventualities, at all places and at all times, so speed limits are, at best, arbitrary, and, all in all, not very good tools for road safety. From when man first started travelling, we have always slowed down and exercised more caution in places and at times where and when danger, or perceived danger, exists - when there are a lot of hazards around, where there's little space to manoeuvre and where things can happen very quickly. We slow down in an attempt to mitigate the danger.
This natural behaviour gave rise to the somewhat distorted idea that "slow is safe", even though slowing down doesn't remove the danger but, at best, mitigates it. We slow down because of the danger, the danger doesn't go away because we slow down. In fact, if people are lulled into a sense of false security by low speeds, the danger may even increase.
But this idea gradually morphed from "slow is safe" into "speed kills", creating the impression that it's speed itself that creates the danger, when in fact there's no safety benefit whatsoever in driving at low speeds in places and at times where and when no dangers exist.
Note that I'm not talking about speeds so high that they're likely to lead to loss of control, nor am I talking about joyriders and the like barrelling through estates at insane speeds - those are different matters entirely
Don't get me wrong, I am far from the slowest driver on the road and the risk I am prepared to take is a factor of both safety and prosecution. And I've had to take my punishment. Its a choice we all make, if we want to drive on the roads, we have to play by their rules.
Jon1967x said:
if we want to drive on the roads, we have to play by their rules.
That's the whole problem - it's the rules they impose which we are in peril of falling foul of in the process of going about our daily business.It's now not enough to merely drive safely and conscientiously, you now also have to take extra care to avoid exceeding some limit which is set far below the speed most reasonable people would choose to drive at in the absence of such limits.
Will you still have the same accommodating attitude when we have blanket 10mph limits? And if you think that's far fetched, did you envisage ten years ago that we'd be seeing 20mph limits covering whole cities?
Phatboy317 said:
Jon1967x said:
if we want to drive on the roads, we have to play by their rules.
That's the whole problem - it's the rules they impose which we are in peril of falling foul of in the process of going about our daily business.It's now not enough to merely drive safely and conscientiously, you now also have to take extra care to avoid exceeding some limit which is set far below the speed most reasonable people would choose to drive at in the absence of such limits.
Will you still have the same accommodating attitude when we have blanket 10mph limits? And if you think that's far fetched, did you envisage ten years ago that we'd be seeing 20mph limits covering whole cities?
OTBC said:
LEJOG riders sometimes use the A82, if you Google the road you see a lot of riders who say they are terrified by the behaviour of drivers along that stretch. Drivers like the OP. Remember, there does not have to be a fatality on a road for speeding drivers to be intimidatory, aggressive and anti-social (although there have been four fatalities on the road in the last 12 months.
Genuine question, why not leave earlier, leave more time for your journey, that way you won't break the law, won't scare other road users and won't get a fine? Other people manage it, why not you?
Genuine question, are you serious?Genuine question, why not leave earlier, leave more time for your journey, that way you won't break the law, won't scare other road users and won't get a fine? Other people manage it, why not you?
Are you suggesting the only reason individuals exceed the limit is because they are running late?
Frankly I'm amazed you got anywhere near 80 on the A82 yesterday, I had the misfortune of having to drive to Dumbarton and back and it was hellish. The weather conditions were bad, with horizontal rain and high crosswinds.
Not to mention that it's the height of the tourist migration season and there were nose to tail muppets over long stretches of the road.
I'm surprised you got done though, normally the scammera boys don't like going out in the rain because obviously speeding is only dangerous when it's dry and takings will be higher!
Not to mention that it's the height of the tourist migration season and there were nose to tail muppets over long stretches of the road.
I'm surprised you got done though, normally the scammera boys don't like going out in the rain because obviously speeding is only dangerous when it's dry and takings will be higher!
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