Speeding Does Not Cause Accidents

[emmaT2014]

DocSteve said:

emmaT2014 said:

it isn't and you have no evidence it is nor does DocSteve.
List all UK road safety programs and then analyse the list to see if "the focus seems to mainly be on speed with regard to road safety" is justifiable. When you do as I suggest you will find it is not.
I'm not listing them for it was not I that made the first idle claim.

It wasn't an idle claim. I said that the focus "seems" to be mainly on speed. There may or may not be plenty of road safety initiatives that are unrelated to motorists adhering to set speed limits. However, the message that is most strongly disseminated to the general public is that speed is the main problem. I doubt you can deny that the majority of people consider safe driving to mean driving within the speed limit rather than seeking to improve their driving standards irrespective of this.

On the contrary; the majority of people are very happy with safety efforts; it is a tiny minority who make claims such as yours on tiny minority sites and in popular media. That is why what 'seems' to be the case in your view is not the view of the majority; it just seems so to you and a small number of like minded people.

[emmaT2014]

otolith said:

vonhosen said:

You will have moved position in respect of what it's reasonable for others to expect when they are making judgement calls in relation to your speed, because those parameters have changed.

The reasonable expectations of other traffic need to be taken into account - however one should be considering what is an appropriate speed around other road users either way.

One should! But one should also do that and remain within the regulated maximum otherwise those doing so will come into conflict with those who do not.

[otolith]

emmaT2014 said:

otolith said:

If the limit on my local road drops from 60 to 50 tonight, will the speed I did today become more dangerous? If the speed limit is 60, is there a step change in risk the instant I exceed it?

It's safer to crash at 40 than 50 and 50 than 60, what influence does the number on a stick have?

It has been established that there is a step-change in the average speed of traffic that follows a change in the speed limit. if your speed in the new limit is high with respect to the new limit then it will present a hightened risk of danger than it did in the higher limit.

That makes no sense. I think what you are trying to say is that the level of risk the law arbitrarily permits has been lowered - which is irrelevant to the absolute level of risk.

emmaT2014 said:

The lower the speed carried into a collision, the lower the potential for damage and injury so yes it is preferable to collide at lower speeds than high speed. Tak a t-bone incident with a motorcycle on car collisio. At 20mph the motorcycle will not intrude so much o the passenger compartment of the car and the rider of the bike and car driver may well both live with serious or slight injury. Now take a 70mph collision; the motorcycle will intrude most of the way through the car, kill the driver, cut the rider in half and send the top part of his body and head a long way down the road. Go figure whether your question was really deserving of an answer or just a

Sure. It's basic physics. Show me the term in the equations of motion for the prevailing speed limit.

[vonhosen]

otolith said:

vonhosen said:

You will have moved position in respect of what it's reasonable for others to expect when they are making judgement calls in relation to your speed, because those parameters have changed.

The reasonable expectations of other traffic need to be taken into account - however one should be considering what is an appropriate speed around other road users either way.

An appropriate speed around other road users is already defined.
A safe speed for the conditions up to but not beyond the posted limit.

[otolith]

emmaT2014 said:

One should! But one should also do that and remain within the regulated maximum otherwise those doing so will come into conflict with those who do not.

The speed limit is one piece of information useful to factor into other people's expectations of speed. It's also a useful piece of information to consider if one wishes to avoid prosecution. It has little other use.

[otolith]

vonhosen said:

An appropriate speed around other road users is already defined.
A safe speed for the conditions up to but not beyond the posted limit.

I care about safety and the avoidance of points. I don't really care about exceeding the limit so long as I can maintain those objectives. I have no respect for the law in principle in this matter.

[vonhosen]

otolith said:

vonhosen said:

An appropriate speed around other road users is already defined.
A safe speed for the conditions up to but not beyond the posted limit.

I care about safety and the avoidance of points. I don't really care about exceeding the limit so long as I can maintain those objectives. I have no respect for the law in principle in this matter.

By exceeding the limits you do potentially compromise those though, by placing yourself outside the reasonable expectations of others & by placing yourself at risk of prosecution where detected. Your choice of course, but you do say you care about those.

[otolith]

Not if I only exceed the limit where there is neither anybody else to be affected nor any speed enforcement. I drive at the lower of what I believe is safe and what I believe is likely to get me into trouble, and along with the prevailing limit the probability of coming across enforcement is part of the judgement of what speed will get me into trouble.

[vonhosen]

otolith said:

Not if I only exceed the limit where there is neither anybody else to be affected nor any speed enforcement. I drive at the lower of what I believe is safe and what I believe is likely to get me into trouble, and along with the prevailing limit the probability of coming across enforcement is part of the judgement of what speed will get me into trouble.

That also relies on you never making a mistake or missing seeing another road user/speed enforcement, are you that good?

[DocSteve]

emmaT2014 said:

On the contrary; the majority of people are very happy with safety efforts; it is a tiny minority who make claims such as yours on tiny minority sites and in popular media. That is why what 'seems' to be the case in your view is not the view of the majority; it just seems so to you and a small number of like minded people.

I wasn't disputing whether the public as a whole are happy with road safety efforts.

What I was saying is that the public generally consider speed to be the main issue when it comes to road safety. No doubt they may be happy with this but what is being said on here is that this is only one of many issues with respect to individual driving behaviour.

Take the adverts - hit a child at 40/30/20 and x/y/z happens: "It's 30 for a reason". How about focusing on anticipating and avoiding the child in the first place?

Anyway, it appears we are arguing about separate things and no doubt in fact hold similar views but are approaching them in different ways...

[otolith]

vonhosen said:

otolith said:

Not if I only exceed the limit where there is neither anybody else to be affected nor any speed enforcement. I drive at the lower of what I believe is safe and what I believe is likely to get me into trouble, and along with the prevailing limit the probability of coming across enforcement is part of the judgement of what speed will get me into trouble.

That also relies on you never making a mistake or missing seeing another road user/speed enforcement, are you that good?

Nobody is perfect - but one can make misjudgements at any speed, and often the limit is irrelevant in the sense that both the appropriate speed and the mistake are below the limit. We trust ourselves to make those judgements all the time, with much finer granularity than that at which limits are set. In terms of avoiding enforcement, I've had one ticket in twenty-odd years, but perhaps I choose to exceed the limit less frequently than you imagine I do.

[vonhosen]

otolith said:

vonhosen said:

otolith said:

Not if I only exceed the limit where there is neither anybody else to be affected nor any speed enforcement. I drive at the lower of what I believe is safe and what I believe is likely to get me into trouble, and along with the prevailing limit the probability of coming across enforcement is part of the judgement of what speed will get me into trouble.

That also relies on you never making a mistake or missing seeing another road user/speed enforcement, are you that good?

Nobody is perfect - but one can make misjudgements at any speed, and often the limit is irrelevant in the sense that both the appropriate speed and the mistake are below the limit. We trust ourselves to make those judgements all the time, with much finer granularity than that at which limits are set. In terms of avoiding enforcement, I've had one ticket in twenty-odd years, but perhaps I choose to exceed the limit less frequently than you imagine I do.

it's not irrelevant where you miss seeing somebody who is expecting you (& making judgements based on expecting you) to be travelling at a speed within the limits.

[Hackney]

DocSteve said:

Take the adverts - hit a child at 40/30/20 and x/y/z happens: "It's 30 for a reason". How about focusing on anticipating and avoiding the child in the first place?

How about focussing on preventing children from wandering about on roads?

[Phatboy317]

vonhosen said:

You will have moved position in respect of what it's reasonable for others to expect when they are making judgement calls in relation to your speed, because those parameters have changed.

Are you seriously suggesting that a 10mph change in speed is going to make a significant difference in that respect?

[vonhosen]

Phatboy317 said:

vonhosen said:

You will have moved position in respect of what it's reasonable for others to expect when they are making judgement calls in relation to your speed, because those parameters have changed.

Are you seriously suggesting that a 10mph change in speed is going to make a significant difference in that respect?

It can make the difference.

Somebody doing 40 where you were expecting them to be doing no more than 30 is going to be at least 33% over what you were reasonably expecting.

[Phatboy317]

vonhosen said:

It can make the difference.

Somebody doing 40 where you were expecting them to be doing no more than 30 is going to be at least 33% over what you were reasonably expecting.

If I'm about to cross the road, and I see a car I judge to be doing 30mph coming along, and I judge that I'll be able to cross safely without causing them to have to slow down, and that car is actually doing 40mph, it will be able to stop in time to avoid hitting me, UNLESS I have ALSO grossly underestimated the time it takes me to get across the road - and even then, only if I have cut things very fine indeed.

As the Americans say, do the math.

[rich888]

Some very interesting and contrasting posts, so hope you don't mind me adding to the thread.

From my own experience as a driver and a pedestrian I must say that I've noticed recently that speed limits are being meddled with and limits dropped, for no good reason apart from a few accidents that are speed related, but when looked at closer, there was nothing actually wrong with the original speed limit imposed, what caused the accidents was a combination of inexperience, stupidity and an excessive speed well above that considered safe and far above the speed limit imposed. End result being head on accidents and dead bodies.

Whether the limit was set at 60, 50, 40, 30 or 20 is irrelevant if the drivers involved ignore the limits in the first place by massive margins and drive like complete idiots, and in the process and kill themselves and sometimes other motorists whom just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Dropping the limit of a wide open straight road from 60 down to 40 on the grounds that it will make it safer for everyone just frustrates most drivers. Am guessing this will result in more motorists overtaking others and in the process potentially increasing the chance of accidents rather than decreasing the accident rate.

In the USA in the 1970s they introduced a blanket 55mph limit in the belief that it would reduce accidents but it didn't, it merely caused much annoyance and frustration by drivers across the country, the limit was later repealed when the country ground to a halt after several motoring organisations worked together to actually drive at 55mph.

Much research was done in the USA to determine the safest speed to drive at on a given stretch of road which would result in the lowest numbers of accidents and this revealed itself to be the 85th percentile of average speeds when no limits were imposed. In other words, the speed limit across a given stretch of road was set to that driven by 85 out of 100 motorists. Now this is in stark contrast to the simplistic mindset used for speed limits across the UK where a bunch of councillors get together, discuss the best way to reduce the possibility of accidents and simply drop the limits.

It would also seem that speed camera tax revenue is also fogging the issue nowadays which is resulting in limits being moved up and down like a yoyo by councils keen to catch motorists out and cash in on potential speeding revenue, though I am sure that fines go direct to London so speed cameras are actually sucking money out of the local economy and the high-street which isn't good.

Surely it's in the best interests of safety for the motorists and pedestrians to have the driver looking out onto the road for potential risks, rather than having to be continually scanning the side of the road for speed limit changes then checking his speedometer to ensure he's complying.

Edited by rich888 on Sunday 19th October 23:00

[otolith]

vonhosen said:

It can make the difference.

Somebody doing 40 where you were expecting them to be doing no more than 30 is going to be at least 33% over what you were reasonably expecting.

That's quite a large margin in the sort of place one is likely to come across people with expectations of traffic speed. It's not really comparable to 80 on the motorway or 60 on a well sighted straight on an NSL B-road downgraded to 50.

[Trax]

emmaT2014 said:

otolith said:

vonhosen said:

You will have moved position in respect of what it's reasonable for others to expect when they are making judgement calls in relation to your speed, because those parameters have changed.

The reasonable expectations of other traffic need to be taken into account - however one should be considering what is an appropriate speed around other road users either way.

One should! But one should also do that and remain within the regulated maximum otherwise those doing so will come into conflict with those who do not.

It's that kind of unjointed thinking in the safety partnerships that is causing far more deaths than should happen on our roads.

You imply that driving above a prescribed limit causiers conflict with those that don't? Thats as stupid as saying that those that drive below the limit cause conflict with those that drive at the limit speed.

[vonhosen]

Phatboy317 said:

vonhosen said:

It can make the difference.

Somebody doing 40 where you were expecting them to be doing no more than 30 is going to be at least 33% over what you were reasonably expecting.

If I'm about to cross the road, and I see a car I judge to be doing 30mph coming along, and I judge that I'll be able to cross safely without causing them to have to slow down, and that car is actually doing 40mph, it will be able to stop in time to avoid hitting me, UNLESS I have ALSO grossly underestimated the time it takes me to get across the road - and even then, only if I have cut things very fine indeed.

As the Americans say, do the math.

And it could be somebody with a less developed sense/appreciation of speed having to make the judgement. It's not only about you, it's about catering for all & creating a framework that achieves the best compromise.

A minimum of 33% in such a case isn't a small difference.

I believe the math is (assuming all else being equal with a good reaction time by the driver in each case of 0.67secs & a deceleration of 8.5m/s-2, which represents a fairly good modern car with ABS)

That the 30mph car will take 19.56m to stop & the 40mph car will take 30.79m.
The result of that is that at the point in the road that the 30mph car has come to a stop the 40mph car will still be doing 30.89mph (which will hurt).

That's because when you increase speed you are much further down the road before you even hit the brakes & a lot of your speed is lost in the last metres, which results in high impact speeds at the position in the road slower vehicles have already stopped. Fairly modest increases can result in high impact speeds.

If we do the same with 70mph v 100mph, the speed for the 100mph car at the point in the road that the 70mph car has come to a stop is 76.34mph.

Edited by vonhosen on Monday 20th October 06:40