Monday 11th August 2008

Biggest Road Death Reductions In Camera Free Zones

Safety campaigners call for Gatso ban after police slash road deaths without them

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Road safety campaigners have called for speed cameras to be banned after police almost halved road deaths without them. Just two forces in Britain are understood to shun fixed speed traps and both have recorded huge reductions in road deaths.

Even though Durham Constabulary only gets £169,000 in fines - tiny compared to those using fixed cameras - its force has cut its road death toll from 44 in 1998 to 26 last year, a drop of over 40%. Neighbouring forces have raked in millions of pounds by using Gatsos but have not seen such large reductions.

Northumbria has 45 fixed cameras and 104 mobile sites and collected more than £3million. However the only other force in the country to have banned fixed cameras is nearby North Yorkshire and road deaths have dropped 15%.

Claire Armstrong, of the anti-fixed camera campaign group Safe Speed, said: 'Speed cameras are not saving lives. The police presence on the road is no longer there. You can drive up and down all day and not see a single police car. It is very worrying. Speed cameras just target the ordinary, law-abiding motorist who goes a few miles an hour over the limit but isn’t driving dangerously.The result is that the relationship between the police and the public is now at an all-time low.'

In Durham – which has just one mobile speed camera, - the force’s policy is to operate 'common sense' policing and work with drivers to improve road safety. 

PC Dave Nixon, the county’s casualty reduction officer, said: 'We police by public consent. The decision was taken at the highest level that we could do this in a proportionate manner. We felt that we could keep our local community on side, so that when we need help on other things, they wouldn’t be reluctant to help us.'

 

[Skinner.Daddy]

SOMEBODY IN POWER LISTEN!!!

Get more plod on the roads and get rid of pointless cameras. Just leave the ones in places like outside schools.

Get rid of undercover cars too, Police presence will reduce deaths and get dangerous drivers off the roads.

We all know speed cameras don't catch drink/drug drivers

[White-Noise]

Sounds promising but will it be?

[stevesingo]

I wonder how much the forces using fixed cameras are spending on responding to and dealing with the incidents and deaths the fixed cameras are not preventing? It would be interesting to see how the economics of this stacks up.

Surely there is a case for fixed cameras a vulnerable spots like schools ect, but with variable limits with electronic signs so to provide safety when required and traffic flow at other times.

Sounds too sensible to me

Steve

[sublimatica]

Lies, damn lies, and statistics...

The article said:

Even though Durham Constabulary only gets £169,000 in fines - tiny compared to those using fixed cameras - its force has cut its road death toll from 44 in 1998 to 26 last year, a drop of over 40%. Neighbouring forces have raked in millions of pounds by using Gatsos but have not seen such large reductions.

These are relatively small numbers of deaths and so it's likely that the inevitable variations year-on-year will translate small actual numbers into large percentages, making for impressive headlines. On their own, though, these figures aren't enough to give the whole picture. Is this "40% reduction" part of a continuous and demonstrable downward trend in Durham or is Safe Speed simply siezing on this one figure as a way of publishing disingenuous headlines in support of its (commendable) objectives?

And what of those forces who embrace the cameras with enthusiasm? How do the trends in their figures compare?

An attention-grabbing article without much substance, sadly.

[cuneus]

This is cherry picking at it's worst

http://www.durham.gov.uk/durhamcc/usp.nsf/pws/Your...

for the full picture

Edited by cuneus on Monday 11th August 11:56

[Driller]

You guys aren't really naïve enough to believe that the government is going to give up all the millions of pounds of revenue the GATSOs generate, just because they don't reduce road deaths are you?

You'll be saying that the media tells the whole truth and doesn't distort the facts next...

[julianc]

Driller said:

You guys aren't really naïve enough to believe that the government is going to give up all the millions of pounds of revenue the GATSOs generate, just because they don't reduce road deaths are you?

You'll be saying that the media tells the whole truth and doesn't distort the facts next...

+1

Statement of the bleeding obvious in the OP, really, but there's no chance anything will change.

[Tony*T3]

Sorry but "Safe Speed" is not a "saftey Campaigners" organisation. Its simple a blog that rants about its arguement for banning cameras.

I dont have issues with their arguements about cameras and usage, but quite frankly the way they present those arguements is deeply flawed. No one of influence is going to look at their website and come away thinking "they're so right, how could we not have seen this before?" when the main page has an advert centre stage for a solicitor that can help find the 'trick' to finding a 'defect' on a NIP. It smacks of people advocating avoidance of the law through loopholes.

Take a quick look at this rather childishly presented arguments and out of date headlines on the main website. www.safespeed.org.uk . The whole thing looks like one mans poorly presented rant directed at like minded people. Persuading 'like minded' people that you are right is easy. Persuading skeptics takes so much more.

you dont win arguments by ranting or presenting your case so poorly that your apponents just roll their eyes and go "tut, nutter alert". You dont win argeuments by saying your and 'anti-road camera' organisation. You dont win argeuments by affiliating yourself to 'Pistonheads - Speed Matters' websites.

I know the 'driving force' behind safe speed has sadly moved on from this planet. Maybe its time for "Safe-Speed" to move on from the style and presentation used in the past and take those argeuments to a style that more adequately handles a professional Public Relations type approach.


It always irritated me that PH was a mouthpiece for SafeSpeed. When SafeSpeed gets its articles published first by properly recognised motoring organistion websites rather then I might conceed that they deserve an article on PH.

[dan101smith]

Skinner.Daddy said:

Just leave the ones in places like outside schools.

Why do they only work around places like schools?

[Skinner.Daddy]

cuneus said:

This is cherry picking at it's worst

http://www.durham.gov.uk/durhamcc/usp.nsf/pws/Your...

for the full picture

Edited by cuneus on Monday 11th August 11:56

In what way? All the figures in the table clearly show that the number of accidents are down and generally (other than an inevitable fluctuation) decreasing over the years.

[Skinner.Daddy]

dan101smith said:

Skinner.Daddy said:

Just leave the ones in places like outside schools.

Why do they only work around places like schools?

I'm not saying that's the only place they work, I'm saying if they were all to be taken down then leave the ones outside of schools (and other REAL high risk areas) because that's where they are actually bringing some beneiit in the way of safety to children

[PhantomPH]

dan101smith said:

Skinner.Daddy said:

Just leave the ones in places like outside schools.

Why do they only work around places like schools?

And also - please don't. I want drivers looking at the road and associated dangers (you know - opening their eyes and looking for kids wandering out from the curb), instead of watching their speedometer, please.

If the highway code has braking distances that include thinking time, then it needs to also modify this for 'time it takes to look up from your speedometer - adjust focus - assess genuine hazards - then brake'.

In my experience as a father, when kids are out and about around schools (start and end of the day), there are so many cars/adults/hazards, that the speed limit around the school is limited hugely anyway. Try doing even 30mph outside a school that's gates have just opened - not possible. School buses, kids, parents, cars, lollypop elderlies...schools are much 'safer' outside by virtue of the sheer AMOUNT of activity around at the key times.

P~

Edited by PhantomPH on Monday 11th August 12:13

[paddy27]

Skinner.Daddy said:

dan101smith said:

Skinner.Daddy said:

Just leave the ones in places like outside schools.

Why do they only work around places like schools?

I'm not saying that's the only place they work, I'm saying if they were all to be taken down then leave the ones outside of schools (and other REAL high risk areas) because that's where they are actually bringing some beneiit in the way of safety to children

I have yet to see how a speed camera can bring any kind of benefit. Would think a school is the worst place to have one. Try getting people to walk instead of parking everywhere and letting kids run across the road without looking first.

[mmltonge]

Thanks to the person who linked to the Durham overall statistics, it proves what I was questioning in my mind. "Is this a one off or a sustained trend?" - those full stats show this is indeed a sustained trend, if you graphed the set of stats for both accidents and casualties you would get a graph with a general downward trend year on year (a couple of blips '02 and '03) which shows the policing is working in that county.

Not sure why you thought those stats showed something completely the opposite mind you...

[LukeBird]

What spin will the government put on this to dispose of it quietly?
I'm going to make a stab that all the people who completed the research are led away for psychological 'investigations'.

[Graemsay]

Northumbria Police has an annual budget of £320 million.

£3 million from fines is 1% of this, so the argument that speed cameras and traps are a stealth tax on motorists is (IMO) misleading.

[mmltonge]

Tony*T3 said:

It always irritated me that PH was a mouthpiece for SafeSpeed. When SafeSpeed gets its articles published first by properly recognised motoring organistion websites rather then I might conceed that they deserve an article on PH.

Just to let you know Tony this was first published in national newspapers (however tabloid they may be) The Sun and Daily Express. If you'd like a list of the many many other places which publish some SS Press Releases or ask SS for comment on Motoring items then head over to

http://www.safespeed.org.uk/forum/viewforum.php?f=... - you'll see it goes a fair bit beyond PH

Edited by mmltonge on Monday 11th August 12:27

[mmltonge]

Graemsay said:

Northumbria Police has an annual budget of £320 million.

£3 million from fines is 1% of this, so the argument that speed cameras and traps are a stealth tax on motorists is (IMO) misleading.

Not really.... £3million is still £3million extra pounds collected in one county on top of all your other taxes. Therefore it can quite comfortably be described as a stealth tax. Or are you saying you'd turn your nose up at £3million?

[STASH1]

It seems to me that you have to keep one eye on other road users and one looking out for the various types of camera.surely this is a distraction and in many cases im sure must have caused accidents.does anyone else share this point of view ?

[cuneus]

mmltonge said:

Thanks to the person who linked to the Durham overall statistics, it proves what I was questioning in my mind. "Is this a one off or a sustained trend?" - those full stats show this is indeed a sustained trend, if you graphed the set of stats for both accidents and casualties you would get a graph with a general downward trend year on year (a couple of blips '02 and '03) which shows the policing is working in that county.

Not sure why you thought those stats showed something completely the opposite mind you...

Indeed you have made the point that should have been made about the overall trend. It would be easy to pick another 2 years and say xx% increase in deaths.

The std dev for the data is over 7