If I was Secretary Of State for Transport, I'd...
Discussion
...not really give a s**t. I get a chauffeur driven car for work use, and fully paid up 1st class transport for myself, family and party members and friends, to anywhere in the world. And beside, we have the cheapest, fastest, safest transportation systems in the world, that provides industry with the efficient infrastructure required for todays global economy where the leanest industries win.
Regards
Gordon
Regards
Gordon
The Black Flash said:
xyphod said:
Like a pilots license, a minimum number of hours driving to keep your license otherwise retest. That should get rid of all the sunday drivers
So how do you do that? I know, how about some sort of electronic box that you have to log on to in order to drive. Of course, you'd need to uniquely identify everyone to account for car sharing, say, some sort of ID card. It would suck if you lost it and were unable to drive, but as long as you stop the old folks going out for a bit of pleasure on a sunday and getting in your way, it's worth it. First they came for the sunday drivers...
It's not the idea that is unworkable, it's your "solution".
That said, I don't necessarily agree with xyphod's idea. The thing that would prevent his idea from becoming practice is more to do with whether it is fair or not then whether you think it would be too complicated. (Mainly because I don't drive enough by some PHers standards, I prefer the train
)The things I would do would probably be around the rationalisation of the number of rules/regulations. I see part of the problem is that there probably are too many rules and regulations about driving. There should be some sort of elegance in simplicity. As someone posted earlier, remove silly specific offenses along the lines of "Driving whilst eating a Sunday Roast on the third Tuesday of the month" and just allow discretionary use of something akin to "Poor standard of driving".
109 Bob said:
your chances of walking away unhurt are very slim, the same as being involved in an accident on a motorway.
Give over, accidents on m'ways are rarely fatal, they're the safest roads of all, and i would say that a great many of those causes of accidents that do happen would not be addressed by training.109 Bob said:
The Black Flash said:
109 Bob said:
The Black Flash said:
No, you don't, because in your mind it would only inconvenience other people. You see?
So what about people who don't live near to a normal driving test centre. Should they be allowed to drive anyway, with no training or licence? A driving test centre can be put anywhere. A motorway can't.
To take your test you have to get yourself to a test centre for a certain time. The choice whether to add the motorway part of the test would be your own decision & may be left open for a few years or so. If you don't drive on motorways then you don't need it so no problem, you can still drive. If you do need it then you book an appointment & make your way there, with the added bonus of being able to drive yourself.
Before we get to that though, you still haven't said why it's a good idea. Forget the how for a minute, what are you trying to achieve by this, and what evidence do you have that more testing will achieve it?
109 Bob said:
I don't know how far you live from a motorway but it can't be much more than a hundred miles or so, so maybe a couple of hours drive & not the end of the world that you'd have us believe.
I drive on the motorway every day. I don't see driving standards being particularly bad on the motorway compared to the rest of the road network, without a specific M-way test.the-gofer said:
The Black Flash said:
xyphod said:
Like a pilots license, a minimum number of hours driving to keep your license otherwise retest. That should get rid of all the sunday drivers
So how do you do that? I know, how about some sort of electronic box that you have to log on to in order to drive. Of course, you'd need to uniquely identify everyone to account for car sharing, say, some sort of ID card. It would suck if you lost it and were unable to drive, but as long as you stop the old folks going out for a bit of pleasure on a sunday and getting in your way, it's worth it. First they came for the sunday drivers...
the-gofer said:
Or heaven forbid, you lose your car keys (many of which are cards these days) and were then unable to drive your car.
Yup, an unfortunately necessary pain. But I wouldn't want to increase that pain by introducing yet another key, or whatever.the-gofer said:
It's not the idea that is unworkable, it's your "solution".
Any solution will involve some form of logging on a per-person basis, which has to be reasonably tamper proof. You're creating another reason for people to falsify information, hence you need more laws and enforcement to punish them, and so on, and so forth. I want to see fewer administrative laws, not more.the-gofer said:
The things I would do would probably be around the rationalisation of the number of rules/regulations. I see part of the problem is that there probably are too many rules and regulations about driving. There should be some sort of elegance in simplicity. As someone posted earlier, remove silly specific offenses along the lines of "Driving whilst eating a Sunday Roast on the third Tuesday of the month" and just allow discretionary use of something akin to "Poor standard of driving".
Now you're talking 
With the caveat that the accused had their day in court, rather than being a summary offence.The Black Flash said:
Facts are, for all the annoyance of MLMs and their buddies, motorways are the safest roads in the country. So what would your suggestion achieve, apart from costing me more tax, and making life more difficult for millions?
It would achieve safer motorways and encourage more driver training,which has to be a good thing.
I think the UK is one of the few countries in Europe which
doesn't have motorway training and testing as part of the
usual driving test and boy oh boy oh boy can we tell when we drive
on UK motorways.
I think any point of view which is against more training and
more skill for UK drivers has to be viewed in a negative light.
Presumably you are happy to pay over the odds every year
in car insurance for inadequately trained and tested drivers ?
I know I am not, and I would encourage the Driving Standards
Agency to increase standards.
dcb said:
The Black Flash said:
Facts are, for all the annoyance of MLMs and their buddies, motorways are the safest roads in the country. So what would your suggestion achieve, apart from costing me more tax, and making life more difficult for millions?
It would achieve safer motorways and encourage more driver training,which has to be a good thing.
Then lets see a cost/benefit analysis that shows that any improvements are worth the inconvenience and extra cost. Assertions are easy to make, but policy needs to be based on evidence IMO.
Motorways are already the safest roads there are. This is a matter of fact. Hence not the first place I'd start looking to make improvements.
dcb said:
I think the UK is one of the few countries in Europe which
doesn't have motorway training and testing as part of the
usual driving test and boy oh boy oh boy can we tell when we drive
on UK motorways.
Really? Try a french or italian motorway at rush hour, then tell me how bad things are over here.doesn't have motorway training and testing as part of the
usual driving test and boy oh boy oh boy can we tell when we drive
on UK motorways.
French autoroutes are a pleasure compared to ours most of the time, but that's because there is less traffic density. Around the big cities it's an appalling free-for-all in my experience.
dcb said:
I think any point of view which is against more training and
more skill for UK drivers has to be viewed in a negative light.
I am all for more training, where the costs of doing so outweigh the benefits. If you could make everyone have a retest every week, but it would only save one life a year, would you do it?more skill for UK drivers has to be viewed in a negative light.
dcb said:
Presumably you are happy to pay over the odds every year
in car insurance for inadequately trained and tested drivers ?
Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying in car insurance for inadequately trained and tested drivers ?
dcb said:
I know I am not, and I would encourage the Driving Standards
Agency to increase standards.
Absolutely. I think that can be done in more effective ways than a mandatory m-way test though. Teaching observation skills and to leave an appropriate gap would be a good start, and I don't mean in stupid computer programs either.Agency to increase standards.
heebeegeetee said:
109 Bob said:
your chances of walking away unhurt are very slim, the same as being involved in an accident on a motorway.
Give over, accidents on m'ways are rarely fatal, they're the safest roads of all, and i would say that a great many of those causes of accidents that do happen would not be addressed by training.109 Bob said:
heebeegeetee said:
109 Bob said:
your chances of walking away unhurt are very slim, the same as being involved in an accident on a motorway.
Give over, accidents on m'ways are rarely fatal, they're the safest roads of all, and i would say that a great many of those causes of accidents that do happen would not be addressed by training.If you were involved in an accident on the motorway last year, you had an 88% chance of walking away unhurt. That is not "very slim" in anyone's book.
The Black Flash said:
109 Bob said:
The Black Flash said:
109 Bob said:
The Black Flash said:
No, you don't, because in your mind it would only inconvenience other people. You see?
So what about people who don't live near to a normal driving test centre. Should they be allowed to drive anyway, with no training or licence? A driving test centre can be put anywhere. A motorway can't.
To take your test you have to get yourself to a test centre for a certain time. The choice whether to add the motorway part of the test would be your own decision & may be left open for a few years or so. If you don't drive on motorways then you don't need it so no problem, you can still drive. If you do need it then you book an appointment & make your way there, with the added bonus of being able to drive yourself.
Before we get to that though, you still haven't said why it's a good idea. Forget the how for a minute, what are you trying to achieve by this, and what evidence do you have that more testing will achieve it?
109 Bob said:
I don't know how far you live from a motorway but it can't be much more than a hundred miles or so, so maybe a couple of hours drive & not the end of the world that you'd have us believe.
I drive on the motorway every day. I don't see driving standards being particularly bad on the motorway compared to the rest of the road network, without a specific M-way test.I would like to achieve safer motorways for everyone. A lot of people realise that speed is not the problem but peoples lack of ability is. Some peoples perception & observation skills are terrible, some people don't know which lane they should be in, some people don't know how to overtake safely, some people don't even know how to join a motorway or at what speed, I'm even convinced that some people don't know how to use a wing mirror, not just to lazy to use them but actually don't know how, and a hundred other things as well. And all of these problems are quadrupled in August & Christmas holidays.
Admittedly a lot of problems could be dealt with by simple tuition, but I also think there is nothing better than a new driver being accompanied by someone who knows what they are doing on their fist motorway experience, to give tips & pointers on how & how not to drive correctly.
And to be honest most of this could be done with proper simulators under proper tuition at your local test centre, so a two hour drive from St.Ives wouldn't be necessary at all. And as for evidence I don't have any apart from spending the last eleven years of my working life mostly on motorways & observing a lot of people that are quite frankly accidents waiting to happen.
Edited by 109 Bob on Tuesday 20th October 14:53
The Black Flash said:
109 Bob said:
heebeegeetee said:
109 Bob said:
your chances of walking away unhurt are very slim, the same as being involved in an accident on a motorway.
Give over, accidents on m'ways are rarely fatal, they're the safest roads of all, and i would say that a great many of those causes of accidents that do happen would not be addressed by training.If you were involved in an accident on the motorway last year, you had an 88% chance of walking away unhurt. That is not "very slim" in anyone's book.
So it's ok for accidents to happen because 88% of people don't die? I don't care what statistics say, if I were to choose where to have an accident it most certainly wouldn't be doing 70mph on a motorway. I'd probably choose a 30mph built up area which people are taught to drive in. I still find it crazy that people are taught to drive in that sort of area but not on the fastest roads in our country which are a totally different environment.
Edited by 109 Bob on Tuesday 20th October 15:01
109 Bob said:
The Black Flash said:
109 Bob said:
heebeegeetee said:
109 Bob said:
your chances of walking away unhurt are very slim, the same as being involved in an accident on a motorway.
Give over, accidents on m'ways are rarely fatal, they're the safest roads of all, and i would say that a great many of those causes of accidents that do happen would not be addressed by training.If you were involved in an accident on the motorway last year, you had an 88% chance of walking away unhurt. That is not "very slim" in anyone's book.
Seriously, I've seen some people walk away from accidents you wouldn't believe.
ZesPak said:
109 Bob said:
The Black Flash said:
109 Bob said:
heebeegeetee said:
109 Bob said:
your chances of walking away unhurt are very slim, the same as being involved in an accident on a motorway.
Give over, accidents on m'ways are rarely fatal, they're the safest roads of all, and i would say that a great many of those causes of accidents that do happen would not be addressed by training.If you were involved in an accident on the motorway last year, you had an 88% chance of walking away unhurt. That is not "very slim" in anyone's book.
Seriously, I've seen some people walk away from accidents you wouldn't believe.
that's a joke right? What is that? And more importantly: does it has an airbag?109 Bob said:
St. Ives to the the M5 is a two hour drive, you have an hours test, a cup of tea & you're home for lunch. As I say, not the end of the world.
Funny, it took me three hours just recently.Whichever, you're talking a 6 hour round trip minimum, which equals a day off work, not to mention the cost.
109 Bob said:
And as for evidence I don't have any apart from spending the last eleven years of my working life mostly on motorways & observing a lot of people that are quite frankly accidents waiting to happen.
Accidents waiting to happen? Yet you can expect to drive 12.5 million kilometers before being involved in one.The evidence is there, and it does not support the need for what you are saying.
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