2003 fatalities from road crashes
Discussion
dmsims said:
Does anyone have the national figure and the figures from each region compared to 2002
This is what I've gathered so far from web sites and newspaper reports:
County 2002 2003
Bedfordshire 52 32
Cheshire 70 68
Cumbria 49 55
Derbyshire 61 63
Dorset 54 50
Durham 42 42
Essex 92 116
Hampshire 96 114
Kent 113 103
Lancashire 66 88
Lincolnshire 91 103
Staffordshire 62 90
Northamptonshire 62 62
Totals 910 986
Increase 8.4%
National 3413 3698 <= projected total
percentage known 26.7%
Apologies for formatting.
With 26.7% of fatality information for 2003, we've seen an entirely unprecedented 8.4% rise in road deaths.
If this same rise is projected across the whole of GB we will have had 3,698 fatalities in 2003 - up by about 300 on 2002, and the highest since 1993.
Looking forward from 1993 and based on 40+ years of fatality rate trend ANYONE would have predicted deaths falling to about 2,000 per annum in 2003.
If these early 2003 figures prove typical we now have some 45% of all road deaths caused by speed cameras and the policies that support them. Really. I've searched and searched for other causes of the loss of trend and I've found nothing else that fits.
Best Regards,
Paul Smith
Safe Speed
www.safespeed.org.uk
I'm not getting into statistics for I have learnt that if you ask anybody what two and two is they will say four. Write two and two on a blackboard and it is twentytwo?
Wasn't last year a record year on new vehicles being registered?
So if the number of new vehicles were greater than the number of old vehicles taken off the road then more use is being made of our inadequate road structure system leading to more conflict/accidents? How does this simple equation fit into fatal fiqures?
That cameras cause accidents is balony. They are caused by the nut behind the wheel. Period.
DVD
(30 years at the roadside in the blood and gore dealing with them not pushing fiqures from behind a desk)
Wasn't last year a record year on new vehicles being registered?
So if the number of new vehicles were greater than the number of old vehicles taken off the road then more use is being made of our inadequate road structure system leading to more conflict/accidents? How does this simple equation fit into fatal fiqures?
That cameras cause accidents is balony. They are caused by the nut behind the wheel. Period.
DVD
(30 years at the roadside in the blood and gore dealing with them not pushing fiqures from behind a desk)
Dwight VanDriver said:
That cameras cause accidents is balony. They are caused by the nut behind the wheel. Period.
Well you are right. And wrong.
Of course cameras do not cause accidents.
Of course the driver is to blame. I think the figure for mechanical failure accidents is about 2 or 3 percent? The rest must be caused by road users, and largely that must be the driver...
However. The point is:
Does the policy of putting up speed cameras reduce accidents. Maybe. Maybe not.
Are other accident prevention policies, which might be better than cameras, being ignored because too much of the attention and resources available are being expended on the cameras.
In cash terms this would be viewed as "opportunity cost" - its not nice to think about it in terms of lives lost.
Would we be better off putting our money into different forms of accident prevention? I would contend that the answer to this is yes.
We need a proper, level-headed, non-PC study that looks into RTAs, their causes and recommends the most appropriate method of combatting them. Getting this study is going to be nigh-on impossible and getting it to be free-thinking even more difficult. There is simply too much dogma in the Road Safety "industry" and too much in the way of vested interests.
After all. If you are high-up in a "Safety" Camera Partnership and getting paid a lovely big salary are YOU going to honestly assess whether or not SCs are a good idea? Of course you're not. Its like asking a Turkey if it wants to be eaten come Christmas.
So the question isn't "Do Cameras Cause Accidents?" (Although some might.) It is "By spending our cash on Cameras have we wasted money we could have used elsewhere to more effectively save lives..."
Don said:
Dwight VanDriver said:
That cameras cause accidents is balony. They are caused by the nut behind the wheel. Period.
Well you are right. And wrong.
Of course cameras do not cause accidents.
Of course the driver is to blame. I think the figure for mechanical failure accidents is about 2 or 3 percent? The rest must be caused by road users, and largely that must be the driver...
However. The point is:
Does the policy of putting up speed cameras reduce accidents. Maybe. Maybe not.
Are other accident prevention policies, which might be better than cameras, being ignored because too much of the attention and resources available are being expended on the cameras.
In cash terms this would be viewed as "opportunity cost" - its not nice to think about it in terms of lives lost.
Would we be better off putting our money into different forms of accident prevention? I would contend that the answer to this is yes.
We need a proper, level-headed, non-PC study that looks into RTAs, their causes and recommends the most appropriate method of combatting them. Getting this study is going to be nigh-on impossible and getting it to be free-thinking even more difficult. There is simply too much dogma in the Road Safety "industry" and too much in the way of vested interests.
After all. If you are high-up in a "Safety" Camera Partnership and getting paid a lovely big salary are YOU going to honestly assess whether or not SCs are a good idea? Of course you're not. Its like asking a Turkey if it wants to be eaten come Christmas.
So the question isn't "Do Cameras Cause Accidents?" (Although some might.) It is "By spending our cash on Cameras have we wasted money we could have used elsewhere to more effectively save lives..."
Agreed.
The main problem is the start point of the study. These studies are always carried out by people with a green tinge. The basic paradigm is always skewed. It is perfectly understandable but renders all the research useless.
If I were in charge of the study it would be biased the other way and most likely recommend
(Don't feed the sensationalists)Have yet to see any mention on any web, regarding the RTA site being designated a Crime scene and which could be a possible Murder scene, if a fatality has occured.This according to Cambs plod, on a Tv item.So is a guilty driver now to be charged with Murder?.The complete gridlock for hours and great cost, was acknowledged by plod but a minor detail, and no doubt the increase in speeding by drivers trying to make up for lost time, improves Scamera income.What is the supposed feedback from this cynical practice, which will improve road safety ?.
nonegreen said:
Don said:
Dwight VanDriver said:
That cameras cause accidents is balony. They are caused by the nut behind the wheel. Period.
Well you are right. And wrong.
Of course cameras do not cause accidents.
Of course the driver is to blame. I think the figure for mechanical failure accidents is about 2 or 3 percent? The rest must be caused by road users, and largely that must be the driver...
However. The point is:
Does the policy of putting up speed cameras reduce accidents. Maybe. Maybe not.
Are other accident prevention policies, which might be better than cameras, being ignored because too much of the attention and resources available are being expended on the cameras.
In cash terms this would be viewed as "opportunity cost" - its not nice to think about it in terms of lives lost.
Would we be better off putting our money into different forms of accident prevention? I would contend that the answer to this is yes.
We need a proper, level-headed, non-PC study that looks into RTAs, their causes and recommends the most appropriate method of combatting them. Getting this study is going to be nigh-on impossible and getting it to be free-thinking even more difficult. There is simply too much dogma in the Road Safety "industry" and too much in the way of vested interests.
After all. If you are high-up in a "Safety" Camera Partnership and getting paid a lovely big salary are YOU going to honestly assess whether or not SCs are a good idea? Of course you're not. Its like asking a Turkey if it wants to be eaten come Christmas.
So the question isn't "Do Cameras Cause Accidents?" (Although some might.) It is "By spending our cash on Cameras have we wasted money we could have used elsewhere to more effectively save lives..."
Agreed.
The main problem is the start point of the study. These studies are always carried out by people with a green tinge. The basic paradigm is always skewed. It is perfectly understandable but renders all the research useless.
If I were in charge of the study it would be biased the other way and most likely recommend Begg et al were
Bravo!
Of course all stats are flawed: "Lies, darned lies and statistics." and "40% of all statistics are made up on the spot!" (Two common sayings). As for opinion polls - ddepends on how you phrase the question! Speaking as trained interpreter - one wrongly placed word can change whole emphasis!!
Don has taken words out of mouth. One of family posted something similar elsewhere! Already passed comment that if we accept periodic courses and training within professional careers, then why so much reluctance to have periodic courses on driving to keep skills well tuned and refined! Would suggest every 5 years - and with compulsory medicals (but that last bit is personal bias!)
Andysp quoted Lancs as having significant increase in RTAs/KSIs despite ca. 320 fixed scams, plus mobiles. Something is very, VERY wrong here! Lancs also has a Speed Awareness Course - which they offer up to 35mph only! Members of this family live in Lancs, and confirm that they all know people who have been invited to this course. When they have asked questions about this course, they find that a significant number have received their invites at 31-33 mph! (10% +2???????).
Clearly inviting the wrong people then???! Leads to accusation of fleecing when the idea of training and education is a darned good one! (People who have been invited reckon that course was of some benefit to them!) Should they open this to all nicked regardless of speed recorded? Or for all first offences regardless of speed recorded? After all, the only "learning" curve (very loosely speaking) is the points on licence, fine and feeling of being fleeced, and thus resentful. Does this make one a safer driver? Does it make one "speed and hazard aware"? Would it not be better to offer a training course to all motorists every 5 years?
A further inspection of Lancs' website reveals that accidents caused by DRUNKS is UP! Perhaps again - too much concentration on talivan activity and not enough real policing in patrols!
Then a perusal of prestontoday, and the letters page by POLICE OFFICERS in the local papers reveal that many of these accidents are caused by drink drivers, doped drivers, tired drivers, mobile phone and audio fiddling drivers! Noted that SPEED per se was not mentioned!
Conclusion: targeting wrong places and safety issues! Scams set up at fleece spots not black spots! Cannot see any other explanation! Thus cameras have little impact on saving lives in Lancs!
And if cameras are supposed to reduce speeding - how come so many
drivers are nicked! Not achieving much there then! They can only make you speed aware if you can see them, and some as we all know are almost "invisible!" Which again is Don's very pertinent question: Are we wasting resources on a flawed system, when we should be looking at the issue from wider perspective? Of course, as DVD says - there are more cars on the roads. There are also more pedestrians. Higher volume = higher probability of crunch.
Where is the pedestrian training for adults? Seen lots of people j-walking, tripping red men, clambering over steel barriers, crossing at inappropriate places - even when there are crossings nearby?. Simply not using the brains they were born with!
Cyclists? They appear to run roughshod over the HC and the law! Not lights, no hands on handlebars, cycling wrong way down one-way streets!
Where is the pedestrian training? Crossed swords with Kurgis somewhere over this hedgehog rubbish! Saw advert on Kids' TV yesterday morning. Asked the 6 year old if he understood the advert.
Response: "Some hedgehogs singing!"
Me: "What were they singing about?"
Response: "Dunno! Was not listening to them! Only read the last bit about Looking, and Listening - OH!"
(Light dawns!)
His final word? Why not use real people? His age?
Incidentally, this reasonably bright-ish 6 year old can tell me what speed I am driving at at any one time in a journey! He can look at a car on the road and estimate fairly accurately its speed! Been taught from toddling - like rest of this family! He knows the Green Cross Code already! He can help me service one of the old crocks too!
So, message appears to get lost in the song! But the final frame appears to work - for those who can read!
This all part of the wider perspective as well! Clearly a need for better safety campaigns for all roads users and not just drivers!
Thank you Don and Wildcat for those well reasoned posts. Pleasure to read. Unfortunately we could write a thesis each and no doubt bore the pants off everybody.
In my advancing years I have seen a free fall into bad driving behaviour that I would suggest is virtually impossible to arrest unless very draconian measures are taken which is doubtful as motoring = revenue and votes mean everything.
This runs side by side with lowering standards/discipline of Society as a whole.
Strange, and is it only me, but much play is made of the danger of speeding. If so, then why are offenders allowed to continue after the offence and only 14 days later told of this by paper. The old days it was a lug holing from a white top in a jam sandwidge there and then. Guess which seems to have the more effect.?
DVD
In my advancing years I have seen a free fall into bad driving behaviour that I would suggest is virtually impossible to arrest unless very draconian measures are taken which is doubtful as motoring = revenue and votes mean everything.
This runs side by side with lowering standards/discipline of Society as a whole.
Strange, and is it only me, but much play is made of the danger of speeding. If so, then why are offenders allowed to continue after the offence and only 14 days later told of this by paper. The old days it was a lug holing from a white top in a jam sandwidge there and then. Guess which seems to have the more effect.?
DVD
B 7 VP said:
Have yet to see any mention on any web, regarding the RTA site being designated a Crime scene and which could be a possible Murder scene, if a fatality has occured.This according to Cambs plod, on a Tv item.So is a guilty driver now to be charged with Murder?.The complete gridlock for hours and great cost, was acknowledged by plod but a minor detail, and no doubt the increase in speeding by drivers trying to make up for lost time, improves Scamera income.What is the supposed feedback from this cynical practice, which will improve road safety ?.
Brunstrom has said he wants any driver involved in a fatal accident to be investigated for homicide.
No mention of what happens if a pedestrian causes the accident.
AN apalling insight into the camera phenomena, as witnessed by me & Mrs Biker. Some friends of ours who regulary drink and drive (having NO accidents in over 20 years of doing so, despite warnings to the contrary) now say that it is "even safer" to drink and drive because there are less Police cars about !!
Now if that isn't a clear signal that cameras are wrong, I don't know what it.
A similar message - and one I am not too proud about, some bikers I know now think it is top fun to wheely in highstreet, and do burnouts in public places, *BECAUSE* there are no Police patrols. Once out of camera range, you CAN DO ANYTHING.
Does this not worry you? I can go on (and will!). The Maxie P mob, just love getting away with murder - an empty Essex industrial estate is top class fun. SO what if there is a gatso on the main road? tape it up, and do whatever. NO POLICE PATROLS.
Am I getting though yet? MORE ACCIDENTS because of MORE CAMERAS.
Sigh. Once we get rid of the last few police officers, then true anarchy can reign.
Now if that isn't a clear signal that cameras are wrong, I don't know what it.
A similar message - and one I am not too proud about, some bikers I know now think it is top fun to wheely in highstreet, and do burnouts in public places, *BECAUSE* there are no Police patrols. Once out of camera range, you CAN DO ANYTHING.
Does this not worry you? I can go on (and will!). The Maxie P mob, just love getting away with murder - an empty Essex industrial estate is top class fun. SO what if there is a gatso on the main road? tape it up, and do whatever. NO POLICE PATROLS.
Am I getting though yet? MORE ACCIDENTS because of MORE CAMERAS.
Sigh. Once we get rid of the last few police officers, then true anarchy can reign.
Dwight VanDriver said:
I'm not getting into statistics for I have learnt that if you ask anybody what two and two is they will say four. Write two and two on a blackboard and it is twentytwo?
Wasn't last year a record year on new vehicles being registered?
So if the number of new vehicles were greater than the number of old vehicles taken off the road then more use is being made of our inadequate road structure system leading to more conflict/accidents? How does this simple equation fit into fatal fiqures?
That cameras cause accidents is balony. They are caused by the nut behind the wheel. Period.
DVD
(30 years at the roadside in the blood and gore dealing with them not pushing fiqures from behind a desk)
There are people who mess with figures to tell lies. I'm not one of them.
Your logic is incomplete. The average behaviour of the average nut behind the wheel is very much affected by policy and enforcement. Drink drive is up because roads policing is down. Hardly surprising is it? Roads policing is down for a number of reasons, but one of the big ones is that roads policing was not listed as a "core policing activity" by the Home Office in 1994. What wasn't roads policing listed? Because they thought speed cameras would do the job.
Bad thinking at the government level has altered a number of things. Fewer trafpol becuse of cameras. Lies about the dangerous of speeding. And on and on.
The government has tended to make roads enforcement a one trick pony - and a seriously lame one at that. Are you surprised that the roads are getting more dangerous?
Oh, and the trend in question is the "fatality rate": deaths per billion vehicle kilometres. Growth in vehicles and traffic are included.
Best Regards,
Paul Smith
Safe Speed
www.safespeed.org.uk
Don said:
So the question isn't "Do Cameras Cause Accidents?" (Although some might.) It is "By spending our cash on Cameras have we wasted money we could have used elsewhere to more effectively save lives..."
The other vital question is: "What are the side effects of high levels of automated speed enforcement?"
There are loads of side effects. I keep a list.
www.safespeed.org.uk/dangers.html
Best Regards,
Paul Smith
Safe Speed
www.safespeed.org.uk
Don said:
So the question isn't "Do Cameras Cause Accidents?" (Although some might.) It is "By spending our cash on Cameras have we wasted money we could have used elsewhere to more effectively save lives..."
Spending some money of the roads would be a good start.
If safety really was an issue with local authorities and government and not revenue, there would be no potholes, full ditches allowing water to run across the road, ruts, crumbling edges and so on that I see all over the country.
Nonegreen, in light of recent events I'd very much appreciate you not using language that some might choose to interpret as death threats!
A sad state of affairs I grant you but this is a public forum read by all sorts waiting to capitalise on banter and turn it into column inches at PH's expense.
A sad state of affairs I grant you but this is a public forum read by all sorts waiting to capitalise on banter and turn it into column inches at PH's expense.
Wildcat said:
Where is the pedestrian training? Crossed swords with Kurgis somewhere over this hedgehog rubbish! Saw advert on Kids' TV yesterday morning. Asked the 6 year old if he understood the advert.
Response: "Some hedgehogs singing!"
Me: "What were they singing about?"
Response: "Dunno! Was not listening to them! Only read the last bit about Looking, and Listening - OH!"
(Light dawns!)
His final word? Why not use real people? His age?
You didn't cross swords
I appreciate using real people rather than characters - I would much rather that real people were used all the time, but then again I aren't some child psychologist or teacher who deals with the lovely little blighters on a day to day basis - so I can't say if cuddly hedgehogs are any use! As DVD said above Speed Cameras dont cause accidents (they certainly don't stop any either) - it is indeed the driver behind the wheel in the vast majority of accidents.
2003 stats:
The availability varies from authority to authority. If my local plod are anything to go by again I won't get the details till April. I know our local rural authority will have got theres by now. Why the difference? I don't know. I do know that none RTA accidents that have involved vehicles have to be taken out. That is accidents where for example the driver has had a heart attack then crashed - that would be taken out.
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