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Mikey-two-Names
Joined: 24 Feb 2004
Posts: 4108
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 Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2005 6:00 am Subject: |
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Yet to me you come across as a motor vehicle supremacist. Your ideas are incredibly pro car. It's cycling and skating that have opened my eyes to the nutters that are allowed to exist unpunished and more importantly un-behaviour-modified on our road system. Just like the evidence in the helmet debate has opened my eyes in an uncomfortable way, I'd prefer never to have learnt what I did.
On bad road users, I wrote "a tosser is a tosser no matter what form of transport they use" some time ago on SR.com. Admittedly that's cribbed from where I first read it, but it sums up my viewpoint rather well.
To me it's you who has the blinkered viewpoint.
It's like the "bastard cyclists who all jump red lights" viewpoint. True, lots of cyclists do, and I think they should be punished. What no-one seems to care about is that just as many cars go through amber and red lights, and they are far more dangerous than bikes. This is probably partly because psychologically to most people car drivers are the in crowd, and cyclists a small group of nutter outsiders.
The fall asleep at 20mph routine seems to me to come straight out of that nutter Paul Smith's safespeed campaign. Well I think he's a nutter anyway.
Don't forget I too use and enjoy a car regularly, the difference now is that I'm much more aware of how dangerous to others a car is. A ton of metal at speed is a big responsibility that many drivers don't seem to give a toss about. If you want to compare risks and danger to people, it'd save many more lifes to spend all the effort and money that's gone on terrorism on making the roads safer for all. |
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lemming
Joined: 05 Jan 2005
Posts: 693
Location: Reading, UK
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| Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2005 7:03 am Subject: |
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| "bastard cyclists who all jump red lights" viewpoint. True, lots of cyclists do, and I think they should be punished. What no-one seems to care about is that just as many cars go through amber and red lights, and they are far more dangerous than bikes. |
I didn't really want to get back into this but what the hell. I do care about htis - I like people to behave correctly and drive according to the rules of the road. Whether it's a car jumping the red light or a push bike doesn't make any difference in my eyes - they should have stopped. You are right Mike - a car doing that could potentially cause way more problems. I've also seen a motorbike go through a red light (only once though).
Maybe it's just all different in London. I have a 30 mile (ish) commute each day, and J11 on the M4 will occasisionally have a red-light jumper. Haven't seen any for a while. Conversely, on my trip to town last night on my motorbike, I saw a cyclist jump 2 red lights just on the 3 minute trip into town.
I'm not condoning anyone breaking the law, or that cyclists shouldn't be on the road. I'm saying that if we have rules then everyone should obey them.
Sadly Rick is right - speed limits (or any other laws) will alwyas be ignored by those people who choose to do so - they don't care about the consequences, so what's another law for them to ignore going to do?
Oh, and the phone thing from Dan - yes - it IS now illegal, but I believe it's just a 30 quid fine - we need to give people points for that too I reckon - people still do it and I see it every day on the motorway.
Roads are safe - it's the people that use them who make them dangerous. There will always be a contingent of people who think that they own the road. that's bad, but unavoidable (in my opinion.)
For the record, I give cyclists a wide berth, I observe speed limits and I alwyas indicate and stop at red lights, etc etc. I take (some) pride in knowing that I drive correctly and hopefully do not cause anyone (in ANY vehicle type) aggrevation. |
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Mikey-two-Names
Joined: 24 Feb 2004
Posts: 4108
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| Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2005 7:07 am Subject: |
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| Now that's a quality post I can agree with! You and rick both made a good point about enforcement - that is a big problem today. |
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Rick
Joined: 25 Feb 2004
Posts: 5914
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| Posted: Wed Oct 26, 2005 10:21 am Subject: |
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| ls_mike wrote: |
| Don't forget I too use and enjoy a car regularly, the difference now is that I'm much more aware of how dangerous to others a car is. A ton of metal at speed is a big responsibility that many drivers don't seem to give a toss about. If you want to compare risks and danger to people, it'd save many more lifes to spend all the effort and money that's gone on terrorism on making the roads safer for all. |
Which is the reason to target the people that commit the offences and not the form of transport.
I'll give you an extreme example of badly targetted legislation. Remember Dunblane? One person randomly shot kids in a school. The reports came back that he was mentally unstable and still the police issued him with a firearms certificate. What happened? Rather than tigthening up the system of issuing certificates, all handguns were banned, penalising a good number of people who were very responsible but not in the majority. What is the knock-on effect of banning handguns? Gun crime has soared in this country in the last 10 years so probably nothing whatsoever. I would be foolish to suggest that the increase in gun crime is due to the illegality of weapons but making them illegal hasn't done anything to stop people getting shot and more handguns kill more people now. It may actually have made some legally owned weapons disappear and turn up killing people now but I don't have anything to back that up.
At the time the legislation was being proposed I jokingly said If you want to save lifes in this way, why not ban cars as they kill far more people every year. I was making a serious point, it's not the weapon it's the person that wields it. People are rarely killed by cars, they are frequently killed by car drivers.
So one last time. Making something illegal has very little impact on behaviour of people who are going to commit offences. If the legislation inconveniences other people who would otherwise be safe then it is bad legislation. Worse still, if it enrages them then you get a backlash from people who would otherwise be law abiding. |
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KarineM
Joined: 27 Sep 2005
Posts: 40
Location: Paris (No longer Lille)
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| Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2005 7:50 am Subject: |
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Remember clunck click every trip?
I don't have the numbers, but I remember reading a report that talked about the seat belt law. Apparently, after people were forced to wear seat belts they paid less attention and drove faser. Death rates for pedestrians and cyclists soared. I think the report was called the invisible hand. I.e. whatever you do will have unforseen effects of a negative nature.
Anyway since when were speed limits or other driving laws respected?
At least over there (GB) cars stop for pedestrian crossings and they are easy to see. Over here you take your life in your hands. Drivers don't hardly see them with cars parked right up to or even on them. Plus there's no yellow light flashing just next to it. And of course the drivers don't give a sh** about pedestrians, cyclists or skaters.
Cor I feel better now for a little rant  |
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Xia
Joined: 06 Apr 2004
Posts: 874
Location: Geneva (Suisse)
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| Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2005 8:55 am Subject: |
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| KarineM wrote: |
At least over there (GB) cars stop for pedestrian crossings and they are easy to see. Over here you take your life in your hands. Drivers don't hardly see them with cars parked right up to or even on them. Plus there's no yellow light flashing just next to it. And of course the drivers don't give a sh** about pedestrians, cyclists or skaters.
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Karine, How long have you been in UK? While car ALWAYS stop at pelican crossing (the one with flashing yellows ), the majority will not stop when turning left unlike in France. In France drivers are used to pedestrian having prioriy when they turn. Its not the case overhere and I had a few close calls in my early english walking days.
Each country have their own set of rules (quite often unwritten).
Talking about pellican crossing, I drove for 18 month without knowing that it was mandatory to stop to let pedestrian through... Wasn't often an issue, as I ussually let people through but I guess a few time I must have gone without stoping to the anoyance of pedestrians.
As for not giving a shit about cyclist or skaters, try cycling on a sunday morning in France and in Uk, its day and light. Thanks to the french tradition of having loads of cyclotourist on the road sunday morning, its much safer than english roads where most of the time you end up on your own. To balance things (I dont want to sound biased) england is one of the best country I have been for walking. The extend of public pathes across the country is fabulous.
Alex |
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Rick
Joined: 25 Feb 2004
Posts: 5914
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| Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2005 9:16 am Subject: |
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| Xia wrote: |
In France drivers are used to pedestrian having prioriy when they turn. Its not the case overhere and I had a few close calls in my early english walking days.
Each country have their own set of rules (quite often unwritten). |
It's the law here too but most pedestrians give way to cars turning because they are bigger. Many people (not just drivers) in the UK don't know the real rules and even when doing the driving theory test aren't required to score anywhere near 100%. Some of the questions are a bit dodgy but a passmark of 90% should be required.
Other issue in the UK. Full car and motorbike driving licenses are issued when you pass and are valid until you are 70 years old unless you suffer from a notifiable medical condition. When you reach 70 you just need to write off to say you want it renewed and they do it without checking anything. No re-testing of vision or knowledge. This means there are people driving today who passed their test 50 years ago. Things have moved on a little since then. 20 years ago there were people on the road like my grandmother who got her license before driving tests were introduced.
I'd like to see people have to renew their driving licenses every 10 years maximum with an eyetest and a quick knowledge check of any new rules that came up since their last renewal. |
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Fred_Paris
LSST Chairman
Joined: 11 Mar 2005
Posts: 1418
Location: Ealing Broadway
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| Posted: Thu Oct 27, 2005 9:48 am Subject: |
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I do share the point of view of punish the ones that commit offences.
When I was working in france I was used to drive a lot (120km a day), and actually I noticed that drivers in general was just so bad, and really don't care about others drivers,bikes, pedestrians.
I should add than in france pedestrian can cross any road with priority, and cars have too stop, in fact since december 2003 a car have to stop as long as a pedestrian is waiting to cross the road ! (hit a pedestrian is just soo bad for a driver, because when it happens you are just so done regarding the law..)
I was used to skate a lot in the skates as well at this time, and noticed than skaters were just too bad while skating, no checking while changing direction, at that time I realised than actually a driver who cares, is a skater who cares as well (yes it's me  ). Pedestrians as they have all the rights regarding the law were just too bad, and we were used to fight with them... (in France Skaters are actually pedestrians, so it was a fair fight).
In 2003 the government in france just change the laws and became very, very tought regarding offences on roads, speed limit (exceed the speed limit by 50 km/h and you go to the court ^^ ). As a matter of fact drivers in france are much more civilised now, because they just fear to get caught.
It goes for bikes and skaters as well, skate on the road and you can be arrested and have to pay 60 euros... (skaters are pedestrian and not allowed on the road, except for fns).
But i feel much more safe in the UK for some reason, I noticed than drivers most of the time don't overpass me when I'm on a bike (on skate it's worse).
My opinion regarding safety on roads in general is a zero tolerance, even if people will complain about their rights, if it can save a life it's priceless. |
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