demerit points and speading fines

Harsh but fair.

 

too many

'cos they're friggin' stupid bureaucrats with nothing better to do with
their time than annoy us.

JL

 

No argument based on your presumption, however there's a key difference
between Perth and Sydney in my opinion. You guys mark your speed zones
reasonably rationally. Sydney doesn't, I know of a number of examples of
a 3 or 4 lane divided road, with no side streets marked as 50 and 60
zones. Hence not knowing the location of the incident in question, I
wasn't willing to presume that it was a suburban back street.

It's not the velocity per se that is the issue, it's the appropriateness
of the velocity to the environment, and doing a certain speed isn't by
and of itself dangerous.

Well that was the case where I grew up too, but then there was only a
car past every couple of days...

JL
(I'm struggling to come to terms with how you even go about bringing up
kids in the city, good thing I don't have any)

 

Ditto, but that's not the point.

JL

 

Hear hear.

70% of pedestrian accidents are the fault of the pedestrian

JL

 

Well I wouldn't have thought the parent would have deliberately put the
child in the middle of the road, hence you are correct, I made an
assumption.

Accepted, I don't have kids (well none that I'm aware of anyway), so
that thought didn't occur to me. I thought manacles, and hobbles were
standard equipment for managing toddlers, my bad.

See above note to Theo. There are 50 zones in Sydney I'd consider to be
perfectly safe at 110, hence I'm not about to presume that it was a
suburban back street until so stated.

JL

 

Hmm that's the sternest reaction I've ever seen from you Theo.

JL

 

If you don't want us to go there, don't raise it on a public forum. I'm
afraid you don't get some sort of right to only present one side of an
issue and then not allow anyone right of reply.

I disagree. I would suggest that a very small percentage of road trauma
is going to be significantly affected by getting people to "slow down in
general". The fundamental issue is the lack of consideration of root
causes rather than symptoms. There's a good reason for that of course.
It's very easy to plug another speed camera in, it's very hard to change
people's attitudes and make them drive appropriately to the conditions.

Even basic things like to not put their makeup on while driving and not
treat their car like it's their bedroom etc are very hard behavioural
changes and would require a fair bit of money spent over a longer term.
Which isn't going to happen because we have a governance system built on
quick fixes and short term results without consideration of the big
picture, it's institutional and endemic

You assume correctly.

Of course there is, however you firstly can't remove every risk in life
and secondly if the kid is going to run out into the road, the
likelihood that 50 vs 80 is going to make much difference to the outcome
is remote.When a tonne of metal hits 20Kg of flesh and blood the outcome
is never going to be good, regardless of the speed.

Of course if you slowed everyone down to 10K and had a man with a red
flag walking in front you just *might* achieve your desire, but even
then I would suggest it's unlikely. Someone will still get hurt.

Really? So the kid ran out 50+metres from the driver and then just stood
still looking at someone as they mashed the pedal to the floor ? Far
enough away that someone could have stopped from 50 but not from 80 ?

Go redo your physics lessons and a little research and tell me how far
the average car takes to stop from 50K (assuming of course the driver
was capable of stopping it in that distance, or even paying enough
attention to attempt to do so, which I suspect is a root cause issue).

If the kid was supervised and darted into traffic precipitously then
speed is irrelevant, no one would be able to stop. If the driver was
driving negligently and carelessly then it wouldn't matter what the
speed was because he wouldn't tried to stop.

You imply the driver was at fault, hence the latter situation is most
likely, therefore a better preventative would be to ensure that drivers
take their responsibilities seriously and are educated into driving
safely for the conditions (it may well be that the appropriate speed in
that circumstance was considerably lower than 50, in fact if it is a
suburban back street like Theo assumed, then the appropriate speed may
well have been 20K). The implication of that approach however is a need
for a lot more police who are willing to actively deal with dangerous
and inappropriate behaviour, rather than being coerced into handing out
speeding tickets as the panacea for all road trauma. Won't happen as
it's costly rather than revenue generating.

Keep on watching and repeat the government's mantra, it'll save you
having to think for yourself.

You're an idiot if you believe the guff you see on TV, but then I can't
understand why people watch TV to be fed their daily doses of inanity
anyway.

Umm, without being overly harsh, please consider whether you think that
because you're predisposed to do so by having a train of thought drummed
into you via the glass eyed brainwashing machine.

JL

 

Indeed. We now get to the nub of the issue. Legislation is an extremely
poor way of managing behaviour and should be a last resort, not the
first and only weapon in the armoury. When all you have is a hammer,
everything looks like a nail...

I agree, it is.

I wholeheartedly agree with everything you've said. It needs to be
coupled with a strong educational campaign, helping people to understand
things like the REAL braking distance from 100K, and engendering a
"privilege to drive" rather than "right to drive" mentality

JL

 

They get crabbier as they get older, I'm told.

---
Cheers

PeterC [aka MildThing]
'81 Suzuki GS450-s (gone on to better and brighter things - I hope)
'87 BMW K100RT (write-off)
'81 Yamaha Virago (XV) 750H (work in progress)
'01 Yamaha FJR1300

www.dmcsc.org.au
http://eladesom.com.au/ulysses/
# 37181

 

I got caught doing 86 in a fifty zone at 11:30 at night on a street without
lights or houses or factories or kids.

 

Just don't understand why the road user is responsible for the actions of
the stupid bitch?

If the RTA builds roads then they should be responsible for the actions of
the people using it if thats the lodgic.

Killer Janet

 

Why am I responsible for your child?

 

Well, what little I know of you so far makes me rather grateful that you
are not.

One of the annoying little things about living in a civilised society is
that you do have some consideration toward others who share the space.

Expecting you to drive/ride in a reasonable manner in a residential area
doesn't actually render you responsible for others, it just assumes you
are capable of behaving reasonably.

Moike

 

so what was th cop hiding behind? the grass?

 

If the RTA builds roads then they should be responsible for the actions of

No wonder you got caught, your a moron.

 

Why am I responsible for your child?

WHAT A THREAD!! I've agreed with Theo AND Moike!!!!!! Now for ZB to
add headlights are a smart move and the world shall end.

 

In aus.motorcycles on Sun, 09 Apr 2006 11:17:43 +1000

Well.. if the cop car had had its headlights on, then the OP would
have seen it and....

Zebee

 

I doubt he would have. I think he mistook the date for April 1st.
!

 

Stealth mode mate

Johno

Beer?