Gatso's

This is interesting ...."On the M1 the number of casualties halved
after average-speed cameras were introduced on a contraflow between
junctions 6a and 10." considering that there was never a time during
the contraflow when there were no specs cameras, the only alteration
has been to increase the limit from 40 to 50, perhaps thats when the
reduction took place.

Also I can't see how it would work if it's spread over roads with
different speed limits.

 

Nah, it's compared to before the contraflow & limits.

The reason's simple. Traffic _moved_ before.

 

As the old analogue cameras are becoming obsolete they could have that very
policy. They could also have a policy of installing SPECS at the same time!

http://www.safetycameraswiltshire.co.uk/ lists loads of locations and
http://www.swindon.gov.uk/pages_from_ltp2_v24_finalsection4(150-200).pdf
page 177 sets out policy. Looks like you are going to get more 20mph zones
and loads of traffic calming measures in the city. Rural policy seems to be
lowering speed limits and enforcement.

That seems to be the policy around here too. Fewer cameras, more 20mph
speed limits with speed humps in urban areas. More 40 & 50mph speed limits
in rural areas enforced using mobile cameras.

 

Not only does it also make me wince but it really, really undermines the
person's argument.

Here in Her Majesty's East Sussex that's pretty much all we get. The
open A roads are pretty free of speed cameras - the 30/40 villages aren't.

 

I'm guessing it's not cattle lumbering about but deer and ponies which
have a habit of just leaping into the road.

 

Talk about sleep walking. All part of tracking your every movement, email,
call, txt. Now who would want to do that, and why.

 

TBH I ignore them all now unless there is a crossing, school or the like.

 

Wasn't the correct answer to shoot everything that could possibly jump out
into the road?

 

But then that's fair enough really?

What's the score with mobile traps down that way?

In Kent, they seem to keep investing in more and more 'safety vans'... that,
and they've topped the chart for 'The most money spunked by a Local
Authority in the direction of Icelandic banks', so maybe one event is linked
to the other. ;-)

Rye falls under East Sussex... I did hear a mutter that the 'forces for
good', aware of the popularity of the roads down there with the biking
fraternity, had resorted to deploying a 'copter now and again as part of
their efforts to stop the more feckless using a sheep as a breakfall as they
leave the road.

Might fall under Kent plod actually as the roads in question are on the
border between the two counties.

The other thing they've been doing in Kent is lowering the speedlimits
progressively on a number of roads which were, IMHO at least, quite safe
whilst NSL.

No doubt said safety vans will now be deployed on a regular basis along said
routes.

 

Ok... so you're running on false plates or are they all seemingly out of
film etc?

 

Cameras, or at least warning signs for them on NSL roads is the latest
trend round here. Even after riding the route and not actually seeing
any cameras, the next time you go that way you wonder if they have got
round to installing them.

Ruined some classic 'B' road delights, it has.

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I meant speed limits not cameras but erm <coughs>

 

Get used to it. All the formerly nice NSL main roads around here
have been turned into a double white lined hotchpotch of 30/40/50
zones. Red painted slowing zones, loads of extra warning signs.

There is a hill in Telford that always used to be called deathtrap
hill, because of the numerous dire warning signs up its entire length.
Subsidence, falling rocks, Slippery surface, Deer crossing, lots of beware
of the dogs signs. It's kind of lost it's amusement value since just
about every road you travel down these days looks like an over the top
parody of road safety gone mad.

 

I used to have a lovely little circuit not far from here, all quiet,
rarely used roads, all NSL. It's now *entirely* 40's and 50's,
despite nothing fundementally changing, and no huge accident stats.

I can't blame the police though, the blame sits squarely with those in
local government.

 

Plenty of that in Gloucestershire too.

Someone once said that a council can claim more funds from the
government if it has (proportionally) more 40 and 50 limits thn NSL.
Dunno if there'sn any truth in it.

 

Yup... fuckfaces, the lot of 'em.

I actually wonder what kind of dullard it is that signs off the orders for
this kind of thing... as in, do they actually believe in the tripe they're
fed / handing out, as justification for this kind of thing to be put in
place?

I mean, speed kills and think of the children, only it's inappropriate speed
that kills, and maybe parents might like to instill the Green Cross Code
into their offspring?

One of the kids from the house opposite got clipped by a car a while back on
the small residential street that leads up to this one.

I didn't have a GATSO to hand, and nor did any other fucker for that matter,
but a couple of the mongs from elsewhere in the road took it upon themselves
to go door to door and ask everyone to sign a petition asking for tra'fick'
calming measures and the like to put in.

Only I had it on good authority that the little darling concerned actually
rode his bike out in front of the car concerned without looking... and I
felt it my duty to inform said mongs of this as I sent them on their way
with a flea in their ear.

And going back to the 'speed kills' thing - if just a tenth of the time
dedicated to banging this particular drum was spent addressing some of the
other fuckwittery you see displayed on the roads, the roads would be a much
safer place to speed along. ;-)

Oh, and in Canterbury (1) at least, they're now installing a *shedload* more
ANPR cameras in locations that mean you're basically resigned to being
captured on them now regardless of your knowledge of local rat runs etc...

(1) Proudly the initial testbed for these, apparently.

 

That'll be because they have to have said signs along any stretch they want
to run mobile traps along.

Indeed.

 

Well. I didn't say that I slow down for any of them.

On the contrary, I think it's very British.
We just seem to have a slightly muted notion
of civil disobedience. In other countries riots
would be the order of the day. Here, we just
grumble a bit, then carry on pretty much as before.

 

Surrey seemed to go this way first in terms of places relatively local to
here.

I blame JP (1). ;-)

It wouldn't surprise me.

Actually, my mates ex is an advisor for the Dept of Transport... lives in
London and doesn't own a car / bike.

Think that says it all, really.

(1) 'He never rings, he never calls'... is he still lurking at all?

 

The run north up the hill past Silsoe turn towards the Clophill
roundabout on the A6 is like that. I flicked the headlight to high beam
along there one evening and was almost blinded by the reflection off so
many roadsigns on such a short run of road.