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news
Giro Pink Franciacorta.jpgLive blog: Giro towns turn pink, South Yorkshire Police targeting close pass drivers + extreme wheelie video
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
Latest Comments
- S.E. 5 sec ago
I guess the country is more policed... also we have a lot of radars for example, could they do some checking in addition to speed limits and red...
- Andrewbanshee 13 min 20 sec ago
I lived a fair distance, 40 ish minutes walk, which I did every day. Only one of my house shares had a car and he walked too. Back then 92 to 95...
- anke2 54 min 14 sec ago
The front one seems a bit useless - what is it protecting, if not the feet, chain(wheel) and entire bottom bracket area? I found that "ToeSavers"...
- Lozcan 54 min 19 sec ago
I'll stick with my photocromatic ones from Rock Bros for 25 quid that are also way lighter.
- brooksby 2 hours 56 min ago
I'm sure that somethings wrong here, but I don't think that it's the new traffic island...
- Jaijai 3 hours 4 min ago
The vision couldn't have been that good ,they went bankrupt.
- Blackthorne 10 hours 29 min ago
I disagree, the lucky few who get to wear one of these will certainly produce more mass.
- Dnnnnnn 11 hours 3 min ago
That wasn't what my original post was about - it was about the NHS as it is now. If you're going to be run over by an ambulance tomorrow, there are...
- imajez 11 hours 28 min ago
I prefer the not haveing to faff with brakes in first place, which is the typical reality for hydraulic systems.
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11 comments
50%, a bit optimistic. Drive at the speed limit, see how many overtake or the large queue that will form behind.
On the contrary, only today I was driving along to find red and white barriers and “BRIDGE OUT!” blocking the road. Fortunately I was able to accelerate out of trouble, and I cleared the creek and made it to the County Line.
Having driven and ridden bikes and cars since the early 80's I think it's pretty much always been the case that the odds were low that you'd get caught. What has changed is the nature of the stupidity.
We have less drink driving https://www.drinkdriving.org/drink_driving_statistics_uk.php but we now have the curse of the mobile phone (which may actually be worse http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1885775.stm). I also suspect that the problem of exceeding speed limits in urban areas https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/623261/vehicle-speed-compliance-statistics-2016.pdf is now worse than it used be because of traffic volume, cameras and the cars being much faster.
Overall, as someone who is a "techie" I find it hard to understand why we do not automate compliance. Why on earth do we still allow new cars to be sold that are capable of exceeding speed limits on our roads and people to use mobile phones whilst driving. Both are (and have been for a number of years) very very fixable problems e.g. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/road-and-rail-transport/5300462/Speed-restricted-car-a-review.html, https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT208090 It'd be a prime opportunity for a government to grab a technical world lead in such systems, we just need one to show a bit of leadership and care more about its citizens than pleasing the automotive lobby.
I can't remember which manufacturer it was, but one of the interviewees on Radio 5 this morning said they had a car that detected they had a mobile phone and automatically placed it into "Do not disturb" mode as soon as they got in.
As for auto-compliance on speed, I agree in principle but ... in some circumstances it is safer to accelerate out of trouble rather than brake and it would be foolish to remove that option from drivers because they were already at the speed limit.
And, even if manufacturers were only permitted to sell cars that couldn't exceed 70mph, they could still wreak havoc in a 20/30/40mph zone.
The only way to make enforced speed limits work would be to build electronic speed controls into our roads that limited the top speed of the cars driving along it. Installing that across the whole road network would be a nightmare.
Whilst I am sure there are some theoretical circumstances where a burst of acceleration might avoid an accident, I have never experienced such a thing in 50+ years on the road in almost all categories of vehicle. I have however, permanently etched on my memory, several horrific collisions where excess speed was a major factor.
I would actually go further than a speed limit and I'd also support an acceleration limit that removed the temptation to outsprint the other driver to the next set of lights. If all cars could only manage 0 - 60 in, for example, 20 seconds what a relaxed world it could be.
I agree. The only situation I can think of where a burst of acceleration might avoid an accident is during a misjudged over-taking manoeuvre. In which case if the driver hadn't f****d it up in the first place it would not be necessary.
Excuse me, I have something called a sat nav in my car and it displays the local speed limit. Link that to the car computery thing and tell it not to speed whatever the limit.
Electronic speed controls in the road.......... what?
Just had a thought though, it would be brilliant, the day it came into force there would be zero car sales and dealers would be falling over themselves to sell cars.
May sat nav displays the wrong speed limit on some roads, but compliance woukd rise to 98% instead of probably about 50% at the moment.
I do hope most drivers think the way I do and the survey has picked that up. I too think it would be unlikely that I got caught doing some of thes things, I still never would think of doing them
Driving above the speed limit, driving through a red light, driving whilst under the influence of drink or drugs, using a mobile phone whilst driving - all these are against the law.
I could (I wouldn't however) drive around my local area, North Somerset, whilst on my mobile phone and speeding and I am very confident wouldn't get caught.
Why? Because I can't remember the last time I saw a police car patrolling here. There is very little, if any, enforcement for most traffic offences.
So, 2 in 3 drivers think they'll get away with 'careless' driving.
This rather gives the lie to a lot of what is seen as (and comes before the courts as) so called careless driving.
How can you premeditate a 'lack of care' and make a judgement about the likelihood of getting caught?
As I, and I'm sure a lot of readers, have long suspected, 'careless' driving is often calculated and deliberate risk taking, conscious omission (E.g. indicating), plain old ignorance, impatience and bad manners and a perfectly predictable endangerment of other road users.