|
It's not being flippant, it's being practical - we could cut out many road deaths by simply banning motor vehicles - but that's a tad impractical.
|
|
|
What do you propose as a practical way of reducing the number of deaths and injuries ?
The free market solution is to take your custom elsewhere...
|
|
Obviously that's not a practical solution.
|
|
Well, by using the road network you're effectively accepting the finite risk of injury or death. All non-trivial activities carry an element of risk. There is a trade-off between safety and personal liberty.
We do not let the most reckless percentile set the standard for our roads. But by the same token, we should not let the most risk averse percentile call the shots either.
|
|
|
|
What do you propose as a practical way of reducing the number of deaths and injuries ?
Very tricky. The simple theory is that as some people find driving exciting, they take a level of risk they feel comfortable with. Occasionally they miscalculate, resulting in a death or an injury. If those were reduced to near zero, the excitement level would tend to rise to restore the previous risk level. In other words there is a kind of equilibrium. We have reduced the death rate by mandatory seat belts, airbags, crumple zones, crash barriers, education, etc. but there are still risk-taking drivers, inexperienced learners, etc. And snowy roads.
|
What do you propose as a practical way of reducing the number of deaths and injuries ?
Very tricky. The simple theory is that as some people find driving exciting, they take a level of risk they feel comfortable with. Occasionally they miscalculate, resulting in a death or an injury. If those were reduced to near zero, the excitement level would tend to rise to restore the previous risk level. In other words there is a kind of equilibrium. We have reduced the death rate by mandatory seat belts, airbags, crumple zones, crash barriers, education, etc. but there are still risk-taking drivers, inexperienced learners, etc. And snowy roads.
Because there are seat belts, crumple zones and airbags, certain drivers (especially young men) drive in a more risky fashion to maintain their excitement level.
It has been suggested that fitting a large spike in the steering wheel boss would make such people drove more carefully.
|
|
Certainly, driving a car with neither seatelts or airbags seems to make me drive more cautiously - but being even more vulnerable on a motobike doesn't.
|
|
Not much in the way of practical suggestions yet. Come on, surely with our collective brain power we can come up with a number of constructive ideas to reduce road deaths and injuries.
What about installing speed limiters on vehicles that automatically sense the speed limit for any given area and prevent speed excess?
How about not using the roads when severe weather conditions occurs ?
It seems too many people think they can conquer extreme weather and terrible road conditions just by thinking they can drive better than the laws of physics allows. There were people stuck in sand drifts along the east coast the other day, duh. They hadn’t considered the drifting sand pouring off the beach that was powered by 60+ mph easterly winds when they left their nice cosy snowy urban environments. One wonders how many will be heading for the east coast this weekend and when they get there will be shocked by no access to the beach because of mountains of sand blocking the road and/or pavements.
|
|
I have a simple, if expensive solution - stiffen the driving test and make all current drivers sit it - getting rid of the worst 50% of drivers would improve driving standards.
|
|
The fact is all this hand wringing is somewhat missing the point. The problem isn't speeding (only 5% of accidents involve speeding) and it's not aggressive youths thinking they're invincible.
The bulk of the problems as I see them is people driving too close to the car in front and people driving in conditions - such as this week - with snow on their roofs which is hardly sensible.
|
|
Round here:
It's driving at or after 12pm at night.
Drinking
Being under 30.
Driving in snow and in a 4x4 and thinking the laws of physics do not apply.
Driving when seriously drunk.
Driving with no licence at all... none, not ever. usually on the wrong side of the road.
Druggies driving.
|
|
How about not using the roads when severe weather conditions occurs ?
So you want the country to grind to a halt every time there's a little bit of inclement weather? Compared to most of the world, we have very temperate weather. You might think the current conditions are 'extreme', the rest of the world doesn't.
What about installing speed limiters on vehicles that automatically sense the speed limit for any given area and prevent speed excess?
The anti-m**** device. You might want to live in 1984; I don't. Besides, it fails to distinquish between legal speed, and appropriate speed. The two are not synonymous.
I'll repeat what I said earlier; the current road casualty figures are an unfortunate but entirely proportional side-effect to the free movement of thirty odd million motorists.
If you don't like the figures, take a bus.
|
|
You haven't said anything constructive yet unthrottled, merely provided a personal commentary, anyone can do that. Do you have any suggestions on reducing road deaths and injuries?
|
You haven't said anything constructive yet unthrottled, merely provided a personal commentary, anyone can do that. Do you have any suggestions on reducing road deaths and injuries?
As UT seem temporarily indisposed I suggest the following:-
Every ten years every driver/rider with an A or B licence has to take and pass the standard driving/riding hazard perception and theory test to retain their licence.
Having done that they should then be compelled to undertake a 2 hour driving assessment, if they are graded sub-standard they are then given notice that they have 6 months to sort their driving out before taking another driving assessment. If they fail three times it's back to L plates and taking another test.
The message here is that a licence is not for life but is only a temporary permit to use the roads.
|
As UT seem temporarily indisposed I suggest the following:-
Every ten years every driver/rider with an A or B licence has to take and pass the standard driving/riding hazard perception and theory test to retain their licence.
This assumes that performance in a monitored driving test has a correlation with long term driving performance on the road. Whilst perhaps intuitively appealing, it is almost certainly rubbish.
Would you drive in the same manner with an examiner in the pasenger seat as you would on your normal comute to work? Of course not. You want to perform well and get a pat on the head.
A driving test can merely ascertain that a driver has a modicum of competence in operating a vehicle within the the paramters of the highway code. Nothing more.
Look at our friend in the Audi TT who became airborne and collided with a house. I bet he passed his driving test with only two minors. Result: he becomes over-confidant and thinks he is Colin McCrae-and nearly sufferdd the same fate as Colin McCrae.
Conversely, a 'weak' driver who performs poorly in a test, is much safer-providing he knows his limitations and stays within them.
This is why women are less of an insurance risk, even though they have poorer spatial awareness than men. Above a certain (fairly low) threshold, a driver's ability to operate their vehicle is not very relevant.
|
|
Plenty of suggestions coming from government it appears:
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-21937188
Looks like a discarded flipchart from a brainstorming session which bears all the hallmarks of a lets-try-this-and-see-it-works approach.
Still, the infantisation of our nation's young adults is bound to increase personal responsibility and sober decision making, isn't it?
A particularly unpleasant aside is the spin that it will reduce insurance premiums. No mention of the fact that government exacerbates (and profits from) sky high insurance premiums in the form of insurance premium tax. Perhaps if 17-24 years old are going to have second class driving licences, they should at least have an exemption or a cap on insurance premium tax. As usual, the medicine is all stick and no carrot from the people who won't be affected.
|
As usual, the medicine is all stick and no carrot from the people who won't be affected.
Quite. I believe I've said on here before that for everything from free university tuition to automatic towing entitlement after passing your test, the older generation - who screwed the country up - don't want the younger generation to have all the fun they did.
Don't forget these supposedly untrustworthy young people are both a) the same age every 50 year old was when they thought they themselves were trustworthy and b) the people everyones expecting to fund the coffin dodgers in their old age.
|
As usual, the medicine is all stick and no carrot from the people who won't be affected.
Quite. I believe I've said on here before that for everything from free university tuition to automatic towing entitlement after passing your test, the older generation - who screwed the country up - don't want the younger generation to have all the fun they did.
Don't forget these supposedly untrustworthy young people are both a) the same age every 50 year old was when they thought they themselves were trustworthy and b) the people everyones expecting to fund the coffin dodgers in their old age.
You're too young to understand the concept of gaining wisdom with experience - it's something only older people understand.
Free university tuition would still be a reality if university was for the academic high achievers but successive generations of teachers and Labour politicians have devalued education across the board - Tony Blair once said he wanted 50% of school-leavers to go to university which lowered standards at a stroke and made the concept of free university tuition financially unsustainable.
Every driver gets an automatic towing entitlement, even on a B-only licence - yes it has a 3500kg outfit limit but that's enough for anyone to tow most things - if they need to tow heavy commercial loads then the +E towing test is appropriate. Oldies like me didn't ask/demand an unlimited towing weight.
Don't worry you won't be funding me - I worked hard during my career and saved some of my "ill-gotten gains" which I now live on - a principle that's lost on most of today's young.
|
|
I still believe University should be for the cleverest and that money should have nothing to do with it. I never supported the Blair plans. Blair is of your generation and you're the generation who put him in Downing Street, so my 'generation which ruined the country' remark stands up reasonably well.
Don't worry you won't be funding me - I worked hard during my career and saved some of my "ill-gotten gains" which I now live on - a principle that's lost on most of today's young.
Who are you quoting? I am getting really fed up of old people like you consistently denigrating the young. When they do well at school - you tell them the exams are too easy. When they pass a much harder driving test than you passed - you tell them they can't be trusted on the road but you can.
I would hate to be an 18 year old leaving education today, luckily I was born in 1984 and have a bit of a headstart. All I see from the generation of final salary pensions, free tuition and reasonable mortgages is an expectation for the young to be grateful that you've burned the bottom of several ladders for them.
Anyway, where were we? Oh yes, the something must be done culture around accident statistics.
|
|
Final salary pension - I wish, too
Reasonable mortgages - current motgage interest rate is much lower than the 15% pa we had to pay.
Economically, it's the impetuousness of youth that wants everything now, rather than working/saving for it that has wrecked us.
If today's youth are so much better drivers than the mature group, just why is there no evidence of it ?
|
Reasonable mortgages - current motgage interest rate is much lower than the 15% pa we had to pay.
But the average house price is much higher than what you had to pay and the gap between house prices and wages is far bigger than it was for you.
Economically, it's the impetuousness of youth that wants everything now, rather than working/saving for it that has wrecked us.
Such a bizarre comment and merely feeds what I said earlier. 19 year olds didn't cause the financial crisis, it was Governments and banks both stuffed to the top with old grey men. I have no idea what you're talking about. Even if you're one of them who believes every bad thing is Thatcher's fault then the 30-somethings who 'destroyed the country' in the 1980s are now pensioners and the 80s youth are now middle aged.
If today's youth are so much better drivers than the mature group, just why is there no evidence of it ?
I never said they were so much better. There is evidence that both make up a sizeable minority of accidents, possibly because both make up a sizeable minority of motorists. Evidence suggests experience makes you a better driver, rather than age. Delaying the point that someone gains experience - be it by raising the driving age or stopping young people driving in the dark - merely pushes accidents into the higher age groups.
Edited by jamie745 on 26/03/2013 at 21:05
|
|
Why are house prices high - youngsters borrowing more than they can afford to repay but pushing prices up but then getting into negative equity which the market corrects itself. I bought a house for £14,000 and paid the mortgage off after 8 years DESPITE much higher interest rates than currently.
I thought Thatcher sorted a lot of UK's old issues - Blair/Brown introduced all the new issues - nothing to do with left vs right, just sensible logic.
As youngsters, our lack of finances forced us to gain our early experience on older, low performance cars - that's simply unacceptable to today's youngsters - the problem is they can't handle powerful cars any better than we could, the difference is that we didn't try !
|
Why are house prices high - youngsters borrowing more than they can afford to repay but pushing prices up
Well that's just a vindictive attack which demonstrates a complete lack of knowledge. Your generation did pretty well out of the housing bubble, it wasn't 19 year olds flipping their house three times in the 2000s and it's not 19 year olds refusing to take their losses and keeping prices artificially high. The reality is that 'market correction' you talk about was never allowed to happen.
Ultimately the public makes the most of the tools put in front of it and Government/banks stuffed to the top with baby-boomers were quite happy to encourage cheap credit, drive up prices and all make pretty packets for themselves in the good times. Those tiny banks who ended up lending 125% mortgages at 9x salary were run by 50-somethings, not teenagers.
Some bonkers assertion that teenagers caused the housing bubble proves you simply don't live on planet Earth. I have no idea what planet you're from.
|
Why are house prices high - youngsters borrowing more than they can afford to repay but pushing prices up
Well that's just a vindictive attack which demonstrates a complete lack of knowledge. Your generation did pretty well out of the housing bubble, i
My generation gets nothing out of high house prices - if we want to move we sell high but buy high - the generation that benefits is YOUR generation, when it's left to them in our wills - that's the only way anyone really benefits.
Our generation rarely got anything from wills as the generations before us had to cope with 2 world wars and the depression.
|
|
I'm talking about the people who went through three houses in the last decade, cashing in every time in the belief it'd never stop. I know a few of those people, the type who subtly brags 'I sold my house for x amount' but are now trapped in negative equity at the age of 62. Hahahahaha. Sorry, shouldn't be funny but it is.
If it makes you feel any better I won't be getting very much from anybodies will because my parents have very little to leave me. A house? Not a chance. Looks like that generational benefit will pass me by.
|
|
Again- explanation needed. You will note that I said that a driving assessment every ten years would be a good idea, not a driving test per se as in L-driver test.
I have carried out many driving assessments in the past, not all drivers requiring assistance with their driving are L -drivers. Some had been banned for not having insurance because they couldn't afford it, some had bans from being convicted of DUI and needed help to take and pass an extended test, some had given up driving in the past and needed coaching to get back up to a standard where they felt confident enough to resume driving.
Many driving instructors do not teach learners at all but are involved in what is called "fleet training" where they assess existing fleet or company drivers skills, and offer coaching to improve existing skills, most companies who have brought this system into their fleets have seen their accident rates plummet and their insurance costs fall accordingly.
I'm not banging this drum for my own purposes as my ADI qualification lapsed after I left the UK.
Airline pilots have to undergo regular updates, training and check flights-why not drivers?
They are both in charge of a large lump of metal that is capable of killing a lot of people.
|
Airline pilots have to undergo regular updates, training and check flights-why not drivers?
Because frankly; driving a car from one place to another without causing mass injury isn't difficult. In fact driving a car is reasonably easy. Straight forward even.
|
|
|
|
|
>> Alternatively are you content to be flippant and accept x deaths per year and y injuries per year ?
I'll bite and say "yes".
Unfortunately the agenda here is being driven by the "one death is one too many" merchants, with their avowed aim of zero deaths. This is patently impossible to achieve while the control of any vehicle is left in the hands of humans and is thus a fatuous position to take. Even in a perfect world where everything on the road is run by a computer and always takes the correct response to any situation in milliseconds, a major mechanical failure could still kill someone. Nobody's ever figured out a way of having a tonne of steel moving at 30mph+ hit something and have both it and the something left unscathed and nobody ever will. Accidents will always happen and unfortunately, people will always die. Live with it.
The result is a never-ending stream of kneejerk legislation and new features designed to address the causes of whichever high-profile road fatality made the front page of the Daily Mail last.
|
|
Who mentioned zero deaths was possible ? No one. We live in a world where everything is a risk.
If one death can be prevented then the priceless gift of life has been maintained for someone, that someone could be you or someone you personally know. Surely that alone is motive to try to come up an idea that may contribute to conserving a person’s life.
Here are a few simply ideas, some already touched upon :
1. Leave more space in front of your vehicle when driving at whatever speed you drive, tailgating is dangerous, so is driving too close to the vehicle in front.
2. Give yourself more time to reach your destination, less stressful driving is good and mistakes less likely.
3. Be courteous to other roads users.
4. Ensure your vehicle is fully maintained and road worthy.
5. Never skimp on damaged or worn tyres or damaged wheels/rims. Replace ASAP.
Anymore ?
|
|
Collision avoidance systems, while not the answer to all accidents, will certainly drastically reduce certain types of collision. However, I suspect it will be many many years before the majority of cars on the road are fitted with such systems. Unfortunately, until every vehicle on the road is fitted with these, you will always risk being hit from behind and shunted into the car in front.
|
will certainly drastically reduce certain types of collision.
...but possibly increase others. Relying on a system to make judgement calls is sheer stupidity. Commercial aircraft are quite capable of taking off and landing themselves perfectly, but they always have two pilots in the cockpit. Why? Because a computer cannot make judgements.
|
|
|
|
1. Leave more space in front of your vehicle when driving at whatever speed you drive, tailgating is dangerous, so is driving too close to the vehicle in front.
2. Give yourself more time to reach your destination, less stressful driving is good and mistakes less likely.
3. Be courteous to other roads users.
4. Ensure your vehicle is fully maintained and road worthy.
5. Never skimp on damaged or worn tyres or damaged wheels/rims. Replace ASAP.
True but trite.
|
|
What do you propose unthrottled ?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
