BRoomers.
I like it. That may just stick. :o)
No Dosh
mailto:Alan_moderator@honestjohn.co.uk
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Don't Vroom ... BRoom instead!
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Rebecca,
Completely agree, when walking my 4 year old home I have to explain very carefully about crossing roads and it is beginning to sink in a little. But this can all be undone by one person crossing on the red man. Another problem is the polite driver who thinks they are helping by pulling to a stop and waving the small child across.
Unfortunately the small child then thinks it is safe and wants to cross without regard to any other cars/cycles or motorcycles that are present. In this case I politely wave the car on while holding on firmly to my daughter and explaining carefully why.
regards
Ian L.
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Been there; done that....and the other challenge with my little 'uns is teaching them that just because the green man has lit up doesn't magically make it safe to cross. You still need to look both ways. How many adults bother?
Hopefully they got the point a few weeks back when we were crossing at a pelican in Swanage. Green man lights up; kids about to charge into the road; I grab them just as an ambulance comes screaming round the corner; straight across the pelican crossing at full tilt. Hopefully, just for once, they learned their lesson!
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I grab them justas an ambulance comes screaming round the corner; straight across the pelican crossing at full tilt.
SpamCan, out of interest did the ambulance have its siren on?
The reason I ask is because I am currently awaiting a reply from the manager of our local ambulance service to a complaint I made on behalf of my mother. She doesn't see too well these days and was crossing a pelican to get to our local theatre as it conveniently still has the 'beepers' fitted to tell her when the green man is lit. Apparently she was about a third of the way across when an ambulance went through the red and across the crossing in front of her, luckily a young lad was crossing at the time, saw the ambulance coming and stopped her. It would appear from what she says that the ambulance had its blue lights on but not its siren therefore she didn't hear it coming and being partially blind didn't see the blue lights. I would have thought that an emergency vehicle should have been sounding its siren during such a manoeuvre.
Cockle
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I have to disagree on the subject of children, crossings, etc.
The important thing is to teach them to watch the road and the traffic.
Innocently thinking that a little green man means it is safe to cross is as dangerous as going just because a driver beckons the child across.
Sometimes it is safe to cross when the man is red, sometimes it is still unsafe even though he is green.
Road sense means YOUR sense, not automatic devices, indicators, flashing lights, toots, waves, etc.
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A little deviation from this but in Germany, it is illegal to cross a road where there is no crossing, or when the little green man is not illuminated. The thing is, if the police catch you doing it, you *will* get a hefty fine. When the little green man is not lit up, you find that nobody moves, even if nothing is coming. Yes, it would be annoying, but I believe it has really worked at decreasing the number of people getting run over. Maybe there should be laws (and enforcement) like that here?
Just a thought...
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Ve vere only followink orders..... Can't see it catching on over here.
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cockle : yes I think it did have the siren on; trouble is the pelican crossing in question is pretty much on a blind bend; and so the ambulance wasn't even visible until a second before it crossed the pelican.
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It might catch on if they could enforce it with cameras! Of course all pedestrians would have to be required to walk around with a license plate strapped to their butt.
This hefty German fine, do they enforce it with children? Does little 5 year old Johnny have to cough up an 80 euro fine of 3 years pocket money?
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No, its worse than that. Bystanders shout at you in German and glare horribly. Social sanction as well as financial. Seemed to work, when I were a lad in BAOR land.
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A couple of points. I apologise if they have already been made.
The pedestrians in a car park are most likely to be drivers out of their cars. I have to admit to feeling more 'in the right' when walking in a car park. The drivers should give way to me imo. I'm not advocating leaping out in front of a moving car here, just a bit of give and take. When I'm the driver I assume that pedestrians have priority simply because they are more easily damaged.
Reversing out of a space is poor driving imo. A good driver would reverse INTO a space. The space is a controlled area where it's unlikely that there will be pedestrians or other hazards, and there is no passing traffic. This can be very annoying in the supermarket car park where the spaces really tight. They try to cram in as many cars as possible with no regard to safety or convenience, making loading the shopping into the boot a real pain if you back in.
I'd also always reverse into a garage. (Army training.) If the building catches fire and you need to move the vehicle(s) in a hurry you don't want to be reversing. Even worse at night when you don't have the headlights because you're going backwards.
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Grumpy: 'A good driver would reverse INTO a space.'
You are obviously a bachelor, or at any rate you have never been shopping with a member of the opposite sex! The boot is for filling full of shopping. If parked up against a wall, then it isn't possible. Many's the time I've got into trouble for backing into a space, so I always think which way in I should go. If you're lucky and your car is big enough, then you'll take up 4 spaces anyway, and will have full access from all anges, and you won't get scratched either.
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Reversing is less easy than driving forward.
Why would I reverse from a large space (the lane) into a small space (the parking space) rather than the other way around ?
I realise one should not reverse onto a public highway, but then neither should you reverse off it.
And just how do you get to the boot if its reversed in ?
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Reversing is less easy than driving forward.
Maybe, but I find turning into a space easier to do in reverse, especially when there's little room to do it.
It's also preferable to drive forward out of a space than to have to reverse out of it as you're more likely to encounter hazards when leaving the space than when entering it.
I have a hatchback but even that would have to be very close to a wall to prevent access to the boot.
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it's not just access to the boot, but getting the trolley there that's the problem!
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I'd always rather reverse into a space. It's much easier I find. I have real difficulty in getting into a space in 1 go, going forward, whereas reversing it's a doddle. Maybe that's a feature of driving a bigger car, but in a carpark designed for Visas, it takes 3 or 4 goes to put a big estate car in going forward, when parked between 2 other big estate cars. Going backwards, I'll happily put it between 2 cars with a hair's breadth on either side.
Parking a Polo going in forwards works because you can get away with being parked at an angle.
Vehicles manoeuvre much better with the steering-wheels (the wheels that do the steering, not the wheel that you hold to make the wheels that steer, steer) at the back. That's why fork-lift trucks have their steering-wheels at the back. And why those irritating trolleys they have in French supermarkets with fixed back wheels are actually better driven backwards.
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>>I realise one should not reverse onto a public highway, but then neither should you reverse off it.<<
Mark, I beg to differ on this, the Highway Code says...
"Do not reverse from a side road into a main road. When using a driveway, reverse in and drive out if you can."
The only time I ever drove forward into a drive was if I wanted to work on the engine with it nearest to the garage (VW beetles and the like have no excuse!) ;-)
Carparks = Asda/Tescos, frontend in first. Others, backend in first.
John R
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Several odd points to pick up on this one:
1)However easy/difficult it may be to reverse in, or not, you have to do the opposite to get out again, so what's the benefit, overall?
2) Getting the trolley round to the back is the real clincher, likewise getting the shopping out when back home.
3) Grumpy obviously doesn't have very effective reversing lights on his car, or he'd be able to see where he was going when reversing out of his garage.
4) Why on earth do they keep making trolleys with 4-wheel casters that are impossible to steer? And if they must build supermarket carparks on slopes (eg Tescos, Carmarthen) could they please fit parking brakes on the trolleys?
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1)However easy/difficult it may be to reverse in, or not, you have to do the opposite to get out again, so what's the benefit, overall?
I would say that it is easier to reverse out a space than into it, purely that if you are reversing into a space you are reversing into a finite space, whereas reversing out then you are only limited to the roadway space.
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This is possibly one of the first times that I have agreed entirely with you, BobbyG!
I, too, am rubbish at parking, and going in backwards takes a lot more skill and confidence than I have, particularly when there is an audience of either pedestrians waiting patiently for you to manoevre or, even worse, a line of cars which you are holding up by your endeavours.
For me, taking the easy route in is best. Coming out again afterwards mightn't be so easy, but at least in that situation you might just have someone willing to wait patiently for you to vacate your space because they want it for themselves.
HF :)
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"Reversing into a parking space is more difficult"
On the contrary! Thanks to bilateral door mirrors, I can see both sides of my car and the sides of both adjacent cars when reversing in. Going in forwards, I can see neither, just the tops of my wings and over those something of the other cars.
But return to the parking/stopping habits of others. Today the car in front of me in a busy shopping street, one way, cars both sides, suddenly stopped to let Granny out. That there was an empty disabled space two cars on, or that Granny might need some help to get out, manipulate her sticks and bag AND shut the car door, did not occur to the driver. It took nearly five minutes.
(Anyone who wishes to accuse me of ungentlemanly conduct for not alighting and assisting the old lady, may do so)
John
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Unfortunately a sad casualty of exactly this topic today. Surely no-one should ever drive at a speed high enough to cause injury in a car park? Incomers creep around looking for a space, but using airport car parks regularly, I see people hastily exiting without due care for pedestrians moving around.
From my own observation the worst offenders are mini cab drivers.
Boy killed in airport collision:
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/southern_count...m
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