Speed cameras

[senator]

I also wonder about the stastistics on this, I would question whether this is accidents or casualty's?

I firmly believe that if you want safer roads then force everyone to do two years as a motorcyclist before they are allowed to drive a car. Still convinced that my motorcycling days as a youth did far more to make me more aware of my surroundings than any amount of training in a car. As a motorcyclist you know it is you that is going to get hurt so it teaches you to think not only ahead for yourself but also for the drivers of the other vehicles.

I used to be a 40k miles a year man and still do a fair amount of distance driving. it always amazes me how many times a fast moving car in will run a car that they need to overtake into the vehicle in front. If they are gaining on the vehicle in front of them then they are going to need to pull out ignore this point and it is likely to be you they pull out on. back off and give them room and we can all go home safe.

[Guest]

35 minutes ago, senator said:

I firmly believe that if you want safer roads then force everyone to do two years as a motorcyclist before they are allowed to drive a car. Still convinced that my motorcycling days as a youth did far more to make me more aware of my surroundings than any amount of training in a car

Nothing focuses one's concentration on the road surface and traffic conditions like being on something that will fall over at the slightest mistake, brown trousers must be much more common on two wheels than four.....

Youngsters graduate directly to cars now that they are so much more affordable, so bikes have become the older enthusiast's province, mores the pity......

 

[Poppy]

For those who want statistics  -Despite forming only 1% of road traffic, motorcyclists account for 22% (one in five) of road deaths and serious injuries. http://www.rospa.com/road-safety/advice/motorcyclists/policy-statements/

[rightsaidfred]

Strowager

I don't know other than that the campaign is aimed at motor cyclists not motorists and the accompanying film illustrated that, in the first two instances speed limits wasn't relevant.

Fred

 

 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Poppy said:

For those who want statistics  -Despite forming only 1% of road traffic, motorcyclists account for 22% (one in five) of road deaths and serious injuries. http://www.rospa.com/road-safety/advice/motorcyclists/policy-statements/

Unfortunately that 22% statistic is still missing a crucial factor,  the percentage of how many dead motorcyclists caused the accidents.

It highlights only too clearly that they pay the highest price, being so vulnerable in collisions.

 

[Guest]

39 minutes ago, rightsaidfred said:

Strowager

I don't know other than that the campaign is aimed at motor cyclists not motorists and the accompanying film illustrated that, in the first two instances speed limits wasn't relevant.

Fred

Yes Fred, motorcyclists can easily be killed at speeds that wouldn't even injure car drivers.

[Poppy]

28 minutes ago, Strowager said:

Unfortunately that 22% statistic is still missing a crucial factor,  the percentage of how many dead motorcyclists caused the accidents.

It highlights only too clearly that they pay the highest price, being so vulnerable in collisions.

 

I found this http://www.transport.govt.nz/assets/Uploads/Research/Documents/Motorcycles-2014.pdf

PDF so I can't copy/paste the most relevant bit - but look at page 8. The motorcyclist was primarily at fault in about two thirds of fatal incidents.

Not for no reason are motorcyclists known as 'organ donors ' by A&E staffs and paramedics.....

[Guest]

22 minutes ago, Poppy said:

I found this http://www.transport.govt.nz/assets/Uploads/Research/Documents/Motorcycles-2014.pdf

PDF so I can't copy/paste the most relevant bit - but look at page 8. The motorcyclist was primarily at fault in about two thirds of fatal incidents.

Not for no reason are motorcyclists known as 'organ donors ' by A&E staffs and paramedics.....

I'm having a job understanding the key to the charts Poppy, but at the moment the pie chart looks to me like the motorcyclist was the primary cause in 36% of "single" vehicle crashes, and in 22% of "multi" vehicle crashes.

I don't understand the way the bar chart underneath has added those percentages?

edit - ah, I understand it now.....

[rightsaidfred]

The point I was making is that speed limits and speed per se are not always the relevant factor it has been stated the average speed in London is 4.6mph it is also a fact that the majority of cyclists and a large number of pedestrians that are seriously injured or killed are by buses and commercial vehicles at low speeds, rather than blame the motorist it is time people were made responsible for their own actions.

Just to move it on to Motorways etc which is the bigger hazard a free flowing stream of traffic doing 80 mph or an idiot sat in the outside lane at 60mph and which would be caught by cameras, when the M1 opened the speed limit was only brought in when the Midland car manufactures started using it as a test track and the 70mph limit was for fuel conservation at the time of the fuel crisis also at a time when the average family car just about managed 70mph.

Fred

 

 

[BroadAmbition]

I'm somewhat sceptical and would be very wary of those statistics, especially where fatalities occurred of the motorcyclist.

Scenario - 1 x dead biker, 1 x written off tin can with an alive driver in it, do you really think the tin can driver is going to admit fault? - No, the biker can't put his view of events forward,  the tin can driver is therefore safe and rarely admits to being capable of  'Selective vision syndrome'.

I'm a biker, have been for years and very regularly over the past eight years or so, I'm what is known as a 'BAB' - 'Born again Biker' (Or used to be) and for the first year of owning my Tiger1050 was in the highest risk bracket, yes even higher than new bikers.  'BAB's are 40+ bikers that come back to bikes after a long absence, they are at extraordinary high risk because todays machines are so much more powerful, capable and different to the days of their youth, get through the first year and statically you should be ok.

I have had three very near misses on my Tiger over the past 8 x years, each and every near miss I was only saved by my bikers 'Sixth' sense, that is being far more aware and much higher levels of concentration than tin can drivers.  Each and every near miss was also my own fault, you see I had wrongly enabled my special biker cloaking device ('B.A' has one of these devices too as it turns out)  and so was not visible to the car drivers concerned. This despite my Tigers headlights are always on, I have a high vis helmet, the Tiger is bright yellow / gold and is a BIG bike and I still was not visible enough.

Another fact that helps keep me out of trouble is that I enrolled in and completed a 'Bike Safe' course run by South Yorkshire Police Motorcyclists, learnt more that I can write down here, heeded their advice as I still do to this day - that has saved my bacon on more than one occasion, and you don't really want to hear of what the professional Police Motorcyclist has to say about car drivers!

Griff

 

[rightsaidfred]

Griff

I wasn`t pointing a finger at any one group as  I have no knowledge of individual facts, my point was that most of if not all the instances I referred to were in relatively low speed situations where cameras would have been irrelevant.

Fred

[Liberty]

Bike Safe courses are excellent.  You get to ride with the guys who can catch your knee-scraping Jap power-rangers by riding their big upright tourers faster than anyone.

[senator]

I'm taking it that a single vehicle accident is purely the motorcycle, just the road, a tree, a lamp post etc. And the motorcycle. This one you can probably put down mostly to the motorcyclist and very probably speed would feature highly in there with a few gallons of diesel and a few white lines and manhole covers thrown in for good measure.

Once you bring another vehicle into the equation the statistics are saying that it is the other driver most of the time but not by as much of a percentage as might be expected, basically a third of the time it is mainly the motercyclist's fault and in another 10% or so of cases the bike rider is at least partly to blame. Yes I'm sure a few car drivers got away with it but it still suggests that riders need to up their game to avoid extinction.

there is another factor missing and that is the non serious/fatal accidents involving motorbikes, leathers/Helmets etc do a fairly good job of holding the body together at normal town and city speeds, I have a feeling that is where you will find the majority of motorcycle no fault accidents.

[Poppy]

Griff,

Have you looked beyond the charts put up by Strowagwger and read the original study ? It's an interesting paper published by The Ministry of Transport, so it should by all accounts be both independent and largely accurate.  The link can be found in my post just before Strow's.

[BuffaloBill]

2 hours ago, Poppy said:

It's an interesting paper published by The Ministry of Transport,

......From New Zealand 

Australia is about the same, as told to me from a friend that we went out to visit in 2006.

He and I went everywhere on our bikes in the UK, camping, Devon,Cornwall, Lake District and even toured Germany but he stopped riding bikes in OZ(Perth) due to the large amount of accidents involving motorcycles there. Now he has moved back here and is back to riding bikes again.

Riding bikes means that you have to constantly watch for diesel on the road plus wet leaves in autumn, dirt from farm machinery, car drivers on their phones, wet white lines, (usually) young drivers paying more attention to their loud music than what's on the road, etc, etc. The list goes on and on. You have to treat everything and everyone as a hazzard and be prepared for the unexpected!

There are of course those who ride like they haven't a minute to live, and some don't live long because of it  and the same can be said of car drivers. The only difference is that you can get away with a lot more in a car!

I leant to ride in an Iron Stone Quarry from age 11yrs just a few hundred yards from our house at the end of a new estate and took and passed my test first time a day after my 16th birthday.(I then took and passed my car test a month after my 17th birthday)

In all those years, I only had one accident, a few months after my 16th, when I went round a corner and slid off hitting the kerb where a lorry had spilled diesel while going round that corner just minutes earlier. I was only doing about 20mph at the time.The bike was totalled as were my leather jacket and jeans and I had to push the bike the 2 miles home with bent wheels and fork's. No-one else was involved and the lorry driver was never found. It was a lesson I never forgot.

I have now been driving and riding bikes for 53yrs (on the road) and only sold the bike last year. I have driven all forms of farm machinery, lorries, large dumper trucks, forklift trucks and  a trailer with 40ft 'Portakabins' on as part of my workload before retiring. 

Don't have a go at motorcyclists. Just read the EDP every day and see how many car accidents there are. Motorcyclists usually get bad press because of the injuries they receive in even a slow accident. A car gets dented but a biker gets a broken leg/collar bone/arm etc. and extensive repairs to the bike.

Speed does not in itself kill, someone being careless causes the death.

OK.....I'm off my soapbox now 

 

[fishtone]

Who's nicked the speed camera on the Wroxham Rd near the Green Man Pub .Suddenly  disappeared. Wonder if it was put on wrong road. Not for sale on ebay yet.

[BroadScot]

1 minute ago, fishtone said:

Who's nicked the speed camera on the Wroxham Rd near the Green Man Pub .Suddenly  disappeared. Wonder if it was put on wrong road. Not for sale on ebay yet.

Perhaps the BA have purchased it to use this season coming!  Skippers beware!

Iain

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, fishtone said:

Who's nicked the speed camera on the Wroxham Rd near the Green Man Pub .Suddenly  disappeared. Wonder if it was put on wrong road. Not for sale on ebay yet.

Yes, it's intriguing me too.

Not just the camera, but the post and the separate flash as well, the whole shebang.....

[BroadScot]

If the whole thing has gone, perhaps our intrepid Wildfuzz....(inspector to be) may be on the case? 

Iain

[rightsaidfred]

I believe it was because it was obscuring the view of traffic turning right from the side road.

Fred

[wombat nee blownup]

8 hours ago, rightsaidfred said:

I believe it was because it was obscuring the view of traffic turning right from the side road.

Fred

Well you wouldn't say left would you?

[ExUserGone]

You could easily reduce road accidents overnight, just remove all the seatbelts and airbags from cars and replace them with a 6" metal spike in the middle of the steering wheel, speed cameras would be a thing of the past then.

[Guest]

13 minutes ago, LeoMagill said:

You could easily reduce road accidents overnight, just remove all the seatbelts and airbags from cars and replace them with a 6" metal spike in the middle of the steering wheel, speed cameras would be a thing of the past then.

That reminds me of a mate's brainwave about car anti-theft devices many years ago.

He proposed a spring-loaded bayonet in the steering column that would trip if anyone tried to hot-wire the car.

Alas, aside from the subsequent murder charge on the owner, there was always the unfortunate side-effects to the genuine driver if such a device ever went wrong.......

[Regulo]

I want one of these: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQbHnLSasfQ

[TheQ]

8 minutes ago, Regulo said:

I want one of these: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQbHnLSasfQ

Thats 'cos is goes with your web name you obviously like high temperatures