Speeding facts vs fiction

[MarkH]

Very practical. It's not that practical to close roads and have emergency services show up each time some muppet kills someone.

Logic fail!
Doing something impractical doesn't become practical because something else is also impractical.
Retesting all drivers every 5 years wont happen and there are many reasons why not, smart people will be able to understand those reasons while others will scratch there heads and say "why don't they do this?".

[Voltaire]

speed limit was dropped to 80 for a while when they brought in 'Carless Days" not to be confused with the Spanish Guitarist Carlos Dayz.

I remember I had a Sunday sticker for not driving and used to drive the old mans ute as he had a green exemption.

That was about 1980 I think, some trumped up fuel crisis, may have been around the time of the Iran Hostage crisis.

I'm sure the stats would tell you if it made a difference to the road toll.

The media were no so focused on infotainment like they are now, more sort of news orientated.

I had a Z1000 at the peak of bike crashes, I was unaware of it at the time, we had no internet and to get information you went to the library.

[rastuscat]

To a large extent the majority of the events you have described are no more risky at 100 than they are at 80. What changes is the degree of mess.

That is the key to the reasoning of speed enforcement.

Two sentences of truth.

[TheDemonLord]

i think this is a common misunderstanding.
as commercial pilot, i always felt much much safer on a plane than on the road.
the reasons are vary.
the mains are that on a plane there is a constant focus on driver conditions (skills and physical), vehicle conditions (while almost the 85% of road vehicles are not constantly maintained nor verified. tyre pressure are out of range in near the 90% of the cases... every time i jump on the saddle i perform an external verification of the bike: how many do that? and on a car??), there is a constant focus on external conditions (before takeoff i always receive a meteo folder with condition at the place, at arrival and in any other different location i could need if an emergency should occur. do the majority of motorists know how's the weather before leaving home? do they know if all the roads are viable? don't think so...) and there is a constant concern about the position of anyone else around you (never heard "watch out, there is someone coming fast from your left at the next crossroad! slow down to avoid crashes" in a car or on the bike...).

normally you have much more time and space to amend messes on a plane than the 100 cm you spare from the one you're passing on a road...

No argument that flying is safer than driving - but how much of that is due to pre-flight checks and actively mitigating risks because if something goes wrong the consequences are more likely to be worse

[Jantar]

That is the key to the reasoning of speed enforcement.

Two sentences of truth.

But true safety comes from reducing the causes of accidents rather than reducing the consequences of accidents. Another wee truism learnt from aviation.

[Kickaha]

speed limit was dropped to 80 for a while when they brought in 'Carless Days" not to be confused with the Spanish Guitarist Carlos Dayz.

I remember I had a Sunday sticker for not driving and used to drive the old mans ute as he had a green exemption.

Petrol station trading hours were also restricted (no weekend trading?)and I think there was a limit on the amount of fuel you could carry in a can

[SMOKEU]

Retesting all drivers every 5 years wont happen and there are many reasons why not, smart people will be able to understand those reasons while others will scratch there heads and say "why don't they do this?".

People need to start taking more responsibility for their actions when driving. Since the majority of drivers don't give a fuck and treat driving as a right, rather than a privilege, the onus should be on the driver to periodically prove that they have maintained the necessary skills to operate a motor vehicle safely.

Or should we allow the muppets to keep killing one another at the current levels, just because it's "too hard" and may upset some people by making them realize how bad a driver they are and that they shouldn't even be on the roads?

[Scuba_Steve]

That is the key to the reasoning of speed enforcement.

Two sentences of truth.

Is it so true? that reasoning has been proven wrong time & time again. The countries with the highest roadtolls also tend to have the slowest roads in-fact one of the worst rated cities for road fatalities in the world has an avg speed of 12km/h not 120km/h, 12km/h

[Erelyes]

That is the key to the reasoning of speed enforcement.

Two sentences of truth.

The tourist who killed three people on the roads on Queen's Birthday Weekend was not speeding, he failed to stop at a stop sign.

Shall we work out the speed that the deceased's vehicle would have had to be travelling, for the accident to be prevented, and bring the national speed limit down to that?

[gjm]

Is there any merit in a higher speed limit being applied on some roads? For instance, the new piece of SH from Taupiri through to Hamilton is open, clear and a good piece of road. I'm sure we can all think of similar stretches elsewhere.

The national speed limit would remain at 100kph, unless clearly signed otherwise. Or would this over-tax the limited comprehension of too many drivers?

I appreciate that many roads currently 'enjoying' 100kph limits certainly should not have a higher limit. 100kph probably isn't safe - is too fast - on some, under any circumstances!

[swbarnett]

The tourist who killed three people on the roads on Queen's Birthday Weekend was not speeding, he failed to stop at a stop sign.

Shall we work out the speed that the deceased's vehicle would have had to be travelling, for the accident to be prevented, and bring the national speed limit down to that?

Or UP to it. Up or down, if they had been travelling at a significantly different speed the timing would've been completely different and they would never have met.


On another note, I wonder why noone is talking about what the victim (not the tourist) could've done to prevent the accident. I have come up to an intersection a few times where I wasn't sure whether or not the approaching vehicle was going to stop. I have applied the brakes strongly just in case they didn't and only when I was sure released them. Surely it's not that hard to look at a car and judge that they're going too fast, too close to the intersection, to be certain they're going to stop?

After all, isn't this the point of the latest traffic "safety" ad?

[Zrex]

How about for those people that do partake in driver/rider training at their own cost from approved instructors. Those people who do trackdays and continually work at improving their skills. How about for those people they get an endorsement on their licence that raises the open road limit for them.

How many of you would work on your driving/riding abilities and pay the cost then?

[unstuck]

How about for those people that do partake in driver/rider training at their own cost from approved instructors. Those people who do trackdays and continually work at improving their skills. How about for those people they get an endorsement on their licence that raises the open road limit for them.

How many of you would work on your driving/riding abilities and pay the cost then?

How do you propose we police that idea?

[haydes55]

How about for those people that do partake in driver/rider training at their own cost from approved instructors. Those people who do trackdays and continually work at improving their skills. How about for those people they get an endorsement on their licence that raises the open road limit for them.



How many of you would work on your driving/riding abilities and pay the cost then?

I'd pay higher rego for that!

But yea, hard to police. Unless you still get pulled over and have to present paperwork to the officer. Or different coloured number plates.

[Daffyd]

AFAIR the national speed limit before the "oil crisis" was 50mph, with a 60mph exemption, for what were then, called motorways. I can remember the derestricted signs, (white with black diagonal stripe), and also the standard type sign stating 60mph, for the "motorways". They removed the 60mph for the oil crisis. My timing could be out, but it was about that time. This will upset some, but I would get rid of open road speed limits and replace them with dangerous driving if driving at an excessive speed. I guess it would be too hard to police though.