Speeding facts vs fiction

[Daffyd]

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?

One major downside with both your and my suggestions is the less experienced driver misjudging an approaching vehicle's speed when pulling out in front of them. This could well have been the cause of the Canterbury crash.

[rastuscat]

One major downside with both your and my suggestions is the less experienced driver misjudging an approaching vehicle's speed when pulling out in front of them. This could well have been the cause of the Canterbury crash.

Cant speak to that through experience, just a couple of comments.

The young and the old have a lesser ability to correctly judge the onset of oncoming vehicles. It's physiological, it's just a fact. It's why kids and old folks pull out in front of people.

It's dangerous to assume that someone is going to comply with the road rules, but we virtually have to, or we'd never get anywhere. For example, drove back from Hanmer this morning, and took it for granted each time that a car coming the other way would stay on their own side of the road. If I'd have stopped to make sure each time, I'd still be somewhere between Culverden and Waikari.

We have certain conventions of understanding with each other as road users. We expect everyone else to stay on their side of the road. When we're in a give way looking for a gap, we assume that an oncoming vehicle is within coo-eee of the speed limit. It's just an assumption we make.

Occasionally we get it wrong. We're human. Allowing for human error is important. Understanding that the other road users we share the road with are human and that we all make mistakes is an important part of the big road use picture.

[R650R]

Cant speak to that through experience, just a couple of comments.

The young and the old have a lesser ability to correctly judge the onset of oncoming vehicles. It's physiological, it's just a fact. It's why kids and old folks pull out in front of people.

Occasionally we get it wrong. We're human. Allowing for human error is important. Understanding that the other road users we share the road with are human and that we all make mistakes is an important part of the big road use picture.

I've seen that first hand, a learner driver in front of me, his Dad in passenger seat and sister in back. He stopped as if giving way to the oncoming traffic (before making right turn into side road) then half second later let the clutch out smoothly and drove into the path of an oncoming car. I was right behind him an could not believe it, thought the oncoming car was going to land on my bike as it lifted a good half metre clear of ground and rotated 180 deg, and this was in 50k zone. No one hurt but a good lesson for me to see early on in my riding days.
The poor innocent chap coming other way was quite upset as he'd previously been involved in a fatal (not his fault) and brought back bad memories etc...

[Urano]

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

which, actually, is the exactly the same thing that happens on a bike with respect to a car.
anyway since you're talkin about pre-flight checks, i'd like to point out that they have nothing to do with speed.
in fact they're normally performed with the plane immobile.

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?

so it will land at around 20kmh.

a missed sign has little to do with speed by itself.
a missed sign in an information cluttered environment as a city road is more likely to be a slip within scanning procedures, a flaw in the way you look around you.
or maybe result of a distraction: was he alone, in the car? was he chatting, talking at the phone, messaging?
he was a tourist, so maybe he had no confidence with the road, with left driving rules, maybe he was looking at a map, he was trying to interpretate the gps, he was looking for a hotel...

and when you consider all the possibilities you'll realize that there is no actual speed which is "right" to avoid those slips, 'cause they don't depend by statistics or by general physic but they vary with any single person and even more, they vary, for the very same person, with time of the day, stress situation, sleep amount, mental load, nutritional situation, weather, conformation of the single road...

at the end of the evaluation process you'll find the only, real, undeniable truth: there's an intrinsic risk in anything we do, and these type of accident are not possible to be "prevented". ("safety is not the equivalent of risk-free" as the u.s. supreme court stated years ago...)
the only thing you can try to do is mitigate the outcome of the event.
since the threshold speed which more likely would permit victims to survive in similar tragic events is 30kmh (and that's the reason why this is the limit in residential and "sensible" areas), you'll end up to set a general speed limit around 20.

that's it...

Occasionally we get it wrong. We're human. Allowing for human error is important. Understanding that the other road users we share the road with are human and that we all make mistakes is an important part of the big road use picture.

so true

[Dave-]

What if we increased the speed limit to say, 150km/h (or your favourite)

But decreased the tolerance to 0 and increased all fines by a factor of 10?

[Urano]

What if we increased the speed limit to say, 150km/h (or your favourite)

But decreased the tolerance to 0 and increased all fines by a factor of 10?

it would work only if you'd be absolutely sure to be fined every single time you reach 151.

[swbarnett]

What if we increased the speed limit to say, 150km/h (or your favourite)

This I like...

But decreased the tolerance to 0 and increased all fines by a factor of 10?

This, however would, for one, result in way more runners.

[Dave-]

This I like...


This, however would, for one, result in way more runners.

Prison sentence.

Not here to fuck spiders.

[scumdog]

it would work only if you'd be absolutely sure to be fined every single time you reach 151.

Sealed electronic device that electronicly fines you each time you exceed the 150kph?

And kills your engine management system for 28 days if you go 5kph over?

[FJRider]

This, however would, for one, result in way more runners.

Few die during a police chase ... most die 2 minutes after the chase is called off. So ... it's just another form of suicide ...

[Urano]

Sealed electronic device that electronicly fines you each time you exceed the 150kph?

And kills your engine management system for 28 days if you go 5kph over?

they're talkin about it from the '80s.
it wouldn't be completely a bad idea.
here we have insurance companies that offer a lower price if you agree to put a gps box which constantly records your speed.
but i dare you to mount one: there's the possibility that if you have a problem within a 50kmh limit area and the box records 55, you would not be covered by the policy...
you say "only if you exceed 150". cool. but how long would it take for some moron seated in some government palace to decide that, since everybody have it, it'll be checked for any crash at any speed.
then good luck explaining that you had right of way and the other idiot has passed anyway...

anyway, heavy vehicles have all tachograph, so as soon they're stopped by police they could be fined for all the speeds they kept.
it doesn't seems me that they have particularly low crash records...

[Jantar]

Sealed electronic device that electronicly fines you each time you exceed the 150kph?

And kills your engine management system for 28 days if you go 5kph over?

But My DR650 doesn't have an engine management system.

OK, It won't do 150 either, so I guess I'm safe on that bike. Now as for the GSX..............

[Dave-]

they're talkin about it from the '80s.
it wouldn't be completely a bad idea.
here we have insurance companies that offer a lower price if you agree to put a gps box which constantly records your speed.
but i dare you to mount one: there's the possibility that if you have a problem within a 50kmh limit area and the box records 55, you would not be covered by the policy...
you say "only if you exceed 150". cool. but how long would it take for some moron seated in some government palace to decide that, since everybody have it, it'll be checked for any crash at any speed.
then good luck explaining that you had right of way and the other idiot has passed anyway...

anyway, heavy vehicles have all tachograph, so as soon they're stopped by police they could be fined for all the speeds they kept.
it doesn't seems me that they have particularly low crash records...

Heard of tinfoil?

[Urano]

Heard of tinfoil?

yes.
i'm afraid in a situation like that you'd be immediately fined (or worse) on presumption that you have something to hide.
burden of proof...? AHAHAHAHA that's a good one...

[unstuck]

anyway, heavy vehicles have all tachograph, so as soon they're stopped by police they could be fined for all the speeds they kept.
it doesn't seems me that they have particularly low crash records...

What you talking bout willis?