I bypassed 1 of these years ago on my way to work when I worked in Twickenham, they had decided to set up the pull-over at a t-junction which caused a hell of a snarl up, just ignored the copper as I was already late for work. Never heard anything but I did drive a company car at the time and company always paid things off without telling you.
Roadside Census..
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Yes, but in order for the police officer to pull you over he has to have a VALID reason, doing a census in NOT a valid reason (I think).[TW]Fox;13719047 said:
Isn't it classed as assault for the police to stop you without good reason? As far as I am aware, failing to complete a census is not a criminal offence.
Thats good!
He didn't turn round or to look at my number and he just flagged the next person in. I wasn't in the best of moods and I was damned if I was stopping for a bunch of people to ask me questions.
What makes you think that?
Man of Honour
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I will check this later, but as far as I am aware, a Police officer does not need any reason to stop you.
of course it is
thats why they are there. Civilians have no legal power to stop a car, a policeman does. Hence to conduct the motoring census, they ask for police assistance.
i believe they have to have A reason. They cant just do it for kicks
But a census is one of them.
Thats good!
arent you a charming individual
You've already established there is a congestion problem on your roads, so how exactly do you expect them to solve it. They can put down the counters, to get an idea of how bad the congestion is, but the only way to try and solve it is to take a cenus.
Where are people comming from, where are they going to, Do they all have one thing in common, and crucially could another road be build to divert this traffic elsewhere.
This is what happened in leeds when they extended the inner city ring road to link directly to the M1A1 link. So all the traffic comming from north of leeds via the M1A1 didnt need to head to the south of leeds, and then take a single lane A road into hunslet, only then to immedately re-join the M621 motorway that goes through leeds.
Only way you find out imformation like that (that most of the traffic on the A64 had come from the M1A1) is to do a census.
They did something similar near me once, there was a chap from the council with a policeman handing out questionnaires to extremely late and irate drivers. My normal 30 minute drive to work took 2hrs 30mins, all to get a questionnaire which I didn't fill in.
I mean how can they honestly expect to get a decent set of answers from late, enraged drivers?
The bloke and the officer looked completely destroyed by the time I'd got to them, the abuse they must have taken for hours handing out those forms... lol.
I mean how can they honestly expect to get a decent set of answers from late, enraged drivers?
The bloke and the officer looked completely destroyed by the time I'd got to them, the abuse they must have taken for hours handing out those forms... lol.
Police are there to catch offenders and so on, not to stop people without a valid reason
Man of Honour
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They are required for a road census, for their traffic powers. Catching offenders is but a small part of police work.
And is it the police's job to be carrying out the census?
see above
its a logical step. The police are the only ones with the powers to stop a motor vehicle. They are about the only people that can be used to conduct a road side census.
Remember the census has its own little place in law. Isnt it a fineable offence to lie on the national census or something ?
And catching criminals is not the only job police do. They do all sorts of things if required, including directing traffic.
Man of Honour
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They don't. They just stop traffic so the council can.
Seriously, just how many times were you dropped on your head as a child?
I take it you don't drive to work in heavy traffic then?
When you spend two hours a day getting to and from work, an extra hour because of the census, and delays the other way because of the other lane closure are a nightmare.. You clearly love sitting in traffic jams.
Yep.. I just don't see why my day should be disrupted.
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Police in the UK do not require any reason to stop a vehicle. They do need one to search it or you though.
Soldato
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Not quite, this type of survey is undertaken so they can build a micro-simulation traffic model for a large area (often a whole town or city) and they need to have a understanding of the origin and destination of a proportion of travellers on the routes so they can factor across total flows.
It is a hugely expensive and consuming exercise.
There are many easier and cheaper ways to observe traffic flows, queuing and journey times. A roadside census is not needed for this. Usually Video-Mast and ANPR surveys will be more than adequate.
They can model the benefits without the need for these road side surveys. This is not why they are undertaken. If they are being undertaken for this reason someone should be fired.
They don’t need to ask people if it will be of benefit, they can model this in many other ways. They need to understand where people are coming from and going to so they can distribute the flows over the highway network in the model and work out how it will relieve congestion at key nodes / junctions.