JRS's Road Safety Proposals

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JRS

JRS

JRS

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Getting these down in writing for when this planet recognises my genius and elects me Supreme Overlord.

1) Any road that isn't a 30 limit -> NSL. Any road that is a 30 limit -> 20mph limit. Motorways and dual carriageways -> no speed limit at all.
2) Traction control, ABS, servo'd brakes, power steering, AYC, stability control etc -> all banned. Airbags banned.
3) Driving test -> remove the stupid hazard avoidance video thing, as it isn't a good test of a potential driver's ability. Instead, in addition to a driving test that now includes motorway driving we shall have new drivers do a real hazard avoidance test in a Tesco carpark. If they come out of it with only one scratch - they pass.

Hopefully this would scare away all the truly hopeless drivers, and everyone that's left would be concentrating harder thanks to the lack of safety equipment/driving aids.

Anyone got any to add? There'll be a Transport Minister post when I create a new government upon my election..... :D
 
Maybe have some speed limit between 20 and 60/70. :p

In my opinion country roads should not have a speed limit as such, but that would only work if you can trust all drivers judgements.
 
So let me get this straight. Your "proposal" is to majoritively increase road speeds across the country, whilst at the same time, removing all assistance, and taking cars back to the 1950's, thus INCREASING braking distances et al?

Madness.
 
paradigm said:
So let me get this straight. Your "proposal" is to majoritively increase road speeds across the country, whilst at the same time, removing all assistance, and taking cars back to the 1950's, thus INCREASING braking distances et al?

Madness.
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Not totally. It makes people stop feeling immortal in a car to a certain extent. Probably better to leave the speed limits at where they are at if you do that.
 
paradigm said:
So let me get this straight. Your "proposal" is to majoritively increase road speeds across the country, whilst at the same time, removing all assistance, and taking cars back to the 1950's, thus INCREASING braking distances et al?

Madness.
Click to expand...

Sorry, when did I say I was taking cars back to the 1950s? Taking away the driving aids wouldn't undo ~50 years of improvement in brakes, tyres, suspension etc.

The plan is to get drivers to focus on the "I'm in control of a huge lump of metal" aspect of driving. The way I see it, that means making cars more difficult to drive :)


***edit***

saitrix said:
Not totally. It makes people stop feeling immortal in a car to a certain extent. Probably better to leave the speed limits at where they are at if you do that.
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Fine. Leave the speed limits as they are for the most part. But I'd still lower the 30 limits to 20 and raise the motorway speed limit. :)
 
JRS said:
Fine. Leave the speed limits as they are for the most part. But I'd still lower the 30 limits to 20 and raise the motorway speed limit. :)
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That can be discussed though.

Some 30 limits I find are set too low, whereas others, I agree, are set too high and even driving through them at 30 seems too fast.
 
paradigm said:
So let me get this straight. Your "proposal" is to majoritively increase road speeds across the country, whilst at the same time, removing all assistance, and taking cars back to the 1950's, thus INCREASING braking distances et al?

Madness.
Click to expand...
I wouldn't say removing driving aids is taking cars back to the 1950's - chassis design has come a long way since then, even though manufacturers seem to increasingly hide poor design with driver aids these days.
On the whole, cars are (even without driver aids) dynamically "better" than they were 50 years ago. Brakes are better, suspension is better, tyres are better and so on.

Removing driver aids might make people treat driving more as an art form - a skill to be learned - rather than something they just "do" - they might actually learn some car control instead of closing their eyes and hoping when it all goes wrong, and this new found skill may help them avoid such situations in the first place.
 
Dup said:
Don't forget banning women drivers, or at least ban women in anything but a Ford Ka.

Otherwsie, I agree!
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Queue a slating, but in some cases I really have to agree (I would like to emphasis the SOME! we also need to add old people who cant see but wont admit it to that group, as well as all chavved up corsa's and saxo's (only those without sunstrips are permitted :D .
 
Talking about women drivers :p

On the way to work this morning, I was behind a car I recognised. Ah yes, that's it... it's the silly bint who has no lane discipline on roundabouts and who doesn't indicate.

Came up to the same roundabout, oh what's this, she's not indicating. :rolleyes:

Next time I see her I'm going to take great pride in winding down my window and shouting "use your ******* indicators" :D
 
Would it not just be far simpler and more feasible to force learner drivers and new drivers into driving something un-aided? I learnt and drove my non-PAS and non-abs corsa 1.2 for a year before getting a car with PAS (still with no ABS), and it taught me a lot about how cars feel on the road.

Removing aids altogether will cause more accidents in the long run.
 
That's true El.

I learnt to drive in a Citroen C2 with ABS and P/S.

Ok, let's do an emergency stop... ready... STOP!

/Mashes the brake pedal

What did that teach me? How to put as much force on the brake pedal as I can, and not let off until I've come to a stop.

Many people's first cars don't have ABS... if they try stamping on the brake pedal, they're not going to stop very quickly.
 
I couldn't cope with 20 mph speed limits. Personally I think that 30 is too low.

I know I'll have the TOTC brigade baying for blood with a comment like that, but I think the same principle applies to 30 limits as to the NSL @ 70 limit. If tyres, brakes, chassis etc have come on enough to increase the NSL limit, then the same applies to urban roads imo. Surely the braking distance of the average car is significantly better than it was in th 60's/70's with the Princess or whatever it was that they were supposed to have used to determine stopping distances.

I personally feel more 'aware' at indicated 40-45 than I do at indicated 30.

I hate the nanny state way that we blame the motorist for an accident with a pedestrian/child.

Consider:-

Roads are bloody dangerous, teach your child/self to cross a road properly. People should respect the fact that they could die the next time they cross the road if they aren't paying attention.

Automatically villifying the motorist for travelling at indicated 40 before investigating the likelihood that accident was caused by a day-dreaming pedestrian is wrong.
 
Taking away the electronic aids would probably result in more accidents, though I can see what you're getting at.
How about giving the driver an incentive to not put themself into a position whereby the assistance is required.
A thought is that during a journey, that the number of seconds when electronic aids are operational is recorded. At the end of the journey, the driver is then given a 10,000 volt shock for the number of seconds during which the aids were running. That would make them think twice before they next drive like a plonker. On a similar note, can the system also measure the amount of time when the driver is tailgating too close and apply a nice "encouragement" for that period of time too.
 
Kingy said:
Surely the braking distance of the average car is significantly better than it was in th 60's/70's with the Princess or whatever it was
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You are thinking of the Ford Anglia I think.

And yes, most cars will stop a LOT quicker these days than a Ford Anglia ever could (on standard parts).
 
paradigm said:
You are thinking of the Ford Anglia I think.

And yes, most cars will stop a LOT quicker these days than a Ford Anglia ever could (on standard parts).
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That must be it, I knew it was something archaic.
 
It was the Ford Anglia that the highway code's stopping distances were taken from.

In fact the Princess had excellent brakes - it was and still is a very common mod to older cars to fit the brakes from a Princess - and as such, Princess brake calipers are worth a lot of money if you have a set.
 
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