Police with speed guns hiding behind bushes

[Dolph]

surely by speeding in the first place its the motorist making himself a criminal?

If they passed a pointless law that made walking illegal, would you call yourself a criminal for walking?

or does a policeman hiding in a bush somehow force you to increase your speed? what you are saying is as long as no policemen is there to witness the crime it didnt happen

No, we're (mostly) saying the law enforcement is pointless because it serves no road safety purpose, and should therefore be stopped.

maybe not knowing if a policemen is hiding behind a bush is a deterent in itselfs? you arent sure so you might think twice before sticking your foot down and gunning it

Or maybe the random reduction of speed limits beyond the natural flow of the road to raise revenue is the problem...

 

[cyborg]

Im so glad speed cameras arn't as common over here. I speed everytime I drive, but i'd never consider myself a criminal. Im sure some people on here would think im scum for that... I just use my common sense when driving. Some roads its safe to break the limits, and its not just me either, a lot of the time im just keeping up with the traffic.

 

[Barks]

Im so glad speed cameras arn't as common over here. I speed everytime I drive, but i'd never consider myself a criminal. Im sure some people on here would think im scum for that... I just use my common sense when driving. Some roads its safe to break the limits, and its not just me either, a lot of the time im just keeping up with the traffic.

Not at all, as stated above sensible drivers adapt their speed to their environment and the government speed limits are pathetic most of the time.

 

[Andy100]

If they passed a pointless law that made walking illegal, would you call yourself a criminal for walking?



No, we're (mostly) saying the law enforcement is pointless because it serves no road safety purpose, and should therefore be stopped.



Or maybe the random reduction of speed limits beyond the natural flow of the road to raise revenue is the problem...

While I agree that speed limits are outdated it is not your place to pick and choose which laws you follow.

If a law was introduced which banned walking (If you think it would get through government) and I continued walking then yes I would consider myself a criminal.

Just because you don't agree with a law doesn't mean you're allowed to break it.

If you want speed limits increased then I guess you and a majority of the country need to vote in a government that would introduce that law.

 

[Morba]

While I agree that speed limits are outdated it is not your place to pick and choose which laws you follow.

wrong.
it is anyones choice as to which law they break, they just need to accept the consequences of doing so

 

[Andy100]

wrong.
it is anyones choice as to which law they break, they just need to accept the consequences of doing so

Agreed


I'm not having a go, I think it's as stupid as the next man but unfortunately that's the world we live in and moaning about getting caught breaking the law is pointless.

If you get caught drunk driving by a random police stop does that deter other people from drink driving.

Having points on my license has made me slow down, so their system has worked.

They have managed to enforce the law on me. Whether I agree with the law or not is another matter entirely.

 

[realscot]

Here's a question.
What if all new cars came with a speed limiter that you could set manually, kind of like cruise control, but more to limit your speed not maintain it. The user would be able to enable or disable said device if and when he/she wanted.

1. Would you use it?

2. What if it cost £100, would you buy it?

If the powers that be offered me a device like that fitted to my car for free, I know i'd take it. Surely not having to look at your speedo at all can only mean less accidents/deaths straight away, not to mention no more speeding if your using it.

Why not go down this route as it'd be pretty simple to intergrate into new cars, and surely not that costly to fit to older ones (yes ok ok more than £100!) Speed camera's don't save lives, this device would. So quit hiding in bushes and let the police do some real policing instead of wasting their time sitting by the roadside.

 

[Vigoro]

Here's a question.
What if all new cars came with a speed limiter that you could set manually, kind of like cruise control, but more to limit your speed not maintain it. The user would be able to enable or disable said device if and when he/she wanted.

1. Would you use it?

2. What if it cost £100, would you buy it?

If the powers that be offered me a device like that fitted to my car for free, I know i'd take it. Surely not having to look at your speedo at all can only mean less accidents/deaths straight away, not to mention no more speeding if your using it.

Why not go down this route as it'd be pretty simple to intergrate into new cars, and surely not that costly to fit to older ones (yes ok ok more than £100!) Speed camera's don't save lives, this device would. So quit hiding in bushes and let the police do some real policing instead of wasting their time sitting by the roadside.

My parents have a speed limited on their megane. They never use it as they are aware of the speed they are travelling at or just use the cruise control.

 

[Barks]

Here's a question.
What if all new cars came with a speed limiter that you could set manually, kind of like cruise control, but more to limit your speed not maintain it. The user would be able to enable or disable said device if and when he/she wanted.

1. Would you use it?

2. What if it cost £100, would you buy it?

If the powers that be offered me a device like that fitted to my car for free, I know i'd take it. Surely not having to look at your speedo at all can only mean less accidents/deaths straight away, not to mention no more speeding if your using it.

Why not go down this route as it'd be pretty simple to intergrate into new cars, and surely not that costly to fit to older ones (yes ok ok more than £100!) Speed camera's don't save lives, this device would. So quit hiding in bushes and let the police do some real policing instead of wasting their time sitting by the roadside.

The thing is for some people EVERY drive is an experience. Sure, the majority of road users are purely getting from A to B and people in this category will still buy performance motors but there are a small minority of people whom extract immeasurable enjoyment from driving every time they get behind the wheel. The only use of such a device most of these people would use is cruise control which is standard on most high performance cars and I suspect ignored as "petrolheads" seem to be incapable at travelling at a constant speed on a motorway for more than 3 minutes without briefly flooring it

I completely sympathise with people in this thread, we all occasionally break the speed limit and I'll openly admit that sometimes I break the speed limit in 30mph zones.
The difference is I'll hit 40-45mph MAX in an area which I believe is safe to do so. An 18 year old mug who doesn't know better will hit 50mph going through a high-street so show off to his mates (and to all the pedestrians for that matter.) It happens ALL the time.

I also don't understand why young drivers feel the need to rev the hell out of their crappy 1.2s in EVERY driving situation. Mugs

 

[arknor]

If they passed a pointless law that made walking illegal, would you call yourself a criminal for walking?

how the hell can you compare walking to breaking the speed limit? i know you bring up some retarded arguments but surely non have ever been this dumb.

hope you get points on your license or lose it and if you kill anyone for speeding i hope its only yourself

 

[realscot]

OOOh now there's an idea, have mandetory speed limiters on new drivers cars for their first what? year? two? more? Have some sort of benefit though, i.e. cheaper insurance or something. Lets face it most crashes involving young people is mainly down to lack of experience, let them learn to drive at 60mph first before they max out their 1.2 corsa's at 90mph.
Slightly off topic, there's this road which i frequently drive on for the last 10 years thats been NSL for as long as I can remember, only recently its been made into a 40mph zone. It's a bypass of the town center, and other than a footpath at one side of the road, there's nothing different. I regularly still find myself sitting at 60mph on it till I remember it's a 40mph and have to brake. Its not like i'm not paying attention to the road, its just hard to break a force of habit.
Loads of people got caught the first week as there were so few signs telling you it was now a 40mph zone, most people didn't even realise. Now they have more signs up, and it's easier to tell.

 

[Barks]

how the hell can you compare walking to breaking the speed limit? i know you bring up some retarded arguments but surely non have ever been this dumb.

hope you get points on your license or lose it and if you kill anyone for speeding i hope its only yourself

Bit harsh mate, I think his point lied along the lines of how ridiculous the speed limit legislation is. He could have said if they made it illegal to have sex would you still have sex, for example.

 

[jbstans]

They do this on the dual carriageway near my house. At several points since it undulates somewhat, it's not uncommon to find them waiting after the second peak at the bottom of the downhill slope, where they're most likely to catch someone speeding! It's so easy to drift over without having to change a thing down a hill.

When they're being obviously sneaky like that then it's just trying to catch people out, not necessarily trying to slow the average car speed down.

On an open road where people have been known to speed randomly having police out with radar guns is def a good thing. I mean unlike a GATSO or whatever they can see you slowing down when you spot them, and if nothing else can pull you over for a stern word.

Random checks like that are always going to be way more effective, but people don't like it when the police are devious about it and hide, or wait at the bottom of a hill or something.

 

[Peerzy]

Here's a question.
What if all new cars came with a speed limiter that you could set manually, kind of like cruise control, but more to limit your speed not maintain it. The user would be able to enable or disable said device if and when he/she wanted.

1. Would you use it?

2. What if it cost £100, would you buy it?

If the powers that be offered me a device like that fitted to my car for free, I know i'd take it. Surely not having to look at your speedo at all can only mean less accidents/deaths straight away, not to mention no more speeding if your using it.

Why not go down this route as it'd be pretty simple to intergrate into new cars, and surely not that costly to fit to older ones (yes ok ok more than £100!) Speed camera's don't save lives, this device would. So quit hiding in bushes and let the police do some real policing instead of wasting their time sitting by the roadside.

Just because the speed limit is 40 doesn't mean it's safe to travel that speed. People would just set the limiter to max, meaning everyone driving around at the speed limit even when road conditions were bad and it was not suitable to do so.

 

[Rainmaker]

People would just set the limiter to max, meaning everyone driving around at the speed limit even when road conditions were bad and it was not suitable to do so.

Not if it was an automatic limiter. BBC article.

The cops in our town are quite even handed and fair. I've never been pulled over randomly in four years of driving, and when they do set up mobile speed traps it's manned by real cops who stand a good mile down a straight stretch of road, in high-vis jackets with temporary speed camera signs erected. The traffic on that road obviously slows considerably on average, which is a good thing considering it's an arterial route into our (tourist attraction) town with lots of pedestrians around.

In contrast, my home town is almost the polar opposite. Cops hide (as was referred to above) in a lay-by under the second crest of an undulating downhill slope, ready to zap drivers as they come over the top. Certainly no deterrent involved there.

I genuinely make an effort to stay under the limit 99% of the time, but I'm not going to lie and say I 'never' break the speed limit (eg empty NSLs at night/early morning). For the numpties doing 40 or 50+ in a 30 residential road, I have no sympathy, however.

 

[dannyjo22]

nvm

 

[Dolph]

how the hell can you compare walking to breaking the speed limit? i know you bring up some retarded arguments but surely non have ever been this dumb.

hope you get points on your license or lose it and if you kill anyone for speeding i hope its only yourself

how about countering my arguments with evidence rather than insults
?

 

[Nomisf]

OOOh now there's an idea, have mandetory speed limiters on new drivers cars for their first what? year? two? more? Have some sort of benefit though, i.e. cheaper insurance or something. Lets face it most crashes involving young people is mainly down to lack of experience, let them learn to drive at 60mph first before they max out their 1.2 corsa's at 90mph.

Thing with this is, you would have to look at the potential safety/traffic issues with this - it could seriously hamper completely safe motorway driving, prevent overtaking, force you into the wrong/unsafe gear on hills or in adverse conditions - and you would still get plonkers ragging it around up to the limiter to show off anyway - causing just as many accidents.

Not good.

 

[Father Ted]

Officers hiding in bushes eh? Must be from Special Branch.

 

[JonnyT]

What makes me laugh is it's never by schools, like this for instance...

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/cn_news_home/displayarticle.asp?id=405788

32,000 cars caught speeding on a road with two schools. 75% of motorists between 8am and 9am were speeding.

Yet there are no plans to stick cameras there. They didn't even issue fines for the ones speeding.

I saw that too! I'm not in the least bit surprised as it is for the most part a long straight road where you can see pretty far ahead of you. It really should have at least one camera outside Netherhall School though as it is divided into two sites and large numbers of kids cross that road to go to lessons on the other site. I speak from experience as it's my old school

Seriously though, if the whole anti-speed safety campaign was truly about safety and not revenue raising, then there would be cameras outside every school and route to school.