Drivers and their problems

David9694 wrote:

Drivers angry about e-scooter and bike bays in Southampton

"Having had a car written off after a driver crashed into his vehicle while it was parked, and claiming drivers speed down the road at 50mph, he felt the bay was also an accident waiting to happen.

He said: “Not only do we all struggle to park on Priory Road but we have seen people travel up to 50 miles per hour – they will go straight into those bollards.""

https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/24380839.drivers-angry-e-scooter-bike-b...

That's motonormativity right there. Complain about the bollards (All Praise The Mighty Bollard!) rather than the drivers speeding down the road. Personally, I'd rather that roads have more hazards if they can help reduce driver speeds and get them to pay more attention.

Fake news - it's only cyclists who hit scooterists.

Wait - I think I know the answer to this one...

They need to, er, increase the speed limit to stop the law being brought into disrepute?

chrisonabike wrote:

Another perrenial again - who is still driving with the most points (229 the current winner)?  Meanwhile m'learned friend comes out to defend the indefensible.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce8yq063m96o

BBC wrote:

Ms Ashworth [the lawyer] said having hundreds of points was "very much the exception".

"I’ve seen many people try their luck… and the courts are quite rigorous in the way they assess these arguments," she said.

She added people who already have points, or who had escaped a ban based on exceptional hardship, which they cannot apply for on the same grounds more than once in a three-year period, were often "a lot more careful than anybody else on the road".

The absurdity of it deepens when you realise that those points were acquired by the age of 26.

" To be fair it is a completely unsolvable problem…. Like aging, belly button lint, or fascism. "

He does now! I suppose they have to occasionally to prove they exist, but I know their true view of MOTs: an entirely optional extra, which can be avoided by self-certification

mdavidford wrote:

Wait - I think I know the answer to this one...

They need to, er, increase the speed limit to stop the law being brought into disrepute?

Got it!  And if lots of motorists are driving on footways (or even running over cyclists) the last thing we should do is take them all to court, as that will ...

(There is a point that it's often far more practical to go with human nature.  And I do agree with a couple of the posters here that - because human nature - the best way is to make the infra largely "self-enforcing".  However a) people have actually been shown to slow down when we merely change the numbers so why not ** b) I don't think the following idea holds up to scrutiny: "but all the roads with 30mph limits now are because that is the 'natural' speed of all those roads".

* Somewhat surprisingly - perhaps this is partly psychological "anchoring"?  There are likely some minimum conditions also e.g. *some* threat of enforcement and of course a 20 sign doesn't yet get you 20 in the UK - just a bit slower (nor do other speed limits e.g. motorway ones - per national travel survey)

** The reasons are several but a headline one is that there is a measurable relationship between lower speeds and less serious crash outcomes.

Except that they are demonstrably NOT (in this sample size of one, anyway). Otherwise nobody would ever get more points, once they'd been given some, surely?

It looks like an annual event:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-67826013

27/12/2023

Maybe wtjs could time his reports to coincide with the Christmas Crackdown.

(Only one per year, mind.)

brooksby wrote:

Except that they are demonstrably NOT (in this sample size of one, anyway). Otherwise nobody would ever get more points, once they'd been given some, surely?

She had one for that also - apparently because there is often a delay (maybe 2 week deadline on NIP) before the law gets in touch with you, AND you could make one "journey" but eg. trigger multiple cameras, why, any otherwise law-abiding driver could easily rack up a large haul of points without knowing. (If only there were several different ways you could be informed about these arbitrary, nay, piffling speed limits... and indeed all the other rules of the road that one suspects these folks can't be bothered with or are possibly not psychologically equipped to understand).

"Snow"?  What is this "snow" of which you speak? 

Clearly fake news !

I wonder if Councils are going about this the wrong way. 30 mins parking- £20, 1hr- £10, 2hrs- £5, 4hrs- £2. And no moving your car until your time's up! Encourage the people who hang around town spending money, dissuade the 'pop to the shops for a paper' merchants.

To be fair it seems there's often potential for legal marking / kerb-nerdery by drivers - I think as normal this stems from the usual "if not banned, permitted" idea being extended because "driving is normal and ubiquitous" to "if we haven't made it really blindingly obvious you can't drive here - according to some potentially fiddly legal rules and a number of 'due notice' procedures - then it's fine".

Councils can get these things wrong and they're also not speedy about saying "yeah we cocked up and lost that round".

Yet another time where I suspect our overall principles (maximum safe throughput of motor traffic / space for vehicle storage) hamstring things all the way down.  That sets up "we need lots of visual noise - signs and markings - to restrict vehicles".  And we know that in practice people en-mass aren't great at driving a car AND reading...

Well you couldn't reasonably expect them to park somewhere else and then walk to the location, could you.

David9694 wrote:

"I don’t want to claim on my insurance because they’ll have my trousers down..."

Quote:

(father of nine)..."

A situation he seems to be quite used to, it seems! 🙄

Why buy one if you have no driveway ?

mdavidford wrote:

Well you couldn't reasonably expect them to park somewhere else and then walk to the location, could you.

Where's PC Plod ?

A sad reflection of the times.

But if you don't have a car, how can you bag the parking space outside your house?

chrisonabike wrote:

  And we know that in practice people en-mass aren't great at driving a car AND reading...

Is that why I see loads practicing reading on their phones while driving along?

Hirsute wrote:

"This one is not normal. There is something wrong with the design.

I take it this comment concerns the person who wrote the "report"?

brooksby wrote:

Road safety police defend parking on yellow lines

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cyx0z91qp70o

Hopefully they put the blue lights on and raced to the scene faster than the speed limit, because "operational necessity" also...