Fast Marina Magazine

The Association of British Drivers - a lobbying group on behalf of the motoring public. One of the associates Paul Smith runs an organisation called SafeSpeed which amongst other things campaigns for the abolition of speed cameras on the basis that they do more harm than good. He has organised an online petition to the Government at http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/scrapcam some of you may well be minded to sign the petition which only takes a moment.

Sean

Thanks ive signed it...lets hope there is a better outcome from this than the crap they just gave us about classic car tax petition...i wont hold my breath! :roll:

i have 3 points due to speeding. i dont blame the camera for that though because it was my own fault i was doing over 30 so i was breaking the law. it is more the speed limits that need to be addressed and the points system. the 70mph was brought in years ago when the motorways were first built and it should now be 80mph.the aobd dont represent me. i have never heard of them or had any literature from them so why should they represent me. just wait until you have been in an accident or someone close to you gets injured whats the first thing you say..."that f!!!!!! idiot was flying........true ?? points system ? i would go for 2 points instead of the three. more policing who pays for it..we do. the answer there isnt one its down to common sense...................clan chieftain.

In my personal opinion Cameras don’t cut crashes, instead they have the opposite effect. Car drivers belt along the road and don’t break until they are upon the camera. They break hard then once passed the camera its pedal to the metal again. It’s this sudden breaking that leads to loss of control and causes other cars behind to break suddenly and in turn this has a domino effect.

The most ironic thing with the speed camera that a lot of people don’t know about is that the cameras aren’t actually set to say 31 mph before they trigger. A camera located in a 30 mph zone will trigger at about 36/37 mph, however having said that each county in this country has different tolerances with regards to the trigger limit and its up to each police force to set the limit on the camera.

Going back to Larry’s point with regards to speed limits on the motorways, I have to agree, 70mph is far too slow in this modern day traffic. Cars produced now are more technically advanced to the cars of the 60’s and 70’s and are more capable of cruising at higher speeds. I for one have never sat a modern car at 70mph on the motorway, usually sit a lot faster than that and I still consider myself in full control as I’m reading the road ahead at least 20 to 30 seconds in advance.

What really pi$$ed me off when I was on the trucks is they are limited to 56 mph, again this causes more accidents in my opinion as I tended to find that ar$ehole$ in cars would end up getting trapped behind you because they had bad planning skills and a poor judgement of speed over distance, then they would end up pulling out behind you because they would get frustrated and bingo they are wiped out by a faster car failing to spot the turd pulling out from behind the truck. Then an Irish truck would pass you doing 70 now that really got up my goat especially if he was heading to the same location as you and you still had a couple of hours drive ahead of you.

If you ever get caught by a speed camera and the letter drops through your door you are not obliged to incriminate yourself by agreeing in the form that it was you driving the car, it’s up to them to prove who was driving at the time of the offence!

If you ever get pinned by a hand held speed gun at the side of the road just ask the police officer if you can see the gun, then write the make and model of the gun down along with any serial number (after all its your right and they cant stop you!) then finally ask the officer if the device has been calibrated today? In most cases you will drive away Scot free even if you were speeding. It’s up to them to actually PROVE you have committed an offence and if their equipment hasn’t been tested how can they prove that it’s actually correct

If you ever do actually get caught speeding then that’s just unfortunate but again get them to prove it beyond reasonable doubt that you have committed an offence, take it to court if you have to. I have been driving for 14 years and never once have I had an endorsement on my licence.

Speed cameras are OK to cover areas that NEED speed limits enforcing; ie bad junctions, schools, dangerous roads......
As for the rest; an increase in traffic officers to catch the bl**dy idiot drivers that cause most accidents. Better training IS NOT the answer as all that does is make the 'better' trained driver think they are untouchable. It would take a massive change in attitude to make the roads safer and I'm afraid the only way to do that would be to have the fear that the police are actually out there looking for bad drivers....something cameras don't have. But, more plod = more costs and the accountants who now run this country won't allow that to happen as it probably works out cheaper to have someone die in a traffic accident than employ people to stop it happening in the first place.

LOL and the human is supposed to be an intelligent species, you can train an animal to do a job and it will do it the same way every time but id you do the same with a human then they tend to fcuk up from time to time. I have some humans working for me and their intelligence is practically nil

I am totally against all forms of speed traps, The main reasons being its only the law abiding people who are usually fined (and pay up!)...Those with no tax no test or insurance,no licence.stolen car etc.."NO PROBLEM" THIS IS HOW THE CAMERAS SEE IT!..and how likely are you to be pulled over by the Police these days?... ps i dont have any points, yet!...pete :roll:

Pete, you’re absolutely spot on mate! If our police force had more funding then there would be no need for the cameras. As far as I am aware Canada has outlawed the speed cameras unless anyone knows any different.

I watched a program on TV a while back about Traffic Police and on the program the Traffic Police were even saying that they had to give up traffic duties to attend domestic calls so that just left the cameras to pick up only the speeders and as a result the drunk drivers and dangerous drivers got away scot free.