Safe at Speed? Don't make me laugh!

Driving into Edinburgh (car) from the East on the A1 at lunchtime on Sunday there was a bit of a holdup, a long queue of slowish traffic on the downhill 400m or so before the 1st roundabout. For those who don't know the area, this is a National Speed Limit section of 2 lane dual carriageway; there is a 40mph speed limit ot the next roundabout but the one in question could in theory be taken at 65. There are two 'on' slip roads in the km or so before the roundabout so it's often quite congested.

It turns out that the delay is caused by traffic slowing to pass 5 yes five cars pulled on to the central reservation having bumped nose-to tail, drivers looking pretty ****ed off exchanging details. So what happened? I didn't see it but here's my best guess. They're all charging along the road at 70 or so, lane 2, maybe a couple of car lengths apart (we've all seen that every day) and the guy at the front comes to the point where he can see traffic stopped at the roundabout, he's going quite quickly so brakes quite hard, then bump, bump, bump, bump behind.

So who's at fault? Conventional wisdom would be to say it's the guys behind, driving too close and too fast. I'd say the one at the front is also culpable; if someone was too close behind he should have slowed down to protect his rear. All of them were going too fast and too close, that was why it happened.

The relevance to this forum is that a biker caught in the middle of this might have been able to escape into the insdie lane or between the lanes. Equally he or she might have been (worst case) thrown across into the opposite carriageway into the oncoming traffic. Messy.

So if there was a prominent speed camera at the top of the hill maybe this wouldn't have happened?

If someone gets close up behind me, I get out of the way and let them go, chance are I'll pass them later when filtering.

[Sid Squid]

Originally Posted by Ken McCulloch

So if there was a prominent speed camera at the top of the hill maybe this wouldn't have happened?

It's a fair question, I'm just not sure of the answer being the one the authorities would like, all circumstances must be treated indivudually of course, but I know of a vaguely similar situation to the one that you describe, where the provision of a speed camera has had just the opposite effect if anything, with the traffic crawling along at a speed which the road layout makes seem very low, the apparent effect has been to bunch the traffic even further resulting in more 'tailgating', I'm not aware of the true frequency of collisions on the said stretch, but it seems more often to me, certainly more of the bump-bump-bump like the one you saw, I've not seen anything serious it's true, but I'm quite sure it happens more often.

if im in that boat - i either pull over to let them pass-
or increase the distance from the car infront - so i dont have to brake so hard if he stopps suddenly - giving the car behind more room to see me braking thus avoid him shunting me up the ass.

plus after a while of reducing my speed - the car behind me 90 percent of the time gets the message and backs off a bit.
if that dont work - a quick flash of the hazard lights.
if it still dont get him off my tail - just pull over and let him overtake .

Originally Posted by Ken McCulloch

So if there was a prominent speed camera at the top of the hill maybe this wouldn't have happened?

Who knows? Can't say if they were or weren't speeding, but their tail-gating wouldn't have been picked up by the camera. Indeed, it might have caused them to bunch-up even more

How about an alternative scenario? Three cars are a safe distance apart in outside lane. They pass one of the slip-roads and there are two cars on it. Two cars from inside lane move into the "safe gaps" between cars 1 & 2 and 2 & 3 to allow the cars on the slip road to join the carriageway. First car brakes due to a hazard ahead before "safe gaps" are re-established.

Now who's culpable?

Originally Posted by Ken McCulloch

So if there was a prominent speed camera at the top of the hill maybe this wouldn't have happened?

I reckon it would probably have still happened - and would be more likely to due to the fact that the road has a 70mph limit - most people see a speed camera and their instant reaction is to brake suddenly, than check their speed only to find that they were driving perfectly legally any way - BUMP! whoops - the person following them was talking on their mobile phone/was an utter cretin in some other way and hits them because of the speed camera...

All the camera has done is to move the accident further up the road!

[embee]

Not quite sure of the thrust of this thread (ahem).

Is it that the cars were probably exceeding the speed limit and a camera might get them under the limit, or that the limit on that stretch of road is inappropriate and it's not safe for traffic to be travelling at the current limit?

Speed (aka safety) cameras will do nothing to get traffic to slow down much below the limit, so if the limit is inappropriate a camera is of no relevance.

The most significant aspect is that the cited incident probably demonstrates the real issue of road safety, i.e. the need for better driver education, and accidents being caused by driver error/misjudgement/lack of skill/lack of awareness etc.

NSL, be it 60 or 70, is probably safe if drivers keep appropriate distances apart, but at any speed if they are tailgating it's a recipe for collisions.

[timwilky]

My painful experience is that bikes brake far better than cars.

the problem is where do you go when there is a **** head 5 ft off your backside and he wants you to go faster cos you are holding him back.

obvios (spelling) answer is slow down., but some gits just wont back off and finding a appropriate place to pull over can be impossible of the single track country lanes I try to ride. Strangely enough when I get a bike behind me most if the have the umph wait until an appropriate point and then pass. Cars NFC. Nuff said

Originally Posted by coombest

I reckon it would probably have still happened - and would be more likely to due to the fact that the road has a 70mph limit - most people see a speed camera and their instant reaction is to brake suddenly, than check their speed only to find that they were driving perfectly legally any way - BUMP! whoops - the person following them was talking on their mobile phone/was an utter cretin in some other way and hits them because of the speed camera...

All the camera has done is to move the accident further up the road!

Agreed.

Besides, at 70 they wern't exceding the limit anyway. Assuming that there was a camera there and the camera wasnt the direct cause of the accident, the accident would still have occured anyway because they were going too fast for the conditions.

"Well put a reduced speed limit followed by a camera before the roundabout" you might say... but heres a counter point; 30mph is too fast to take most corners (at junctions) on roads with a 30mph limit. Just because you're legaly entitled to travel at that speed doesnt mean its safe to do so.

Speed limits are just arbitary numbers, sometimes plucked at random out of the ether. Sometimes its safe to exceed the limit, sometimes (like country lanes) you'd be certifiable to even travel at the limit.

Police to punish unsafe drivers are whats needed. That could mean letting someone who's doing 100mph safely down the motorway off, or arresting some chav drifting round aroundabout at 25mph. Cameras will never be the answer.

Three points :-

If a car/van is following too closely, and wont overtake, I'll sometimes overtake the car in front and let them act as a buffer.

Ever sat in a big 4x4 (eg Toyota Landcruiser) close up to a bike ?
The bike's brake lights are not visible to the 4x4 driver - brake lights are disappearing under the tails of bikes - which I think is a real safety issue. And the SV k3/k4 is a big culprit in this respect.
Of course, I'm assuming that 4x4 drivers would actually care about a bike slowing down.

The weather can be significant - especially with a bright low sun after a shower. I saw a horrible pile-up on the M3 recently in just these conditions.