Policing by sarcasm :(

Maybe off topic, but anyway, another case of police "attitude".

I was almost hit in my cage by a police car that ran the red lights at a crossroads. He had lights on, but no siren, so there was no way to know he was coming as it was a built-up crossroads. I had to skid to a stop to avoid being side impacted by him. He missed the front of my car by about a car length and sped off regardless.

Due to the fact that I was given a speeding ticket a while back by a hidden mobile camera as part of some busy-body organisation's "speeding in september" campaign, I thought "I'm not letting that go", so I wrote a complaint to the IPCC.

After the IPCC guy came to my place of work to take a statement I eventually got a mealy-mouthed, half-hearted letter of apology from the police driver in question along the lines of "I am authorised to drive at high speed and override red lights, I apologise if my driving alarmed you" i.e. not actually admitting he'd done anything wrong by not having the siren on, or that any near-miss had actually occurred, but instead painting me as some sort of jittery numpty who is "alarmed" by fast cars.

I'm pretty sure I would have been killed if I hadn't reacted so quickly and he'd side impacted my driver door at 50-60mph.

Originally Posted by flimbar

Maybe off topic, but anyway, another case of police "attitude".

I was almost hit in my cage by a police car that ran the red lights at a crossroads. He had lights on, but no siren, so there was no way to know he was coming as it was a built-up crossroads. I had to skid to a stop to avoid being side impacted by him. He missed the front of my car by about a car length and sped off regardless.

Due to the fact that I was given a speeding ticket a while back by a hidden mobile camera as part of some busy-body organisation's "speeding in september" campaign, I thought "I'm not letting that go", so I wrote a complaint to the IPCC.

After the IPCC guy came to my place of work to take a statement I eventually got a mealy-mouthed, half-hearted letter of apology from the police driver in question along the lines of "I am authorised to drive at high speed and override red lights, I apologise if my driving alarmed you" i.e. not actually admitting he'd done anything wrong by not having the siren on, or that any near-miss had actually occurred, but instead painting me as some sort of jittery numpty who is "alarmed" by fast cars.

I'm pretty sure I would have been killed if I hadn't reacted so quickly and he'd side impacted my driver door at 50-60mph.

Sadly, that attitude seems to be common. My whole IAM group was nearly taken out by a poorly driven police car one afternoon (a very badly judged overtake round a blind bend especially when you consider it lead onto a long straight ideal for overtaking, in the direction he was travelling). On another occassion, I've seen a pedestrian very nearly hit on my road (a 30) by a police car doing 60-70 (which, I was under the impression, they were never supposed to do). Unfortunately when challenged, they tend to give the stock response, "I'm highly trained, not like you mere mortals." Quite why this is seen as such an effective excuse, whilst having extra training for us is no mitigation for reckless/feckless driving escapes me.

Makes me think of an editorial in streetfighters, where the ed got into a discussion with a traffic cop.
officer (explaining why he can speed): "I'm highly trained and experienced and have ridden professionally and recreationally for years."
editor: "Me too, I've ridden hundreds of thousands of miles, done IAM, ROSPA Gold, have an ACU licence, raced, worked as a courier and motoring journalist."
officer: "That's no excuse"

Originally Posted by Supervox

A slight derail here (sorry !!)

<rant>

But what really bugs me at the moment is that they're re-showing that ad on tv where the little girl says ". . .if you hit me at 40mph there's an 80% chance I'll die, etc etc. . ."

WHAT WERE YOU DOING IN THE ROAD TO START WITH, KID ???

I remember the Green Cross Code ads from when I was a kid - & although we (those of us of a certain age) all took the mickey out of them I'll lay money that the message sunk in !!

As has been stated already some money should be spent on educating pedestrians & cyclists (& disabled scooter drivers) about the dangers of roads - not just on ads blaming the driver for everything !!

</rant>

Originally Posted by Flamin_Squirrel

Oh that's just f**king stupid.

Yeah, guilting an insignificant number of motorists into keeping their speed down for a while, that's a great use of police time. So when a kid steps out in front of them they might get lucky and only get horribly maimed instead of killed.

Certainly never see the green cross code campaigns like the ones that were around when I was little. The police should be educating kids that the roads are very dangerous places and to avoid getting hit by cars in the first place

Woah, woah, I've got to disagree here. I'm not a fan of that ad either. For one, I find it just a bit sick; but the main reason I don't like it is it seems to imply 'It's OK to hit a child at 30 mph rather than 40 mph' when surely the message should be look where the hell you are going and slow where there are children present. I haven't seen the ad for a while, but IIRC it set in a quiet residential avenue and the girl has a school bag?

Which brings me to my point. Kids do stupid things. They don't always think. They lack the concentration we (should) have as adults. They will dart out to catch that dropped 'Shoot-out card' or whatever , they will run and trip over, they do silly things. That is what kids do. I feel, we should react to this not by saying 'well they shouldn't be in the road should they?' but buy driving/riding more carefully in areas where there are kids present. I know there are many other factors involved, and this is taken me far longer to type than I expected so back to work for me...

Its like that advert with the Nissan Sunny braking heavily from 40 skidding and hitting the child... then braking heavily from 30 and stopping before they hit the child. In both cases they locked the front wheels. That would have been a driving test fail. You are taught NOT to lock the wheels which as we all know means that we cant steer around the obstacle when the wheels are locked.

I also like the mickey take one someone created. The car goes around the corner at 50 and the kid crosses behind the car then the car goes around the corner at 30 and hits the kid cos if he'd have been going quicker the kid wouldnt have been near the road when he went past.....

Originally Posted by svpilot

Woah, woah, I've got to disagree here. I'm not a fan of that ad either. For one, I find it just a bit sick; but the main reason I don't like it is it seems to imply 'It's OK to hit a child at 30 mph rather than 40 mph' when surely the message should be look where the hell you are going and slow where there are children present.

You think it's more important to get drivers to slow down than stop kids getting squashed in the first place?

Modern ABS equiped cars can stop extremely quickly so the speed you're going (within reason obviously, less than 40 say) isn't that important.

It's how much time you're given to react. Example: if a kid steps out and gives you 10 meters in front to stop from 40mph you might make it (stopping distances arent my forté, but you'll get the idea), but if you're given 1 meter to stop from 30mph you won't.

[the_lone_wolf]

Originally Posted by Filipe M.

+1. The same thing happens here, pedestrians walking on the wrong side of the road, side by side, hidden behind blind curves, and still testiculate if you beep your horn at them...

could you not have them arrested for indecent exposure?

but seriously, road safety in this country is a joke, the emphasis is on unsustainable policies towards speeding and not on driver awareness and attitude, which would really reduce accidents (and without having to fiddle the numbers like the govt does)

it also depends on what vehicle hits the kid, as inertia is a force to be reckoned with.

if a kid steps out and is hit by a bike at 40, chances are they will survive, less weight to cause dammage, where as a kid steps out at 30 on the same road on a 40 ton arctic or a transit van etc or big 4x4 then they are toast regardless. just like getting hit by a big f**k off train at 15 mph would probably kill you!!!

i for one think that at school in and out times there should be an inforced 20MPH limit across the country with either SPEC's average speed cameras or variable speed cameras all over the place. as these are the only speed cameras that actually slow people down!! anyone ever been on the M42 that streetch of a few miles of v speed cameras

Originally Posted by neio79

i for one think that at school in and out times there should be an inforced 20MPH limit across the country with either SPEC's average speed cameras or variable speed cameras all over the place. as these are the only speed cameras that actually slow people down!! anyone ever been on the M42 that streetch of a few miles of v speed cameras

Oh for christ sake.

Look there's no epidemic of waves of kids being mowed down outside schools every day, so why come up with outlandish ideas to problems that don't exist?

That's not to say that kids don't get killed by cars, and that it never happens outside schools, but it isn't a 'problem' anymore slipping and killing yourself getting out of bed in the morning, or being hit by lightning. To consider it something in particular that requires more interference from our meddling from government is stupid.

Sorry to single you out, but I find such sentiments so deeply irritating, as despite your good intentions it's these kind of views that leave us burried under mountains of health and safely legislation. I find it rather odd that people want all these H&S laws that seriously limit peoples ability to go about their lives, because despite their introduction, the mortality rate in the UK remains a steady 100%

Originally Posted by Flamin_Squirrel

Oh for christ sake.

Look there's no epidemic of waves of kids being mowed down outside schools every day, so why come up with outlandish ideas to problems that don't exist?

That's not to say that kids don't get killed by cars, and that it never happens outside schools, but it isn't a 'problem' anymore slipping and killing yourself getting out of bed in the morning, or being hit by lightning. To consider it something in particular that requires more interference from our meddling from government is stupid.

Sorry to single you out, but I find such sentiments so deeply irritating, as despite your good intentions it's these kind of views that leave us burried under mountains of health and safely legislation. I find it rather odd that people want all these H&S laws, because despite their introduction, the mortality rate in the UK remains a steady 100%

If you read some of my other threads you will see I am not one for the pink and fluffy brigade around here, infact I hate it. But I do take the safty of kids and traffic serious. I agree more needs to be done to educate kids on road safty , I for one go off my head at my daughter for not looking when crossing the road , and once even told her to stand still while I drove into her at 5 mph just so she could see how much it would hurt ( did not actually do it) But it got the point across that cars would give her one hell of a headache. Don’t get me wrong if a driver knocked her over through speeding then a whole world of pain would be upon them before their eventual death!!

My point was with the cameras is that a lot of schools are on main roads with 30 sometimes 40 limits and people only pay attention to speed limits when they are on SPECS or variavble speed cameras. Don’t get me wrong I would get rid off all cameras apart from 30 limits or around schools.

Originally Posted by Flamin_Squirrel

You think it's more important to get drivers to slow down than stop kids getting squashed in the first place?

Modern ABS equiped cars can stop extremely quickly so the speed you're going (within reason obviously, less than 40 say) isn't that important.

It's how much time you're given to react. Example: if a kid steps out and gives you 10 meters in front to stop from 40mph you might make it (stopping distances arent my forté, but you'll get the idea), but if you're given 1 meter to stop from 30mph you won't.

Indeed, when I hit that kid. I was travelling about 20mph. I had about 5M stopping distance. I still hit the kid at about 10mph. You could be travelling at 10mph, but if someone steps out 1M in front of your car, you'll still hit them.

In short, to a point (at all practical speeds) decreased speed only increases the likelihood of their survival if you hit them and decreases how close they can be to your car when they step out and for you to stop in time. It's vastly preferable for all concerned for them to not step out at all.

I concede that as SVpilot says, kids do sometimes run out when they shouldn't. Although, IMO it's still their fault when they get hurt doing this, not the driver's unless the driver is going at stupid speeds (say 20mph+ over the limit). I would have no problem with a 20mph limit outside schools for the 10-15 minutes kids are coming and going each day (IE variable speed limit lights controlled from within the school that a responsible member of staff operates).

This would only reduce the number and severity of accidents though, not eleminate them entirely. Consider my example, I was doing 20, I still hit the kid.