Am I the only person who thinks speed cameras get rather slated in our society for no good reason?

And that the recent news they will also be on the look-out for people using mobile phones and not wearing seatbelts is something to be welcomed not scorned?

Just that when everyone bleats on about it being unfair to motorists, I can’t help thinking we’re all making a silly fuss.

Surely they are just there to ensure we don’t break the law? That we don’t all drive at potentially dangerous speeds. That we concentrate on the road and not the phone call we’re having with our best mate as we hit 80mph on a busy dual carriageway. That we are wearing obligatory safety devices which could just save our lives if we have a crash.

Yet every time cameras are mentioned, there follows an avalanche of irate motorists keen to point out how they are more than capable of driving through a residential street at 90 mph, while on the phone and sitting side-saddle without pedestrians or other motorists being endangered in any way.

It’s a bit like saying you don’t like CCTV cameras because it stops you shoplifting or mugging someone down a dark alley.

So let me become unpopular with the speeding fraternity. Let me antagonise apparently every motorist on the road, and say I think speed cameras are actually a good idea.

What’s more, if you’re stupid enough to be caught on camera by one in this day and age, then more fool you, as you’re clearly not paying nearly enough attention to the road and your surroundings.

The things are painted bright yellow, for goodness sake, and about a million signs in the miles leading up to it warn you where they are. They’re not hidden anymore (which was a silly strategy, no question), and they are all positioned so as to take the heat out of established, danger hotspots.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m no holier-than-thou motorist. And on the few occasions I’ve feared I’ve set a camera flashing in my direction I have cursed and yelled as much as the next man. But, crucially, my anger is directed entirely at myself for being so daft to be driving in a way which may earn me some points on my licence. Not the machine. It didn’t make me exceed the speed limit after all.

I don’t even understand the basic argument against them. Don’t like them? Don’t want to give your money to them? Then slow down when you go past them.

There was a case in Devon recently when a spate of motorists (all, naturally, travelling far too fast) triggered a number of machines into a flurry of flash light photography. They must have looked like a paparazzi parade as they drove past.

But they were so incensed they went back and burnt the things to the ground. Well, obviously, it’s a bit tricky to burn a metal box on a pole to the ground, but suffice it to say, they ended up looking rather the worse for wear.

Yet this was reported by some as almost something to be celebrated – that it was the little man against, well The Man. And I don’t get it.

The other big argument is the fact it makes so much money. So what? In fact, I’m pleased that some money is being extracted from motorists who drive too fast and being invested in things we can all gain some benefit from – albeit just a patched up road somewhere.

So I welcome the cameras. I have no sympathy if you get caught on one. And if it stops a couple of the sort of idiots who drive down my narrow terraced street as if its Monaco on Grand Prix day, then quite frankly no one will be more delighted than I.


 

"Am I the only person who thinks speed cameras get rather slated in our society"

Yes!

When you drive down that wide empty road that you've been driving down for years at 40mph and get flashed by a speed camera because the council have for no good reason reduced the limit to 30mph and you didn't notice the signs had changed, perhaps you'll understand. Or perhaps you'll wait until they reduce it to 20mph before you manage to connect the dots.

Oh dear - another "if we keep to the speed limit the world would be a safe or safer place" article. 

No one ever considers the unwanted side effects of enforcement and "traffic calming".   Road humps damage suspension, tyres and steering - failures of which are bound to have caused some collisions (does anyone know how many?).  20mph zones cause frustration - I was recently overtaken late at night by someone wh was not prepared to stay behind and shot past at 40-50.   20mph zones can also cause pedestrians to feel "too safe" resulting in more injuries as they step into the road without properly checking that it is clear.   Speed cameras cause distraction, sudden braking, etc.  It is a matter of record that speed cameras have contributed to collisions (Google for Myra Nevett or Graham Davies Fergus - in both cases the Coroner laid blame on the speed camera).  It is inconceivable that other incidents have not been triggered by cameras.

I have spent a year in correspondence with the Kent and Medway Camera Partnership and, using my safety engineering background, have concluded that they have no evidence at all that a speed camera has, or could, prevent a collision.  They have also published misleading claims for how successful speed cameras have been in the area (such as "Every day at least one person in Kent and Medway escapes injury due to the presence of safety cameras" - a claim for which they have been unable to support and which is self evident nonsense) 

One of the rules for siting cameras is that the prosecution threshold speed must be less than the speed that 85% of drivers would naturally drive at (which is widely condidered a safe speed, and a more suitable guide to the suitable speed limit. 

The fundamental challenge is "show me a collision where it could be claimed that a speed camera would/could have prevented it".  I have asked that question of numerous speed camera proponents over the last two years and have had no credible answers.

Speed cameras are a sham and a scam which provide no net road safety benefit.  They cost Kent and Medway authorities over £2m.

A shocking waste - the Partnership must be dismantle before it does more damage and wastes more public money.

 

 

The problem with speed cameras is their disporportionality.  The loss of a driving licence for being caught slightly over the speed limit four times is likely to cause significant hardship in an age where we increasingly rely on our cars.  It may even lead to the end of a career, if that requires a driving licence, and those living in rural areas which are not served by public transport find themselves housebound.

Speeding drivers are targetted because they are easy targets.  It's easy to catch someone breaking an often arbitrary speed limit.  By contrast, it's much harder to catch and prosecute seriously dangerous drivers.  The many drivers who drive uninsured normally get away with it.  Even if they do get caught, the typical fine is less that the cost of the insurance they didn't pay!  Banned drivers caught driving typically receive an extension to their driving ban, which is the most pointless punishment of all!

Driving safely is about much more than speed alone.  Indeed, a driver who spends all his time watching the speedometer is likely to be more dangerous than one who watches the road, but sometimes allows his speed to drift to 34 in a 30 mph zone.  That is why speed cameras are unreasonable - they are about punishing soft targets for very minor crimes, to the neglect of serious and dangerous criminals.

Speed cameras could be made fairer by adopting the Canadian model, whereby drivers get fined for being caught speeding by an automated camera, with points reserved for more serious driving offences.

Sorry camera fans, it isn't a question of arguing speeding law, it is the abject incompetence of the concept.

It's almost the same issue as having 16,000 PCSO's (that's plastic policemen with only limited training and ability putting them only slightly above a traffic warden) because for the same money, the country could be employing 11,000 real police officers and doing the job properly.

Same principle for every partnership manager, public relations, mobile camera operator and the raft of non productive support staff, divert all that wasted money back into real front line policing and that could make a real difference, instead of having to fudge their figures so that it looks good, till it is exposed by the UK Statistics Authority where the reality is exposed and speed cameras have made no appreciable difference what so ever!

I don't agree with speed cameras, not because of a disagreement with how to drive safely or what is the right law, but because I see them as nothing more than culpable negligence and a money making exercise for the manufacturers of the technology, such as Redflex who're much more concerned about profits than anything else and are spending millions of dollars on political lobbying around the world in an attempt to thwart the ever present threat of camera contracts being dumped.

It appears councillors and our council taxes are far too easily parted.

Every time someone writes in support of speed cameras they stir up a bunch of reactionary fools who want to be allowed to ignore a law that they don't like.  No-one forces you to speed, so as the article said, you have only yourself to blame if you get caught.  Anyone who feels unable to keep at or below the posted speed limit without staring at their instruments, frankly, isn't fit to hold a driving licence.  And remember, the limit is the _maximum_ limit, not a target!  You aren't obliged to cruise exactly at that speed, you are obliged not to exceed it and by getting behind the wheel of any vehicle you should accept your responsibility to society to follow the rules of the road.  Driving is not a right, it is a privilege, and those caught breaking the rules should be punished, as with every other law of the land.

Now, before you all jump up and down shouting, I'll mention a couple of things that I do agree with from the posts above.  1) Yes, we need more Police on the roads and on the beat, as they are better placed to spot drivers behaving in other dangerous ways, such as on the phone or being reckless.  The answer to that is not to scrap cameras, it's to cut the stupid amount of paperwork that the Police have to do all the time.  And 2) no, I'm not a fan of speed cameras that watch only one point on the road.  They're far too easy for you speeders to learn the location of and hit the brakes just in time!  Paint them all grey again, hide them, and make you lot obey the limit all the time.  Painting them yellow was a political knee-jerk reaction to media coverage of views like in those messages above, and is the equivalent of the Police having to put up a sign warning burglars not to target a street because the Police are watching it!

Ok, so hiding them's never going to happen again, the politicians are too scared.  Would you lot be any happier if the cameras used helped keep the traffic moving?  Idiots who have such a guilty conscience about their speed that they hit the brakes when they see a camera increase congestion and the risk of shunts as everyone behind them reacts to the brake lights.  I drive a lot on motorways and where the roadworks are covered by average speed cameras (SPECS) traffic keeps flowing much better than in the old days, because everyone drives more smoothly.

Why don't we all calm down a bit and stop feeling the need to drive everywhere at top speed?  We're more likely to get there alive, we'll burn less fuel and it'll probably take only a couple of minutes longer.

 

Adrian, you're still making assumptions about how people are driving based on the now discredited and faulty propaganda expunged by the Camera partnerships that doesn't match up with the stats presented by the DfT themselves now they've been exposed by the UK Statistics Authority and forced into admitting the truth.

The official government figures released this year clearly show that accidents where 'breaking a speed limit' (which is the only function of a speed camera) is a cause is responsible for less than 3% of collisions and accidents on Britains roads.

So where you say "Why don't WE all calm down a bit and stop feeling the need to drive everywhere at top speed" the simple answer to that is that we're not.

The public aren't being fooled anymore and they understand the black arts being exploited by the partnerships.

For example, if you want to know why accidents reduce at camera sites, don't look up at the camera, look down at the nice new very expensive high grip road surface that now replaces the worn out super slippery shiney stuff that caused the accident hot spot in the first place. The camera is actually irrelevant.

It's a con, it has always been a con and it always will be a con, this isn't speculation, it's been exposed and the genie is out of the bottle and it isn't likely to be put back in.

Meanwhile, the millions spent on these now obviously totally pointless partnerships isn't being spent on 'real' policing with over 20% of our traffic police missing with some areas seeing a reduction in patrols over up to 80% and therefore the number of people killed by hit and run (people who shouldn't be on the road in the first place), drunk and drugged drivers are on the increase.

The only thing that remains is for the authoritys to confess they've been conned into this wild goose chase and have been massaging the figures to support the incompetence and scrap the camera project as an abject failure which the majority of people reallise it is anyway.

Just like PCOS (plastic police) the camera project was a 'bean counters' idea of how to cut costs on real policing and it simply didn't work.

Eric, the assumptions appear to be all yours.  You clearly live in some kind of parallel upside down, Alice in Wonderland World! What is it that makes people like you spread their dangerous obsessions and encourage contempt for the law?  If just one person reads your spiel and as a result goes out and causes a speed related accident, then you will have blood on your hands.  How do you sleep at night?

Your posting is deliberately misleading.  The latest figures show speed to be responsible for 24% of fatal accidents in the .  Around half of these are through speed OVER the limit.  Drivers who break the speed limit are much more likely to drive at inappropriate speeds within the limit. Drivers who have been caught speeding are more likely to have committed other road traffic offences.  Crime surveys persistently show that speeding is a major concern in local areas.  Speeding equals bad driving - if you cannot drive without speeding, do us all a favour - hand in your licence and get the bus.       

 

 

Since cameras reached their peak in 2004, deaths on the road have nose-dived:

 

 

2005 - 3,508

2008 – 2,538

 

 

A fall of 970 in 3 years.  These figures have not been disputed by the UK Statistics Authority or anyone else.

 

 

It is a shame that a loud and ill informed minority have been allowed to speak for the silent majority of drivers who do support cameras and would like to see more of them. 

 

 

No one is listening to you – cameras are not going anywhere and we can all look forward to hundreds more average speed cameras in the near future (whoever wins the election).

 

 

Virtually all residential streets in Oxford and Portsmouth now have all 20mph limits.

 

 

Hampshire recently introduced 130 new 30mph limits.

 

 

Six other cities are in the early stages of introducing widespread 20mph limits.

 

 

This country now has the joint best road safety record together with .

 

 

Get a life Eric – no one is listening to your discredited and dangerous arguments.

 

 

Great article Chris!

Sam

Now that the information has come out in the press and it is indeed a case where only 3 per cent of car accidents are caused by speeding drivers according to the governments 'now' official statistics (which I obviously had and you obviously didn't) and is as I accurately stated. Do you want to apologise for your somewhat hysterical misleading rant? or would you prefer to continue to accuse me of something else?

I can see what you did, of all the accidents on the roads only three percent are caused by breaking a speed limit, twenty four percent of the three percent were fatal and you're not fooling anyone anymore.

I also sleep fine at nights thank you and I'm not likely to have blood on my hands for telling the truth now am I. But then I'm not responsible for the missing 20% of traffic police due to the governments obsession with speed cameras which was revealed by a freedom of information request in the house of commons by Theresa Villiers the Shadow Transport Secretary who is also going to stop funding to Speed Camera programmes assuming Labour are defeated at the next general election and it isn't just a case of the Conservatives cutting funding to speed camera quangos, Labour have already halved London's speed camera budget and the word is the whole country will be treated the same.

So if my assumption is correct and you work for one of these partnerships, hence the overly dramatic and inaccurate tirade, no amount of fudged statistics and repetition of  faulty misleading propaganda is going to save you from redundancy, so you might as well get used to it and start looking for another job now because the game is over.

I feel obliged to inform you of some other pertinent facts.

Lancashire, who have the highest proliferation of speed cameras in the country (and therefore a corresponding lack of real policing) are the sixth worst county in the country for crashes, behind only the likes of Greater London and Greater Manchester who also use a very large number of Speed Cameras.

However the best performances in the country for casualty reduction are in Durham and North Yorkshire, who don't have any fixed speed cameras and who (inspite of political pressure) continue to police the roads properly.

For all the Camera manufactureres shareholders it's an unfortunate truth and will no doubt cut into their profit margins and cost them millions in political lobbying trying to save their lucrative contracts, just as it has in America where 14 states have now outright banned photo enforcement of any kind because it doesn't work, but it's the truth all the same.

I therefore really don't believe it's me who should be having trouble sleeping at night!

Buy  a Roadpilot product and you don't have to worry!!!

That's part of my point Roger, a road pilot device, or even an iphone app renders the entire countrys stock of speed cameras totally and utterly redundant.

A comprehensive return to real policing is required, not some easily avoided idiotic camera.

This thread of comments has been quite comical. The idiots that are anti speed cameras and pro extra police are the same group that, should that happen, will complain that there is a cop on every corner watching what they do. Same group that belly aches about CCTV.  Here's a thought - OBEY THE LAW - and then who cares about speed cameras and CCTV. It's you idiots that have brought them on. You bunch just don't get it.

Yes a good article and sensible to boot.

To many people drive to fast and it needs to stop.

Speed cameras are no concern for those who follow the speed limits.

 

Wow Eric, you really are obsessed aren't you!  But still  you don’t get it do you? The silent majority are sick of whinging speeders making unqualified statements based on nothing more than the chip on their shoulder. Your views count for nothing as they are not based on anything truthful or factual. And when it comes to being over dramatic you clearly win the prize my friend.

Speed is a factor in 24% of ALL fatal accidents as the official figures show, so stop spreading untruths. There is not a single shred of research in existence anywhere that backs up anything you say.

When Villiers and her cronies get into office they will be briefed by experts and learn that failing to fund cameras is likely to lead to a reversing of the current trend where casualties have been falling, they will change their tune quicker than a speed camera flash. At best there is likely to be a diluted version of Tuesday’s announcement put into place.

Additional police in the current climate? Dream on. The Tories have made it clear that they are out to make spending cuts, raise taxes and collect as much revenue as they possibly can – more than ever they need the revenue raised from the criminals that break speed limits. After all, it was the Tories that introduced cameras in the first place and in doing so boasted of their revenue raising potential. It was Labour who insisted they were painted yellow, Labour who insisted they were signed, Labour who insisted they were placed only where accidents had happened.

When the Tories were last in power some 3,600 were getting killed on UK roads. Now it’s around 2,500. What a coincidence that most of this reduction has happened during the time there were more cameras on the roads than ever, i.e. from 2003/04 onwards.

Why not just learn to drive properly instead of worrying yourself silly about cameras? Details of the rules you must obey are in the Highway Code. If you cannot or will not obey them, you must give up driving now.