Mike Sales said:Matt B said:spindrift said:the accident rate increased after seat belts were made compulsory.
Do you have a source for that? The official UK figures don't seem to show
it.
I remember that the death rates for pedestrians and cyclist went up, whilst
drivers deaths stayed the same.
Do /you/ have a reliable source for that, because the official UK
figures do not show that.
Quoted message said:Quoted message said:Quoted message said:Advances in the human body to withstand an impact with a ton of metal
travelling at lethal speeds have not matched these advances.
Precisely. Now you see why we should be working towards a sustainable way
of ensuring that vulnerable human bodies, and hard metal objects moving at
speed, do not exist in the same space.
Indeed, we have to ensure that the all road users have an equal investment
in avoiding accidents.
And less opportunity to, and less likelihood of, causing them.
Quoted message said:Since the physical results of accidents are so
unequal in that a driver can kill with physical impunity, the legal
penalties must be used to redress the balance.
Or better still, the environment designed to reduce the ways accidents
can happen.
Quoted message said:I would prefer that the
physical results were equal. What are called "dangerous" cars are those in
which the occupants are less likely to survive an accident. As far as I am
concerned these are safer.
Agreed.
Quoted message said:Quoted message said:Quoted message said:Just what does a killer driver have to do to lose their licence?
Not much these days. Yet even with thousands of disqualified drivers, the
roads are still no safer.
Perhaps it is incorrect to assume that by banning drivers that have
already contravened some law or other, that all other drivers will
suddenly loose their human frailties and gasin super-human powers enough
to be able to concentrate on all laws and on all regulations and on all
road signs and on all road signals and on all other road users - all of
the time. - Funny that doesn't seem to hold true.
Strange suggestion. I think that most drivers know how to do all these
things but for some reason don't. I think they only need sufficient
incentive.
They know how to, but can't do all of those things all of the time,
because they are human. The majority, by a long way, of collisions on
our roads are down to "human error". Another day with the same inputs,
the result would be /no/ collision. The variable is the human psyche.
We need to take account of it.
Quoted message said:Quoted message said:Quoted message said:Get
rid of them, the roads are overcrowded after all, and populated by far
too many people like Ms Hunter who learn nothing from their (two)
previous convictions for speeding.
Or, alternatively, recongise the "human condition" as a valid, natural,
phenomenon, and design around it.
That is what I suggest. Change the construction of cars regulations.
Quoted message said:Do we want sustainable road safety, or more jails bulging full of normal
human beings?
I think that jail is hardly ever a useful penalty for any criminal. I would
not send this woman to jail. Lifetime bans are completely appropriate. At 57
I am only now learning to drive in order to chauffeur my widowed mother. So
for all this time I have been in the position of a banee. Hasn't been too
bad. If not being able to drive is such a dire punishment, what of the old
(see Jo Brand) or the too disabled, or children? What have they done to
deserve not being able to drive? It would better for all if society was not
arranged mainly to suit the motorised. I might reluctantly allow prison for
driving whilst banned. So this woman might go to prison for driving whilst
banned for speeding.
I agree with what you say, in the main. I disagree with your support
for bans. I think bans should only be considered for those whose
actions are wilful. I think the ideal will be when everyone is entitled
to (and able to) drive without special training, and without tests etc.
Roads and vehicles could be designed to allow children, the old, the
poor, the rich, everyone, to drive safely without injuring each other -
as they all manage it whilst walking. We are, of course, a long way
from being able to deliver that yet.
--
Matt B
