Onibury crossing accident and road driver capabilities

[Shrop]

There are now “smart lights” which detect approaching traffic. I suspect the Swansea example given in another post is one of these. My late evening route home features one - the lights will change on a time sequence but if they then detect no traffic on the new green route, but something on the red one, they change straight back again. The danger on a quiet crossroads is that you assume this is going to happen because it always does - then it doesn’t!

Thing is, when my job involved traffic signals in the late 1980s, traffic sensors had already been in use for many years back then. Many local authorities chose to introduce systems such as SCOOT, which ran to fixed programmes and often paid no respect to approaching vehicles. These were fine for very busy areas, but they were hopeless at quiet times. But yes, vehicle sensing has been around for many decades. If only local authorities would use it properly!

To answer literally - no one is preventing them from calling a taxi / Uber or whatever.

Exactly. The cost of car ownership, including depreciation, servicing, fuel, tyres, MOT, parking etc etc almost invariably costs far more than using taxis for those few essential trips that people "trapped" outside public transport areas perceive. Being deprived of a car is nothing like the hardship that people claim.

 

[Meerkat]

Being deprived of a car is nothing like the hardship that people claim.

It really is! It’s a massive change of lifestyle

 

[Llanigraham]

Exactly. The cost of car ownership, including depreciation, servicing, fuel, tyres, MOT, parking etc etc almost invariably costs far more than using taxis for those few essential trips that people "trapped" outside public transport areas perceive. Being deprived of a car is nothing like the hardship that people claim.

I don't think you realise just how many people live in areas where there is no public transport and just how many journeys those people have to make. Even in Shropshire there are numerous villages that have no buses and no taxi services available, just as there are here in Mid Wales and other rural areas.
Things might be great in urban areas but they are very different rurally!

You asked me a question earlier, and which I have answered, so here's one for you:
How would you expect a cancer patient living in a small village 15 miles from the nearest bus or railway station get to an appointment at the Velindre Cancer Centre in Cardiff by 1100 and then get home after 3 hours of Chemo, when their immune system is compromised, when there are no Ambulances available?
(And this is not made up situation, it is a patient I transport regularly!)

 

[MarkyT]

It really is! It’s a massive change of lifestyle

It depends on how much the individual actually uses the vehicle and what practical alternatives are available in the particular area. For many in small towns and rural areas there are often few if any alternatives. Occasional taxi use instead of car ownership can work well in urban areas where many journeys can also be accomplished using good public transport, on foot or by cycle.

 

[duffield]

Some insurance companies have insurance products where you have a "black box" fitted to your vehicle and your insurance premium is adjusted according to the "safety" of your driving style. Given that insurance companies' profits depend critically on them assessing risks, it's not unreasonable to assume that these systems are reasonably effective.

Perhaps in future, these devices should be standardised and compulsory, and in addition to the higher premiums, the very worst rated drivers should be required to have extra training until the "black box" showed an improvement.

It'll never happen though, it would be portrayed as part of the so-called "war on motorists".

 

[Shrop]

I don't think you realise just how many people live in areas where there is no public transport and just how many journeys those people have to make. Even in Shropshire there are numerous villages that have no buses and no taxi services available, just as there are here in Mid Wales and other rural areas.
Things might be great in urban areas but they are very different rurally!

You asked me a question earlier, and which I have answered, so here's one for you:
How would you expect a cancer patient living in a small village 15 miles from the nearest bus or railway station get to an appointment at the Velindre Cancer Centre in Cardiff by 1100 and then get home after 3 hours of Chemo, when their immune system is compromised, when there are no Ambulances available?
(And this is not made up situation, it is a patient I transport regularly!)

Yes, this is certainly very challenging, and not completely unfamiliar among friends and family of my own, so I am sympathetic. However, while I accept your example, for every situation like this there are other people who cite hardship when it's less of a problem than they make out. It's complex, and a single solution that fits everyone simply doesn't exist. My contention is that the whole issue needs study, so that deserving cases can be supported, and people can be encouraged to adapt their lifestyles earlier, in order that such situations become less likely to arise. It cannot all be perfect, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't focus on it at all - not when the result of culturally burying our heads in the sand is a dependence on dangerous driving.

Some insurance companies have insurance products where you have a "black box" fitted to your vehicle and your insurance premium is adjusted according to the "safety" of your driving style. Given that insurance companies' profits depend critically on them assessing risks, it's not unreasonable to assume that these systems are reasonably effective.

Perhaps in future, these devices should be standardised and compulsory, and in addition to the higher premiums, the very worst rated drivers should be required to have extra training until the "black box" showed an improvement.

It'll never happen though, it would be portrayed as part of the so-called "war on motorists".

You're right about things being portrayed as a"war on motorists", but this is all part of the weakness among politicians of all parties, ie the fact that they allow petrol-headed journalists to get away with such rubbish. There has never been a war on motorists, only occasional measures to tackle poor or wasteful driving, or which try (often with good justification) to encourage other means of travel.
But this alleged "war on motorists" is like watching the referee give a difficult decision against your football team, and then instead of trying to understand that he was in a genuinely challenging situation, chanting all sorts about wanting his head on a plate. The sad thing is that the public and politicians believe it and pander to it.

 

[Meerkat]

There has never been a war on motorists,

Minority interest groups inflicting hassle on the majority certainly feels like it - see Wales blanket 20 limits, or Surrey‘s continual dropping of speed limits.

for every situation like this there are other people who cite hardship when it's less of a problem than they make out.

So less of a problem….at least you admit that not having a car is a problem. Not having one restricts your freedom to access many more job opportunities, holiday opportunities, a better social life, easier shopping, easier healthcare etc etc.

 

[MarkyT]

Minority interest groups inflicting hassle on the majority certainly feels like it - see Wales blanket 20 limits, or Surrey‘s continual dropping of speed limits.

As opposed to the majority inflicting more injury and death on vulnerable road users. In Wales, it wasn't entirely 'blanket' and has procedures for review on a site-specific basis. It also had broad cross-party political agreement until one side decided to about face and exploit it as a culture war wedge issue.

 

[Meerkat]

As opposed to the majority inflicting more injury and death on vulnerable road users. In Wales, it wasn't entirely 'blanket' and has procedures for review on a site-specific basis. It also had broad cross-party political agreement until one side decided to about face and exploit it as a culture war wedge issue.

It was blanket then struggle to get exemption.
Reducing speed limits is just a ’must do something’ response rather than doing something targeted properly.

 

[MarkyT]

Reducing speed limits is just a ’must do something’ response rather than doing something targeted properly.

It really isn't. While it's rarely the singular cause of an incident, higher speed makes every consequence of a collision worse, especially for those not encased in a big steel box.

 

[Harpo]

Minority interest groups inflicting hassle on the majority certainly feels like it - see Wales blanket 20 limit

“First 20mph year sees 100 fewer killed or badly hurt” (BBC 30 Jan)​

Welsh 20mph limit: 100 fewer killed or seriously hurt in first year - BBC News

Ex-minister says it shows policy was the most successful road safety initiative in modern times.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[ThirteenArches]

Really, you can't undo the transport policy of the last 65 years quickly and painlessly. The almost absolute focus on road transport - this is true, the relative cossetting of the southeast and vanity projects like HS2 notwithstanding - means that outside the largest cities, access to car transport is practically indispensable for most people, for everyday practicalities like getting the kids to school, going to work, shopping etc. Essential facilities have been centralised - remember cottage hospitals? - and public transport, shackled to the profit motive, can't or won't adapt to make access feasible. And that's just essentials. My wife is a member of two orchestras, a choir and a couple of informal chamber groups. The furthest is less than 15 miles away. I just looked up transport times by bus (no other public transport in our district). Google Maps wouldn't even try to compute one of them, another was 1hr 25m away, but no return possible till next day. The return from the others would have dumped her a mile and a half away on unlit roads.

On the other hand, cars don't have to be big or powerful. The teeth- bared SUV is the chariot of choice of many of my neighbours, and parking on roads developed between the 16th and 19th centuries finds it hard to accommodate the ballooning number of Hindenburg- sized vehicles. Even worse, many of the recent oines are electric and smugly holier-than-thou. And the intermittent bus can't get past sometimes. A whacking tax on oversized vehicles would be a start- but remember when Blair chickened out on that one?

Whatever is done (almost certainly nothing good) will necessarily need to involve long- term planning and democratic engagement, and that's right out of fashion.

Just as a glum aside, I see Derbyshire county council (broke) wants to spend 77 million on a new junction off the A50, to serve a new development that's already got a road to it - and even named after that development.

BTW has anyone any idea how that little truck ended up upside down and sideways on a fairly benign level crossing?

 

[Llanigraham]

Yes, this is certainly very challenging, and not completely unfamiliar among friends and family of my own, so I am sympathetic. However, while I accept your example, for every situation like this there are other people who cite hardship when it's less of a problem than they make out. It's complex, and a single solution that fits everyone simply doesn't exist. My contention is that the whole issue needs study, so that deserving cases can be supported, and people can be encouraged to adapt their lifestyles earlier, in order that such situations become less likely to arise. It cannot all be perfect, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't focus on it at all - not when the result of culturally burying our heads in the sand is a dependence on dangerous driving.

So what do you suggest is done and how are people supposed to adapt their lifestyle?
All move to urban areas, because you certainly are not going to get public transport to every remote settlement?

Minority interest groups inflicting hassle on the majority certainly feels like it - see Wales blanket 20 limits, or Surrey‘s continual dropping of speed limits.

What blanket 20 limit?
If it was that then EVERY road in Wales would have been subject to it.
The 20 limits were quite specific and have been proved to have been succesful in reducing accidents and saving money in the health service.. The biggest problem was that various Councils were too lazy to justify why they didn't want them and didn't tell the population that.
As I have said before, I do lots of miles all over Wales and it has made hardly any difference to my journey times.

So less of a problem….at least you admit that not having a car is a problem. Not having one restricts your freedom to access many more job opportunities, holiday opportunities, a better social life, easier shopping, easier healthcare etc etc.

Quite! That keeps being ignored.

As opposed to the majority inflicting more injury and death on vulnerable road users. In Wales, it wasn't entirely 'blanket' and has procedures for review on a site-specific basis. It also had broad cross-party political agreement until one side decided to about face and exploit it as a culture war wedge issue.

The daft part of that is that the original proposal came from a Senate Member of the Party that then complained volubly about it.

It was blanket then struggle to get exemption.
Reducing speed limits is just a ’must do something’ response rather than doing something targeted properly.

Sorry, but when the original proposal was made every Council, right down to Town Council, were given the chance to oppose the limits and provide local reasons why they didn't want it. Too many didn't bother until too late or even not at all.
And it has been proven that it has reduced injuries, reduced incidents and made roads safer. (see above)

BTW has anyone any idea how that little truck ended up upside down and sideways on a fairly benign level crossing?

Knowing the crossing well as I drove over it every day I worked the next Box down.
He came round the slight corner over the river bridge (from the Ludlow direction) mounted the small kerb outside the house, into the iron fence that gradually collapsed under him, launching him onto 2 wheels and onto the line, removing the barrier pedestal as well.
And he failed the breath test!

 

[Shrop]

So less of a problem….at least you admit that not having a car is a problem. Not having one restricts your freedom to access many more job opportunities, holiday opportunities, a better social life, easier shopping, easier healthcare etc etc.

Not sure why you're hung up on having to be without a car? Having a car is absolutely fine, it's only driving it dangerously that isn't.

So what do you suggest is done and how are people supposed to adapt their lifestyle?
All move to urban areas, because you certainly are not going to get public transport to every remote settlement?

The only people who would need to adapt their lifestyles are those who cannot demonstrate that they can still drive safely. Let me ask you, are you advocating that those who cannot drive safely and who put the lives of others in danger, should be allowed to carry on doing so rather than try to make any effort to adapt their lifestyles?
I guess what you're really saying is that if capabilities aren't te-tested, then at least you don't know that your driving has become bad. Sorry, but if so, then in common with (probably) millions of others, you'd rather keep your head in the sand

 

[Meerkat]

Welsh 20mph limit: 100 fewer killed or seriously hurt in first year - BBC News

Ex-minister says it shows policy was the most successful road safety initiative in modern times.

www.bbc.co.uk

My question then would be where those casualties were saved - were they on a small fraction of the roads reduced under the blanket application (I accept there are places that need a 20 limit). Yes I am aware councils could apply not to do it but that would cost time and money, would inevitably be opposed by the noisy zealots, and people in the councils have bought into the anti-car policies.

 

[Harpo]

people in the councils have bought into the anti-car policies.

Anti-car? It’s a few seconds on journies not an exclusion zone.

 

[Technologist]

They have the right to choose where they live, and to run their lives in a practical manner around their choices. If they don't plan ahead and become dependent upon driving in a manner which endangers others, is that really fair? If you, or a close friend or family member was to be killed or seriously injured due to the dangerous driving of someone who chose not to plan ahead for their lifestyle and ended up driving beyond their competence, I suspect you might answer your own question. Yes it's all about difficult choices, but tell me, do you think it's right to just ignore the issue, knowing that doing so puts many innocent lives in danger?

The whole driving as a privilege thing is basically something that old people and anti car people say. 85% of passenger/freight miles are by car/truck and the entire economy and society would fall apart without them.

It's a privilege to have enough money to live in a place with good public transport and/or have enough money to regularly pay other people to drive you. To have no access to a car in any place which isn't privileged with excellent public transport is to have significant barriers to participate in society.

We are basically one whole working lifetime into near universal car ownership, the idea of it being a privilege is long dead. Also British drivers are by most stats pretty much the safest in the world, there isn't any obvious cheap tricks to make them better drivers.

Regarding cost benefit, my whole point was that superficially you get big numbers out from the cost of accidents. But these are small numbers on a per person level or when compared to the UKs £2.8 trillion economy. Extra training for 50 million drivers is going to be incredibly expensive and it targets the majority of drivers who are never involved in a KSI so stands a decent chance of having some unintended consequence.

The good example of this is blanket cancer screening, if you have a rare cancer screening an entire population for it is likely to yield only a few more diagnoses' and thus early treatment. However if you subject millions of people to a test with even a low false positive rate you will end up with dramatically more incorrect diagnoses than correct ones and end up mistakenly treating thousands of people. It's the same effect here, you may well find that the negative impact of re-testing or training ends up putting a small percentage of marginal drivers (old, infirm, poor) off driving all together. However because this group is much much bigger than the drivers involved in KSIs the negative consequences are actually much bigger than the most likely relatively small numbers accidents stopped by re-training.

Activities conducted by the general populations (e.g. driving) are closer to public health in their effects than standards around professional operators driving machines with hundreds of people on them.

Some insurance companies have insurance products where you have a "black box" fitted to your vehicle and your insurance premium is adjusted according to the "safety" of your driving style. Given that insurance companies' profits depend critically on them assessing risks, it's not unreasonable to assume that these systems are reasonably effective.

Perhaps in future, these devices should be standardised and compulsory, and in addition to the higher premiums, the very worst rated drivers should be required to have extra training until the "black box" showed an improvement.

It'll never happen though, it would be portrayed as part of the so-called "war on motorists".

You need to look up Rory Sutherlands talks on choice architecture and options turning into obligations. Something that starts as a convenience becomes a chore when it becomes obligatory.

A black box for a driver who thinks their age and experience is making them over charged is an excellent option, they feel like they are demonstrating their superior driving. However force it on everybody and it becomes an imposition of a snooping device forcing them to drive like a learner. (Unless its the early versions of Tesla's system which was actually based on their massive database of driving data and didn't actually care if you broke the speed limit if there was adequate sightlines.

 

[Meerkat]

Anti-car? It’s a few seconds on journies not an exclusion zone.

It’s minutes by the time every speed limit has dropped, and minutes on journeys people are doing multiple times a day, and businesses are constantly doing.

 

[Llanigraham]

It’s minutes by the time every speed limit has dropped, and minutes on journeys people are doing multiple times a day, and businesses are constantly doing.

I regularly drive from Newtown to Velindre Hospital, Cardiff, a journey that takes around 2 hours. On that journey I only pass through 5 sections of 20 limits, the longest of which is through Newbridge on Wye. 2 of those places with 20 limits you would be lucky to even get to 20 anyway.
Before the limits it took me 2 hours and funnily enough it still takes me 2 hours.

If I go to Shrewsbury Hospital there is 1 20 limit and it takes me no longer.
If I go to Aberystwyth Hospital there are 3 20 limts and it takes me no longer.
If I go to Wrexham Hospital there is 1 very short 20 limit at Llanymynach and it takes me no longer.

Every speed limit hasn't dropped to 20 and to imply it has is not correct.

 

[Sonic1234]

The danger on a quiet crossroads is that you assume this is going to happen because it always does - then it doesn’t!

Same with the tendency to give every new development a roundabout - often on major A roads. Nothing ever comes around these roundabouts, until it does! They're more of a safety hazard than a standard junction.

 

[Ghostbus]

I see poor driving as a direct collorary to society becoming increasingly hide bound by petty rules, where doctors and teachers are some of the worst offenders, but apparently these days we actually need ever more laws to protect us from the negligence or even deeply unethical behaviour of doctors and teachers.

It's a hard life for many people trying to avoid the consequences of breaching some of these petty rules. I dare say they find it hard to care about the serious but seemingly to them theoretical risk of running a red light or doing 35 in a 30, when the digital clock on the dash is telling them what's actually going to make their life harder if they don't take that risk.

I saw a bus run a red light the other day. I had a front row seat as a passenger. There was no reason for it, and about a million ways that kind of reckless attitude can be detected and rooted out of the workforce without needing a camera on every traffic light. But we have a driver shortage and a general post-Covid shift in the sense of personal responsibility, so.....

 

[Topological]

I regularly drive from Newtown to Velindre Hospital, Cardiff, a journey that takes around 2 hours. On that journey I only pass through 5 sections of 20 limits, the longest of which is through Newbridge on Wye. 2 of those places with 20 limits you would be lucky to even get to 20 anyway.
Before the limits it took me 2 hours and funnily enough it still takes me 2 hours.

If I go to Shrewsbury Hospital there is 1 20 limit and it takes me no longer.
If I go to Aberystwyth Hospital there are 3 20 limts and it takes me no longer.
If I go to Wrexham Hospital there is 1 very short 20 limit at Llanymynach and it takes me no longer.

Every speed limit hasn't dropped to 20 and to imply it has is not correct.

From my house to the nearest Tesco the limits are as follows

20 40 30 20 40 70 (1 junction on the M4) 30 (to be fair there is no 20 section on the A48 there) and if I want I could carry on to Morfa Retail Park with 60 50 40 20. This is a journey of less than 15 minutes.

Edit: Missed the 40 between the 20 and the M4.

 

[Bald Rick]

I regularly drive from Newtown to Velindre Hospital, Cardiff, a journey that takes around 2 hours. On that journey I only pass through 5 sections of 20 limits, the longest of which is through Newbridge on Wye. 2 of those places with 20 limits you would be lucky to even get to 20 anyway.
Before the limits it took me 2 hours and funnily enough it still takes me 2 hours.

If I go to Shrewsbury Hospital there is 1 20 limit and it takes me no longer.
If I go to Aberystwyth Hospital there are 3 20 limts and it takes me no longer.
If I go to Wrexham Hospital there is 1 very short 20 limit at Llanymynach and it takes me no longer.

Every speed limit hasn't dropped to 20 and to imply it has is not correct.

I do a couple of big bike rides in Wales eaxh year, and I particularly enjoyed going through the villages at 34km/h!

 

[Meerkat]

I regularly drive from Newtown to Velindre Hospital, Cardiff, a journey that takes around 2 hours. On that journey I only pass through 5 sections of 20 limits, the longest of which is through Newbridge on Wye. 2 of those places with 20 limits you would be lucky to even get to 20 anyway.
Before the limits it took me 2 hours and funnily enough it still takes me 2 hours.

If I go to Shrewsbury Hospital there is 1 20 limit and it takes me no longer.
If I go to Aberystwyth Hospital there are 3 20 limts and it takes me no longer.
If I go to Wrexham Hospital there is 1 very short 20 limit at Llanymynach and it takes me no longer.

Every speed limit hasn't dropped to 20 and to imply it has is not correct.

Those are cross country routes, not urban routes.
In Surrey their anti driver policy means 50 limit rural dual carriageways, 40 rural A roads, and miles of 30 semi urban A road under the excuse that changing limits in between built up bits is too confusing.

 

[Llanigraham]

Those are cross country routes, not urban routes.
In Surrey their anti driver policy means 50 limit rural dual carriageways, 40 rural A roads, and miles of 30 semi urban A road under the excuse that changing limits in between built up bits is too confusing.

Err??
They all go through urban areas; what do you think, for example, Cardiff or Shrewsbury or Aberystwtyh and the places in between are?

And funnily enough I go to Surrey fairly regularly, as that is where my wife's relatives are, and have never noticed any "anti-driver policy". It is no different to many other places in the UK.

 

[Shrop]

Those are cross country routes, not urban routes.
In Surrey their anti driver policy means 50 limit rural dual carriageways, 40 rural A roads, and miles of 30 semi urban A road under the excuse that changing limits in between built up bits is too confusing.

Can I ask what you mean by "anti driver policy"? Are you suggesting that it's a policy to try to deter car use?

 

[Topological]

Those are cross country routes, not urban routes.
In Surrey their anti driver policy means 50 limit rural dual carriageways, 40 rural A roads, and miles of 30 semi urban A road under the excuse that changing limits in between built up bits is too confusing.

Good? to know this unneccessary flirtation with multiple speed limits is not unique to Wales.

I do not understand what is wrong with 30 in towns, 20 near schools, 60 as the single carriageway national limit and 70 as the dual carriageway national limit.

I appreciate some people think the limit is the target, but I think that these 40s 50s and other random numbers mean that the speed limit does become the target. Certainly I am more likely to think I can do 40 on a 40 road than I would be if I drove the road to its conditions and was allowed to go faster on the longer open straights.

Try counting the speed limit changes between Bridgend Designer Outlet and Treorchy. It is unsurprising I get overtaken so much trying to follow the constant changes on that road.

 

[Harpo]

Its nonsense to think that lower speed limits are an arbitrary attack on motorists, they’re almost always about safety, often pedestrians as well as drivers.

Its also worth looking at how many 40s or 50s have got street lighting. Without supplementary signage they’d be an automatic 30mph.

 

[Topological]

Its nonsense to think that lower speed limits are an arbitrary attack on motorists, they’re almost always about safety, often pedestrians as well as drivers.

Its also worth looking at how many 40s or 50s have got street lighting. Without supplementary signage they’d be an automatic 30mph.

I can assure you that I drive many roads without street lights that have arbitrary speed limits.

Likewise, there always used to be 60 and 70 roads with lights. So the existence of lights says nothing to the need to have limits outside the 20/30/60/70 set.

 

[Meerkat]

They all go through urban areas; what do you think, for example, Cardiff or Shrewsbury or Aberystwtyh and the places in between are?

But you are talking long journeys with the urban bit being a minority of it.

And funnily enough I go to Surrey fairly regularly, as that is where my wife's relatives are, and have never noticed any "anti-driver policy". It is no different to many other places in the UK.

Fairly regularly and you wouldn’t notice the drip drip of reduced limits.

Can I ask what you mean by "anti driver policy"? Are you suggesting that it's a policy to try to deter car use?

Yes

Its nonsense to think that lower speed limits are an arbitrary attack on motorists, they’re almost always about safety,

Spurious or vague safety claims. Of course it’s slightly to very slightly safer, but time has a value. They are more normally just to be seen to be seen to be doing something, and this something has very low capital cost and are pushed for by NIMBYS and anti-car lobby groups, with proposals hidden away in a consultation section of the council website that almost no one will know exists.