Onibury crossing accident and road driver capabilities

[6Gman]

When you say there is a pronounced hump, are you sure you have the right crossing? The one at Onibury really isn't that bad - you should try crossing the one further north along this same route, by Nantwich station, that one is far, far more severe! But aside from that, would you not suspect that if the fault was the severity of the hump on the crossing (which I doubt), then the vehicle would have come to rest some distance beyond the tracks rather than right on them?

The Shrewbridge Road crossing (which I use regularly) has a very poor road profile and the station crossing (which I also use regularly) is poor, but both are on 30mph roads where you rarely get anything close to that speed at the crossings. Very different from Onibury.

 

[Bald Rick]

I think it is worth remembering that, despite the relativity between rail and road incidents, we have one of the best road safety records in the world. Using the stat of road fatalties per 100,000 inhabitants, we are 6th, marginally behind Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Japan and Denmark. The first three of these have much lower population density (combined roughly a quarter of the population of England, in an area 7 times the size), and as we know, Japan has most of it’s population crammed into a much higher population density where public transport use is much higher.

Comparable countries for density and economic activity (the Netherlands, France, Italy) have fatality rates around twice ours, whilst the US is nearly six times.

Source below, its a long report, and the numbers I have extracted from a graph, so not quotable:

https://www.itf-oecd.org/sites/default/files/docs/irtad-road-safety-annual-report-2023.pdf

That’s not to say we shouldn’t do better, however it does show that on this subject generally we are in the top set.

 

[Shrop]

I think it is worth remembering that, despite the relativity between rail and road incidents, we have one of the best road safety records in the world. Using the stat of road fatalties per 100,000 inhabitants, we are 6th, marginally behind Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Japan and Denmark. The first three of these have much lower population density (combined roughly a quarter of the population of England, in an area 7 times the size), and as we know, Japan has most of it’s population crammed into a much higher population density where public transport use is much higher.

Comparable countries for density and economic activity (the Netherlands, France, Italy) have fatality rates around twice ours, whilst the US is nearly six times.

Source below, its a long report, and the numbers I have extracted from a graph, so not quotable:

https://www.itf-oecd.org/sites/default/files/docs/irtad-road-safety-annual-report-2023.pdf

That’s not to say we shouldn’t do better, however it does show that on this subject generally we are in the top set.

It's always interesting to bring Japan into comparisons with the UK, and more often than not they seem to be better than us. A good example is their railways which have been much faster and much more punctual than ours for many decades. People in the UK are often quick to excuse our failure to build a world class railway anything like as fast and efficient as we should have by citing France, with their their lower population density. But the Japanese have a greater population density than the UK, a lot more mountains, and a lot more earthquakes, and yet their railways still put ours to shame. We could learn a lot from them, including with our attitude!

As for road safety, well Japan beats us on that too, but the UK being sixth doesn't make us good at all. Sadly all this shows is that cars pander to human nature throughout most of the world, with the political fear of tackling the dangers they pose being like a silent pandemic. Taking heart from other countries being worse than we are is nothing to be proud of, all it really means is that our heads may be slightly less far into the sand than most.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Yes, this figure may be high, but is your figure 320 per traffic lane? Many junctions have 2 lanes for each of 4 or more approaches to the junction. In addition, even if each cycle is 100 seconds (which is longer than for many junctions), that's 780 cycles per 12 hours, rather more than your 320 ...

It's a single lane turning right at a T junction for which the right turn is triggered by detection loops in the road surface - believe me, you do not want to be behind a couple of motorbikes at the front of the queue... The natural cycle if a vehicle has triggered it is about four minutes as there are two separately signalled conflicting flows; the oncoming traffic and the traffic turning right out of the T junction. My calculations also took into account the quiet overnight hours.

It's this one; live Streetview link provided so you can explore it from all angles and a screenshot - the arrow turning right is the direction where you can pretty much guarantee to see vehicles crossing when the traffic lights I have drawn a ring round are already showing green.

Street View · Google Maps

Explore a place in a more immersive way in Google Maps.

www.google.com

 

[Shrop]

It's a single lane turning right at a T junction for which the right turn is triggered by detection loops in the road surface - believe me, you do not want to be behind a couple of motorbikes at the front of the queue... The natural cycle if a vehicle has triggered it is about four minutes as there are two separately signalled conflicting flows; the oncoming traffic and the traffic turning right out of the T junction. My calculations also took into account the quiet overnight hours.

It's this one; live Streetview link provided so you can explore it from all angles and a screenshot - the arrow turning right is the direction where you can pretty much guarantee to see vehicles crossing when the traffic lights I have drawn a ring round are already showing green.

Street View · Google Maps

Explore a place in a more immersive way in Google Maps.

www.google.com

Thanks for this informative reply, and since I have a couple of spare minutes I'll reply. Firstly, are you sure about your cycle time of four minutes? That would be exceptionally long for any traffic lights, except at roadworks where they can be very long. Permanent installations tend to be around 2 minutes maximum - I'd suggest that you might spend a few minutes at the junction and time it from the lights going red on one arm, until they go red the next time around on that same arm.

Secondly, your junction is smaller than most in terms of the numbers of traffic lights. At the A5 Emstrey island in Shrewsbury for example, there are many more than this, with most traffic having to pass through more than one stop line on the island. If you take the number of stop lines, and factor in the number of lanes at each stop line, the figure (in my head) comes to at least 20. TWENTY! That's a whole lot of opportunities for red light running, and I suspect that if this was ever monitored then the figure could well exceed my earlier suggested 5000 per day. Note that monitoring is NOT the same if you stand there in a yellow jacket, because driving habits then improve straight away as drivers perceive a threat of enforcement.

One immediate answer would be camera enforcement. For anyone who suggests that this would be expensive, if you imagine 5000 infringements per day at £100 each, that's a mere two days to reach £1million, far more than the costs of camera installation!!! Okay, there are many counter-comments that could be made here, the point is that it's worth thinking about rather than just dismissing, which so many people will simply do, both on this forum and around the country when it's drawn to their attention

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Thanks for this informative reply, and since I have a couple of spare minutes I'll reply. Firstly, are you sure about your cycle time of four minutes? That would be exceptionally long for any traffic lights, except at roadworks where they can be very long. Permanent installations tend to be around 2 minutes maximum - I'd suggest that you might spend a few minutes at the junction and time it from the lights going red on one arm, until they go red the next time around on that same arm.

Before I scrapped my car, I was frequently held awaiting a right turn at that junction in excess of three minutes. The phasing is particularly poor ( which probably encourages the red light running? ) - the cycle pattern, starting with the approaching traffic from the direction of the High Street ( to the right of the screenshot ) roughly one minute and a half. At the same time, the left hand lane towards the High Street is released.

Next, the right hand turn from East Street into Hook Road operates - the flow I'm talking about - while the left hand lane is halted. Again, about a minute.

Following that, the right hand turn from Hook Road towards the High Street is released - also about a minute. During this part of the cycle the crossing is activated, which is the logical time to do that. So adding each of the three flows together is about three and a half minutes plus the dead time as the phases change - so yes, close to four minutes.

Incidentally, the next junction along ( High Street / East Street / Church Street / Upper High Street ) off the right of the screenshot is a total nightmare of phasing and has the added complication that pedestrians activating the crossing do not change the cycle or the timings at all - all pressing the button does is make the green man come on at the relevant time. However, because the two junctions are not co-ordinated, we often have a tailback of solid traffic across the northbound side at the H/E/C/U junction when the green man comes on - and drivers will more often than not ignore that the green man is on and will move off as soon as the traffic ahead does, even if there are a dozen people walking in front of them...!!!

If you ever find yourself in Epsom, you would enjoy watching this junction for a while. It's literally the Muppet Show...

Every now and again, Surrey County Council will try to amend the phasing at one or both, but it's almost impossible to find a phasing that works across both.

Secondly, your junction is smaller than most in terms of the numbers of traffic lights. At the A5 Emstrey island in Shrewsbury for example, there are many more than this, with most traffic having to pass through more than one stop line on the island. If you take the number of stop lines, and factor in the number of lanes at each stop line, the figure (in my head) comes to at least 20. TWENTY! That's a whole lot of opportunities for red light running, and I suspect that if this was ever monitored then the figure could well exceed my earlier suggested 5000 per day. Note that monitoring is NOT the same if you stand there in a yellow jacket, because driving habits then improve straight away as drivers perceive a threat of enforcement.

Have a look on Streetview at the other junction I mention above...

One immediate answer would be camera enforcement. For anyone who suggests that this would be expensive, if you imagine 5000 infringements per day at £100 each, that's a mere two days to reach £1million, far more than the costs of camera installation!!! Okay, there are many counter-comments that could be made here, the point is that it's worth thinking about rather than just dismissing, which so many people will simply do, both on this forum and around the country when it's drawn to their attention

I agree, and I would advocate that every set of traffic lights in the country should be fitted with Red Light Cameras - and that the offence should be strict liability on the registered keeper unless they can say in a sworn statement who else was driving if it wasn't them ( and woe betide them if it's a person not named on their insurance... ).

 

[Llanigraham]

As someone who knows Shrewsbury by-pass well and who uses it regularly, I am very doubtful of the figures and ideas being put forward here.
The predominate traffic at that junction mentioned above is straight across the junction, as in taking the by-pass route, and there are only 2 sets of lights that as phased to co-ordinate. (The highlighted route on the shot below) Only rarely have I ever been caught on a red at the second set, the A5054 entry. I have also rarely seen anyone jumping the red here, or for that matter on any other junction on the Shrewsbury by-pass.


I drive an average of a thousand miles a month in the area to the west of Cheltenham, Birmingham, Stoke and Liverpool, and including the whole of Wales and rarely do I see vehicles jumping red lights. The worst offenders of this are cyclists, especially in Birmingham and Cheltenham!

 

[Meerkat]

Of course the big difference between red lights on road and rail is that a road driver can assess the risk and stop in a short distance, whilst the rail driver has limited knowledge of the danger the red is protecting, can’t stop in a short distance, can’t swerve, has a much longer vehicle, and likely has the safety of significant members of the public in their hands. That much greater risk is why railway SPADs are taken a lot more seriously.

Culturally cars are seen as instruments of freedom and independence , which British people are protective of, and we just don’t treat the government’s laws as black and white in the same way as the Germanics (I remember the glares from other pedestrians when I crossed an empty road against a red man!).

 

[Topological]

Thanks for this informative reply, and since I have a couple of spare minutes I'll reply. Firstly, are you sure about your cycle time of four minutes? That would be exceptionally long for any traffic lights, except at roadworks where they can be very long. Permanent installations tend to be around 2 minutes maximum - I'd suggest that you might spend a few minutes at the junction and time it from the lights going red on one arm, until they go red the next time around on that same arm.

Secondly, your junction is smaller than most in terms of the numbers of traffic lights. At the A5 Emstrey island in Shrewsbury for example, there are many more than this, with most traffic having to pass through more than one stop line on the island. If you take the number of stop lines, and factor in the number of lanes at each stop line, the figure (in my head) comes to at least 20. TWENTY! That's a whole lot of opportunities for red light running, and I suspect that if this was ever monitored then the figure could well exceed my earlier suggested 5000 per day. Note that monitoring is NOT the same if you stand there in a yellow jacket, because driving habits then improve straight away as drivers perceive a threat of enforcement.

One immediate answer would be camera enforcement. For anyone who suggests that this would be expensive, if you imagine 5000 infringements per day at £100 each, that's a mere two days to reach £1million, far more than the costs of camera installation!!! Okay, there are many counter-comments that could be made here, the point is that it's worth thinking about rather than just dismissing, which so many people will simply do, both on this forum and around the country when it's drawn to their attention

I have no problem with more camera use.

However, there would need to be an accompanying demonstration that lights were not being used to make money. To a lesser extent there should also be a demonstration that lights are not being used as tools to make motoring less pleasant.

There are lights around Swansea which regularly cycle to red, pause a moment and then go back green. These lights do have cameras and so it requires taking great care not to be caught out. The junction of Elba Crescent and Fabian Way is particularly bad for this. If we are to move into a more fine based system, then junctions like that should only cycle when there is genuinely a car either trying to join from the side roads, or looking to turn across the flow. At 40mph I do not think a filter light is needed for a right turn.

Also in Swansea, too many lights cycle across the 4 roads separately rather than allowing right turns across oncoming traffic. That is another case of traffic light sequencing that causes unnecessary frustration.

A reset of the relationship between lights and supporting flowing traffic should accompany any plan to charge.

 

[Shrop]

I have no problem with more camera use.

However, there would need to be an accompanying demonstration that lights were not being used to make money. To a lesser extent there should also be a demonstration that lights are not being used as tools to make motoring less pleasant.

This is exactly the problem with successive weak Governments, they don't even have the courage to tell the UK public that it's all about road safety, and that taking money from drivers is only a side effect. And yet many police forces use speeding as a means of ticking a box for number of offences prosecuted, which is what (understandably) gets motorists annoyed - it's very frustrating to be fined for doing 35mph in a 30mph limit when the road is clear, especially when you watch Police Camera Action and see that drivers who deliberately outrun police and do 70mph+ in 30 limits get away with barely more punishment than drivers who exceed limits by small amounts. It all needs focus and re-balancing, but far too few people, including on this forum, are interested in this.

But primarily, thanks for your interest

Of course the big difference between red lights on road and rail is that a road driver can assess the risk and stop in a short distance, whilst the rail driver has limited knowledge of the danger the red is protecting, can’t stop in a short distance, can’t swerve, has a much longer vehicle, and likely has the safety of significant members of the public in their hands. That much greater risk is why railway SPADs are taken a lot more seriously.

While I don't disagree with your comments, they appear worded in favour of penalising train drivers rather than car drivers. I wonder what percentage of SPADs lead to trains actually blocking other tracks, or being in very real chance of hitting another train? All those SPADs where these don't happen, aren't really putting the lives of passengers in danger. Meanwhile car drivers running red lights are often accelerating at the time, either that or paying so little attention that other members of the public really are in genuine danger. Of course SPADs should be taken seriously, my argument is that they should on the roads too.

Culturally cars are seen as instruments of freedom and independence , which British people are protective of, and we just don’t treat the government’s laws as black and white in the same way as the Germanics (I remember the glares from other pedestrians when I crossed an empty road against a red man!).

Freedom and independence does NOT include driving in a manner that endangers the public, which kills 35 people on UK roads every week, and which causes life changing injuries to others every week. There is plenty of room for freedom and independence to exist in a manner which doesn't endanger others, it simply needs attention.

 

[MarkyT]

Road signals don't really change unexpectedly because they're not monitoring the state of infrastructure in the route ahead. Motorists are also supposed to employ some caution approaching them such that they can take appropriate action if they do change. Typically the only thing that can change a traffic light from green is the end of the particular control system time phase for the junction. There are various ways more sophisticated controllers, with sufficient road sensors, can vary phases according to traffic conditions but it's generally still just a simple sequence of timed events. A rail signal can return to red if point detection, track circuits, power, lamps or TPWS transponders ahead fail. The default failsafe response for all these is to place the signal at red, even if there's a train on final approach. Signallers can also replace a signal if there's a major hazard they've become aware of that's not detected already by the signalling system, maybe a report of a fallen tree blocking the line, or animals/trespassers on the loose. It follows that the vast majority of signals passed at red are automatically no fault of the driver, because they're the result of a legitimate attempt by systems or staff to stop trains in an emergency, or are verbally authorised by the signaller. There remain a tiny minority that are the result of some misjudgment or inattention. Still, even those events are protected to a large degree by flank protection trapping at junctions where employed, overlap locking and TPWS.

While police can legally wave motorists through a red phase at a road junction, they have no such authority at rail crossings as they have no knowledge or control of train movements; the railway 'bobby' being in the box. It's also worth noting that every rail driver is a trained professional with an employer with legal responsibiliities, not something all road drivers can be accused of! It's clear that passing a red on road and rail are very different in risk profile generally, but some busy junctions on high speed roads no doubt pose very high risks. NR usually (invariably today?) fits red light cameras at rail crossing road signals. They are relatively small in number compared to signalised road junctions however. I expect budgets and other practicalities limit how many road intersections can be so equipped realistically so it's likely the busiest and fastest are the most likely sites for such enforcement. No doubt some will claim authorities choose such busy junctions 'just to make lots of money' but there's no doubt the risk is also significant at such sites. Conversely, taking action against someone cautiously negotiating a minor junction on red in a quiet road in the early hours probably does little for real measurable safety and in large numbers would likely create yet more political pushback.

 

[Llanigraham]

This is exactly the problem with successive weak Governments, they don't even have the courage to tell the UK public that it's all about road safety, and that taking money from drivers is only a side effect. And yet many police forces use speeding as a means of ticking a box for number of offences prosecuted, which is what (understandably) gets motorists annoyed - it's very frustrating to be fined for doing 35mph in a 30mph limit when the road is clear, especially when you watch Police Camera Action and see that drivers who deliberately outrun police and do 70mph+ in 30 limits get away with barely more punishment than drivers who exceed limits by small amounts. It all needs focus and re-balancing, but far too few people, including on this forum, are interested in this.

Drivers caught doing 35 in a 30 limit will invariably get either a Fixed Penalty Notice of £100 and 3 penalty points or a Speed Awareness Course costing roughly the same amount and no points. They will not be going to Court unless they want to fight the prosecution. Those you see in that programme are dealt with far more harshly. There is no comparison between them!

While I don't disagree with your comments, they appear worded in favour of penalising train drivers rather than car drivers. I wonder what percentage of SPADs lead to trains actually blocking other tracks, or being in very real chance of hitting another train? All those SPADs where these don't happen, aren't really putting the lives of passengers in danger. Meanwhile car drivers running red lights are often accelerating at the time, either that or paying so little attention that other members of the public really are in genuine danger. Of course SPADs should be taken seriously, my argument is that they should on the roads too.

Trying to compare a train driver's SPAD to a car driver jumping a red light is not reasonable.
Car drivers jumping red lights is taken seriously as and when drivers are caught, but it would be impossible to fit every set of traffic lights in the country with cameras, both economically, physically and employment wise.

Freedom and independence does NOT include driving in a manner that endangers the public, which kills 35 people on UK roads every week, and which causes life changing injuries to others every week. There is plenty of room for freedom and independence to exist in a manner which doesn't endanger others, it simply needs attention.

And the vast majority of drivers do not drive in that manner, but you only seem to be oncentrating on the negative.

 

[Technologist]

I’d say it’s slightly more nuanced than that. I reckon it would be possible to reduce the number of fatalities and injuries on the road quite substantially simply by making the competence assurance regime a little stiffer, and in particular by finding an effective way of getting a relatively small number of drivers off the road.

The reason it doesn’t happen is because, as another poster said, people are too heavily reliant on their cars, such that to do this would be bordering on political suicide, even though the outcome would be very much for the greater good.

In essence, for some of the population driving is probably the most technically challenging task they have to undertake, and for a proportion of those people it is pushing or beyond their level of aptitude and competence. Not the sort of thing a politician wants to address when they’re after votes.

We could apply Hitchens Razor to this:

"What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence"

In the last 30 years we have added a load more steps to the driving tests as well as put considerable insurance cost barriers in front of younger drivers.

Has this reduced the accident rate?

I'd argue that most of the drop in deaths between the 90's and today is down to improved car safety rather than driving standard improvements. The controll group here would be pedestrian deaths which have not dropped as fast as car passengers.

The most basic reason why we don't do any off this draconian stuff is that 1700 people die on the roads but there is 65 million of us. This results in a 1 in 40,000 annual chance of any of us dying on the roads. We also have some personal agency in whether that chance is higher or lower.

Increased licencing and enforcement has costs and those need to be stacked up against the benefits. Putting more safety features on cars is probably the highest cost/benefit approach to reducing accidents.

Cars last an average of 14 years and the car makers get better at making them every year so the cost of putting safety features on new cars every year decreases and cars gets safer and no more expensive so the cost is essentially zero on that cost/benefit equation.

We aren't going to get better a driver training over time so that just becomes a dead loss on the economy. At least building new safer roads also gets you a new road as well as the safety benefit.

 

[MarkyT]

Increased licencing and enforcement has costs and those need to be stacked up against the benefits. Putting more safety features on cars is probably the highest cost/benefit approach to reducing accidents.

Speed limiters especially, and related tech could also enforce red light and stop sign stopping.

Cars last an average of 14 years and the car makers get better at making them every year so the cost of putting safety features on new cars every year decreases and cars gets safer and no more expensive so the cost is essentially zero on that cost/benefit equation.

Once they establish the economies of vast scale...

We aren't going to get better a driver training over time so that just becomes a dead loss on the economy. At least building new safer roads also gets you a new road as well as the safety benefit.

The Dutch approach is good, with three distinct classes of roads. The urban type, which must coexist with pedestrians and cyclists nearby, passively deters speeding and other dangerous behaviour by rationing road-space for cars, narrowing and reducing the number of lanes, disrupting sightlines, psychologically conditioning the motorist to behave more cautiously. Other classes are more focused on safe high throughput and minimise junctions etc. There are still some awful stroads in the NL but policy generally is to modify to one of the three modern types if work in the area offers an opportunity.

 

[Bald Rick]

The Dutch approach is good, with three distinct classes of roads.

And yet their casualty rate is double ours!

 

[MarkyT]

And yet their casualty rate is double ours!

That's odd isn't it. Sometimes I think in many places the UK makes the built environment so hostile to anything but private car travel that the number of pedestrians and cyclists is depressed, meaning there are less of the most vulnerable road users overall, raising safety for the vast majority who are more safely secured in their metal boxes. The Netherlands is well known for widespread cycling and its town centres are often very pedestrian friendly. I wonder if a much higher vulnerable user proportion attracted by such measures could affect statistics in such a way. It would be interesting to see a breakdown of which classes of roads the incidents are happening on.

Edit: Here's a 2023 EU report on Dutch traffic safety:

https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2023-02/erso-country-overview-2023-netherlands_0.pdf

...
2.1 General risk in traffic

In the Netherlands, a total of 515 people were killed in reported traffic accidents in 2020. In terms of mortality rate, there were 30 road fatalities per million inhabitants, which is far below the EU average (42). Since 2001, the mortality rate in the Netherlands has declined at a slower pace than the European Union overall. When taking into account the number of vehicles, the Netherlands also perform better than most EU countries with a rate of 0.48 road fatalities per 10,000 registered vehicles.

Contrary to the downward trend that is observed in the European Union between 2010 and 2020, the number of fatalities in the Netherlands has remained stable over the past ten years. The number of serious injuries increased between 2014 and 2019. In most EU countries the numbers of fatalities and serious injuries fell between 2019 and 2020. The COVID pandemic and the associated restrictions in mobility undoubtedly led to a reduction in the number of casualties though the extent to which this was the case is not known.
...
2.2 Transport modes

In 2020, cyclists represented one third of road traffic fatalities in the Netherlands. This percentage is much higher than that observed for the European Union as a whole (10%). Pedestrians on the other hand, account for only 7% of road fatalities, which is well below the proportion seen in the European Union (19%). The share of powered two-wheelers (13%) is also less than the EU average (18%). Over the past ten years there has been an increase in the number of fatalities in the Netherlands for all modes except pedestrians and powered two-wheelers. While the EU average shows a significant drop in the number of fatalities for car occupants and occupants of lorries, their numbers increased in the Netherlands. The number of cyclist fatalities shows an upward trend as well.

Of all vulnerable road users (pedestrians, cyclists and powered two-wheelers) in the Netherlands that were fatally injured, 46% were involved in a crash with a car, and 21% were involved in a crash with a lorry or a heavy goods vehicle. Over the past ten years these numbers have dropped in the Netherlands.
The overall number of fatalities in single vehicle crashes (i.e. only one vehicle and no other road user is involved) in the Netherlands has increased by 19%, while the number dropped in the European Union.
...

 

[Harpo]

SPADs as a comparator in any road conversation makes no sense. A railway red light (usually!) means a safe conflict-free route has not been set.

No train driver knowingly ‘jumps’ a red light in the way that road users do so frequently and with impunity. A train passing a red light will be an error such as a mis-judgement, mis-read etc..

 

[Shrop]

That's odd isn't it. Sometimes I think in many places the UK makes the built environment so hostile to anything but private car travel that the number of pedestrians and cyclists is depressed, meaning there are less of the most vulnerable road users overall, raising safety for the vast majority who are more safely secured in their metal boxes.

This is absolutely spot on. I spent many years in road traffic management, and one of my jobs was liaising with headteachers and the police, addressing concerns about parking outside schools. We held many public meetings, often showing police videos, where parents were asked why they parked in such a hazardous manner, including asking why their children couldn't walk or cycle to school. The answer was almost invariably that they drove their children to school precisely because the roads were so dangerous, and if they weren't, then they would allow their children to walk or cycle.
This is just one of many forms of proof that driving leads to more driving, with all of the attendant hazards and blinkered attitudes that driving involves.

SPADs as a comparator in any road conversation makes no sense. A railway red light (usually!) means a safe conflict-free route has not been set.

No train driver knowingly ‘jumps’ a red light in the way that road users do so frequently and with impunity. A train passing a red light will be an error such as a mis-judgement, mis-read etc..

You're not wrong, but you're missing the point. What you're observing is that an error (SPAD) is punishable, whereas a deliberate act of wilfully creating danger out of something that doesn't need to be dangerous (deliberate law breaking while driving a road vehicle), for well over 99% of road junctions without cameras, isn't. Is it not right that an error should be investigated, with help to the offenders where necessary, whereas deliberate offences are worse, with more severe punishments being deserved? Or ... should we just perpetuate some miguided ideology whereby driving entitles people to break the law and cause danger whenever they think they are above that law? I'm NOT advocating draconian driving enforcement, but I do think it's wrong to ignore just how far we have our heads in the sand about it all.

 

[Harpo]

You're not wrong, but you're missing the point. What you're observing is that an error (SPAD) is punishable, whereas a deliberate act of wilfully creating danger out of something that doesn't need to be dangerous (deliberate law breaking while driving a road vehicle), for well over 99% of road junctions without cameras, isn't.

Its apples and oranges. For a train it’s a movement authority violation which has it’s comparators in the marine or aviation world, not roads. There is no guaranteed safe space beyond that stop point.

On the road, as dangerous as it is, a motorist will still probably risk assess the box area visually to get across, knowing that it’s safe and business as usual beyond the box.

There is no automatic punishment for a rail SPAD as no train driver ‘jumps’ a red light. Consider Ladbroke and more recently Tallerddig where there are questions about the unit.

I agree though that road driving discipline is poor. Get a licence at 17 and an assessment-free lifetime to drive in vehicles with no recording devices. (Yes HGV etc is a bit better.) There’s definitely a need to improve road driving in general, but no politician is brave enough to do it.

 

[Shrop]

Its apples and oranges. For a train it’s a movement authority violation which has it’s comparators in the marine or aviation world, not roads. There is no guaranteed safe space beyond that stop point.

On the road, as dangerous as it is, a motorist will still probably risk assess the box area visually to get across, knowing that it’s safe and business as usual beyond the box.

There is no automatic punishment for a rail SPAD as no train driver ‘jumps’ a red light. Consider Ladbroke and more recently Tallerddig where there are questions about the unit.

I agree though that road driving discipline is poor. Get a licence at 17 and an assessment-free lifetime to drive in vehicles with no recording devices. (Yes HGV etc is a bit better.) There’s definitely a need to improve road driving in general, but no politician is brave enough to do it.

Once again I agree with you in principle, and you're absolutely right that no politician is brave enough to tackle this. But is it simply a lack of courage, or is it just that they don't even think about it? Some years ago one of our MPs (alas I can't remember who) visited the Netherlands and came back wanting us to investigate introducing double deck trains to the UK. People on this forum will all know that this is a crazy and wholly impractical idea since our loading gauge is so much smaller than it is in continental Europe, but it didn't stop this MP going on about it for quite some time. This was simply because it had been drawn to his attention by a personal visit, all it needed was this catalyst. Similarly, if an MP or a close friend or relative of his/hers was to be involved in a serious road accident where dangerous or inattentive driving was at fault (as almost all road accidents are), that MP might then be motivated to investigate this further, it could be a case of simply drawing it to their personal attention, and at least they would be in a greater position of influence than are that minority of us who recognise that something ought to be done.

As for getting a licence at 17, the commonly held but wholly bizarre view held by many is that every time you drive you get better at it through practice. This has been told to me many times by Local Authority Councillors and others I've discussed it with. I've responded by saying that driving is a qualification, and most other qualifications (a great many professional qualifications for example) make no such crazy assumption, they require regular observations, re-testing etc, with the qualification being withdrawn if the qualified person no longer comes up to standard, and only re-issued after successful re-training. Their responses have ranged from curiosity to actually being quite supportive, although even those in support who have ventured to take it further have eventually been closed off by people with more power who claim that we're not seeing "The Bigger Picture" ...

 

[Technologist]

As for getting a licence at 17, the commonly held but wholly bizarre view held by many is that every time you drive you get better at it through practice. This has been told to me many times by Local Authority Councillors and others I've discussed it with. I've responded by saying that driving is a qualification, and most other qualifications (a great many professional qualifications for example) make no such crazy assumption, they require regular observations, re-testing etc, with the qualification being withdrawn if the qualified person no longer comes up to standard, and only re-issued after successful re-training. Their responses have ranged from curiosity to actually being quite supportive, although even those in support who have ventured to take it further have eventually been closed off by people with more power who claim that we're not seeing "The Bigger Picture" ...

This is where we get back to cost benefit, there is about a 1 in 40,000 chance of you dying in a road accident in the next year, for simplicity the value of a life is about £4 million. So if you could completely remove all deaths from the roads you have about £100 per year per person to do it.

This is why testing a "professional development" type training initiatives won't work, lets say you re-trained everybody every 5 years and it cost £500, you have just blown your £100/pp/pa budget and I suspect that you'd probably move the dial by a single digit % or less. Thus your cost benefit would be off by a factor of about 20-1.

This is why any cost effective road safety system needs to be either targeted or done on a sampling basis. E.g. speed limit enforcement probably prosecutes something like 1 in 10,000 incidents of speeding but has a limiting effect on all driving and most of it is done by automated low cost systems. Getting old people medically unfit to drive off the road is relatively cheap as you can get the health service to do it nearly for free and they have a very high accident rate, likewise accidents aren't randomly distributed so it is cost effective to deal with road infrastructure at accident blackspots.

 

[Shrop]

This is where we get back to cost benefit, there is about a 1 in 40,000 chance of you dying in a road accident in the next year, for simplicity the value of a life is about £4 million. So if you could completely remove all deaths from the roads you have about £100 per year per person to do it.

This is why testing a "professional development" type training initiatives won't work, lets say you re-trained everybody every 5 years and it cost £500, you have just blown your £100/pp/pa budget and I suspect that you'd probably move the dial by a single digit % or less. Thus your cost benefit would be off by a factor of about 20-1.

This is why any cost effective road safety system needs to be either targeted or done on a sampling basis. E.g. speed limit enforcement probably prosecutes something like 1 in 10,000 incidents of speeding but has a limiting effect on all driving and most of it is done by automated low cost systems. Getting old people medically unfit to drive off the road is relatively cheap as you can get the health service to do it nearly for free and they have a very high accident rate, likewise accidents aren't randomly distributed so it is cost effective to deal with road infrastructure at accident blackspots.

If I had time I'd examine your costings more closely, but alas I only have a few minutes at present. Nevertheless here goes for what it's worth. Firstly, you've costed a death at £4million, so with over 1600 deaths in 2024, that equates to over £6.4billion. Let's cost a serious injury at 10% of that (£400k), and since there were around 28,000 of those in 2024, that works out at another £11billion. Then there are the 100,000 or so slight injuries, at around 10% of that again (£40k), which is another £4billion. So using your initial figure and my costings for lesser severities, we're talking about over £20billion. Of course all of these wouldn't be stopped, but it's still a big enough figure to be worth addressing.

Then we could address congestion. I doubt an exact figure could be obtained, but I've heard that it costs the UK economy around £8billion per year. Again, this would never all be removed, but since a great deal of congestion is caused by unnecessarily blocking road junctions, then some driver education wouldn't go amiss. And have you ever sat on a busy motorway and seen the amount of drivers who sit in the middle and outside lanes while the inside lane is clear?

It would be quite something to do some detailed research on this and find out just how much bad driving there really is. You could investigate the two second rule and see just how many drivers follow too close to the vehicle in front, the list is almost endless. Then you could look at the positives, such as the wonderful employment opportunities for implementing careful driving strategies.

I won't go on here, suffice to say we should have it drilled into us by our politicians and others, that driving really isn't a right, it's a privilege to be earned and respected. Yes, it's a "right" in that everyone is entitled to apply to gain the qualification, but it isn't a right to drive in a manner that endangers others.

 

[Llanigraham]

I won't go on here, suffice to say we should have it drilled into us by our politicians and others, that driving really isn't a right, it's a privilege to be earned and respected. Yes, it's a "right" in that everyone is entitled to apply to gain the qualification, but it isn't a right to drive in a manner that endangers others.

To many people driving is the only way they can get around because they have no public transport and are never likely to ever get any. What are their "rights"?

 

[Harpo]

To many people driving is the only way they can get around because they have no public transport and are never likely to ever get any. What are their "rights"?

The level of aggressive driving on our roads shows that far too many motorists see their ‘rights’ as an entitlement to ignore normal rules.

I’d be more interested in their obligations, especially respect to other road users.

 

[Shrop]

To many people driving is the only way they can get around because they have no public transport and are never likely to ever get any. What are their "rights"?

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 exile]

Road signals don't really change unexpectedly because they're not monitoring the state of infrastructure in the route ahead. Motorists are also supposed to employ some caution approaching them such that they can take appropriate action if they do change. Typically the only thing that can change a traffic light from green is the end of the particular control system time phase for the junction.

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!

To many people driving is the only way they can get around because they have no public transport and are never likely to ever get any. What are their "rights"?

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

 

[Harpo]

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

An anticipation SPAD in other parlance.

 

[Meerkat]

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!

The ones near me are all red when it’s quiet and first come first gets the green. Staring from all red is quicker reacting than having to cycle from a conflicting green.
There is an element of playing chicken with them and hard braking when they don’t change, but it’s a red so one has no excuses…..

 

[Llanigraham]

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?

So if we take that to it's logical conclusion, no-one would live in the typical small villages in Mid Wales (and othert parts of the UK) because they have no public transport to get them to work, school, college or to medical facilities. Is that what you want? Even my own town of 2700 people has problems doing all those things. "0 years ago we had a good bus service to the local big town, now it is 5 times a day and to get to the nearest big hospitals takes hours and in some cases takes more than one bus. Plus none of the bus services tie-in with local train services.
I can give you plenty of examples where people have no other means of transport to hospital appointments where the ONLY method of getting there is by car.

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?

I drive over 12k miles a year, much of it as a volunteer with the Welsh Ambulance Service taking people to hospital appointments all over the western side of the UK, and I do not see the aggressive driving to any of the extent that you are implying. Yes there is some, but it really isn't that prevelant. Yes you will see it on those "Police Camera Action" type programmes because that is what "sells" them. And when those miscreants are caught they are generally severely punished, with fines, bans, vehicle confiscations and even prison sentences.

I'm not ignoring the issue, I am pointing out that some people are implying that it is the norm whereas from my own experience and from contacts with professionals in the Road Safety field it isn't. There have been numerous proposals to re-test drivers at intervals after passing their tests but these have been denied for various reasons: the unavailability of examiners, the cost both to the government and the customer, and the lack of facilities to do the tests.

Going back to the incident that started this thread, the driver was found to be "under the influence" so will be dealt with by the Courts and will be fined, banned and quite probably will loose his jobs. I do not condone his behaviour in any way and am glad he was caught, but like it or not he is in the minority of drivers.

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

And that preseumes there are taxi companies in the area!
My own town has had 3 people try to run a taxi companies in the last 5 years and all have given up because they couldn't make it pay.

 

[MarkyT]

The ones near me are all red when it’s quiet and first come first gets the green. Staring from all red is quicker reacting than having to cycle from a conflicting green.
There is an element of playing chicken with them and hard braking when they don’t change, but it’s a red so one has no excuses…..

That makes sense. Not unlike rail signalling where signals protecting junctions normally remain at red and are cleared when appropriate for scheduled trains approaching, either by the signaller or an automatic route setting computer.