The Speed Trap - BBC1 Scotland

Matt B wrote:
What about my judgement?

Warped.

--
Nobby

Matt B wrote:
Do _you_ think that cameras are the best tool for the purported objective at
all the locations at which they are deployed?

No. I think that in a world of unlimited funding, reengineering the
roads with appropriate horizontal measures would potentially bring
traffic speeds down and would lower the overall accident rate. However,
I know of no definitive study that examines the relationship between
various speed enforcement types and injuries for VRU as opposed to MVO.
It would be of importance to determine whether the horizontal
engineering at faster speeds results in more conflict and hence more
incidents betwen motorised traffic and VRU.

The cost of engineering on a large scale would also be prohibitive,
wheras motorists appear to be quite willing to fund the provision of
speed cameras.

In terms of a limited budget, speed cameras are a very cost effective
solution as they are revenue neutral, and per hundred thousand pounds
more lives would be saved installing cameras than using more effective
but more expensive methods of speed control. This is why it is not a
simple one or the other decision. Plenty of locations are easy to
install cameras and gain the benefits, but would be prohibitively
expensive to gain the benefits by engineering.

The most effective is an old cardboard box with 'Speed Trap' written on
in black marker pen. Needs to be renewed every so often but is cheap
and biodegradable. Remarkably effective for the cost.

...d

Matt B wrote:

outburst of indignation

I've never professed to be a researcher, but feel entitled to air my views
and thoughts.

Put your indignation back in its box because I'm not stopping you airing
your views. I think you're entitled to air them too, just as I'm
entitled to point out I think they're largely ********.

I am a libertarian, motivated by the prospect of reduced regulation and
control, with a firmly held belief in that to ban something makes it
automatically more desirable.

And you're still thinking that in a few cases might just as well be the
same as everyone. It isn't.

I prefer the carrot to the stick {{{ :-) }}}* (as a behaviour modifier)

And so do I, but you've got to have someone who likes carrots. And if
they're offered a tasty apple instead of "you can get to your
destination faster and really /use/ that car you paid £15K+ for that is
advertised for its sporty performance" then you "social contract" carrot
is going to have a fair few noses turned up at it IMHO.

I am motivated by the prospect of reducing road casualties.

Though something with a proven record of doing that is rejected out of
hand because it doesn't work according to your libertarian ideals. You
clearly have a clash of interests where your two motivations cross, and
it's foolish for you to pretend they don't.

I am incensed when I see the old guard defending the old technology as the
only way of doing something, and especially if part of the reason appears to
be the prospect of punishing someone up for something which is a symptom of
the larger social malaise.

I haven't seen any arguments in this thread that cameras are the only
way of doing the job, so that's a fairly pointless bit of indignation in
this context, but you're so busy being indignant you can't see that.

Closed doors need to opened.

Only if there isn't something nasty on the other side, which you have
failed to demonstrate.

Blinkers need to be removed. There's definately a better view outside of
the tunnel.

FSVO of "better view". If it includes a deal of carnage it isn't
necessarily better to /my/ eyes. You are making unwarranted
assumptions, and have failed to demonstrate their validity.

Its an exasperated "hands in the air" resignation that I should stop banging
my cranium on the masonry

Maybe you should stop banging your head against the wall because you're
so set on one path that you have blinded yourself to the logical flaws
and personal conflicts of interest inherent in what you've been saying.
It doesn't seem to occur to you that the only reason you're a lone
voice here might not be everyone else is a stick in the mud, but you
might be wrong. But, hey, it's only peoples' lives at stake, so it
doesn't matter if we try something based on reading a selective few
abstracts and ignoring any evidence that contradicts them and topping it
off with some unsubstantiated reasoning based on a libertarian
philosophy, does it? Well, actually, it *does* matter, and I for one
think rather more care is required in tweaking things.

* Bracing oneself for the comical/smutty retorts - feel free.

It's not funny, it's sad. I don't really doubt that you Really Believe
what you're saying, but you have failed to realise that that does not of
itself guarantee you are right. Or we'd all be running our computers
and heating off cold fusion jam jars right now.

You have demonstrated beyond much doubt that You Believe, but like the
JWs that come to the door you'll find that people need more tangible
proof than /just/ your Belief and a few selected quotes. The JWs are
sad that people can't see the "obvious" too, but again that's not enough
reason to take up their call.

Time to call it quits and get some useful work done on my part. I need
more than you repeating homilies about progress to be convinced that
your ideas represent progress, and if you're indignant about that, be
indignant about that: it's not the same as a useful factual and logical
argument about the matters at hand.

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

Matt B wrote:
I claim the silent
majority

you can't - they are dead.

d.

On Mon, 14 Nov 2005 11:14:38 +0000, Peter Clinch
said in :

While you claim you never troll, and for values of "troll" that are
limited to deliberately inflammatory statements designed purely to get a
flame war going that /may/ be the case, it remains the case that for
values of "troll" which cover congenital cluelessness and the production
of much heat and the total exclusion of *any* light, you are a prime
contender for the label.

I'd say you are wrong. I'd say he is /also/ a troll according to the
criterion of posting deliberately inflammatory statements (in the
sense that having repeatedly been told that something is both wrong
and widely known to be wrong, he will still assert it as fact). This
group will be somewhat improved when he learns to masturbate and moves
on to the binary groups.

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken

On Mon, 14 Nov 2005 13:09:20 +0000, davek
said in :

After FIVE years of intensive speed enforcement the
accident rate is only reduced by 21%.

Only 21%? Well, that's only a few thousand lives saved, really not worth
it at all.

And in any case completely misses the point that this annihilates
MattB's sole argument. But I think he's too stupid (or maybe too
self-absorbed) to realise that.

Guy
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

"To every complex problem there is a solution which is
simple, neat and wrong" - HL Mencken