Sunday Times: Death row: Britain's most dangerous road

On 28 Sep 2004 03:08:44 -0700, (David E.
Belcher) wrote:

the B6161-A61 junction at Killinghall was
probably the riskiest bit of the course.

Strangely appropriate name...

On 28 Sep 2004 03:08:44 -0700, David E. Belcher wrote:
My memory may be a
little clouded here, but I seem to recall an instruction in the race
route/start sheet advising competitors not to stop due to
mechanicals/punctures/loo breaks in the vicinity of the base if
possible as this may be frowned upon by the military police based at
Menwith. I may have my facts wrong here, though Arthur Clune might be
able to back me up or disprove as appropriate.

That is indeed the case, someone we know was picking blackberries near
the base and was accosted by policemen within minutes of arriving who
wanted to know what they were up to. They weren't concerned after they
found out, though, and let them be.

We drive near there regularly and for some reason I don't know (but
possibly connected with me telling them so) my kids think that there
are lots of cameras in the trees. The 7yo eagerly waves at the trees
as we go past now and the lurking police land rover gets a cheery
wave each time we see it. I guess our cars' number plates are well
embedded in their database by now. And there's a funny echo on the
phone line ... ooh, look daddy, a black helicopter ...

--
Trevor Barton

"Just zis Guy, you know?" wrote in message . ..
On 28 Sep 2004 03:08:44 -0700, (David E.
Belcher) wrote:

the B6161-A61 junction at Killinghall was
probably the riskiest bit of the course.

Strangely appropriate name...

The same TT course also passed through Kettlesing Bottom. No comment.

David E. Belcher

The Evening Standard had a 1/2 page article about SMIDSYs last Friday,
using the insurance industry abbreviation of 'looked but did not see'
(LBDNS), about their irrestitible rise in recent years.

Bike magazine had an article on SMIDSY the other month and was rather more
relaxed about the phenomenon than the cyclists who post her on the subject.
The article accepted that in some instances there was justification when
some drivers say the immortal words as car design has evolved and has lead
to fatter pillars seperating the roof from the body which creates larger
blind spots which are harder to eliminate by drivers' head movements.
Rather than berate the motorist the article then dealt with strategies that
motorcyclists could adopt to keep themselves in the field of view of car
drivers this minimising the risk.

On Tue, 28 Sep 2004 18:36:57 +0100, "vernon levy" wrote
(more or less):


The Evening Standard had a 1/2 page article about SMIDSYs last Friday,
using the insurance industry abbreviation of 'looked but did not see'
(LBDNS), about their irrestitible rise in recent years.

Bike magazine had an article on SMIDSY the other month and was rather more
relaxed about the phenomenon than the cyclists who post her on the subject.
The article accepted that in some instances there was justification when
some drivers say the immortal words as car design has evolved and has lead
to fatter pillars seperating the roof from the body which creates larger
blind spots which are harder to eliminate by drivers' head movements.
Rather than berate the motorist the article then dealt with strategies that
motorcyclists could adopt to keep themselves in the field of view of car
drivers this minimising the risk.

The Evening Standard discussed the fatter pillar syndrome too, along
with the reduced tendencies of drivers to move their head around to
overcome blind spots.

Personally, I think treating driving like some sort of video game
played from a comfy armchair rather than a serious business in which
you have to move about to improve lines of sight, /is/ something to
berate today's motorist about.


--
Cheers,
Euan
Gawnsoft: http://www.gawnsoft.co.sr
Symbian/Epoc wiki: http://html.dnsalias.net:1122
Smalltalk links (harvested from comp.lang.smalltalk) http://html.dnsalias.net/gawnsoft/smalltalk

vernon levy wrote:
So you put up some signs saying something like "20 foot diameter holes in

road

in several places, all obscured from view until 10 foot from hole". Let's

even

assume that this particular statement is true i.e. that the holes exist.

How

many drivers would actually reduce their speed to the level required to

avoid

plunging into one of the holes?


You have totally missed the point.

No, I haven't, but perhaps I haven't made my point quite as clearly as I had hoped.

Many roads have been where they are for probably hundreds of years. They will
have started as a footpath then will have widened as they were used by people on
horseback. The introduction of horse drawn carts will have changed the track
into a major road and so on. Such roads will have followed the easiest route for
walking and may have changed later to accommodate horses and then carts or
carriages. Later generations will have laid down a harder surface to accommodate
the heavy wheeled traffic. All that the 20th Century road builder had to do was
lay a strip of tarmac on top of what was already there. The road, with all its
corners, deep gorges and other 'hazards' just happened.

The current state of affairs is such
that the hazards are so varied and difficult to 'advertise' that a first
time user to the road is likely to have problems

I was not actually advocating that the hazards should be advertised as such. I
realise that such an exercise would be very difficult not to mention expensive.
If we now go back to my hypothetical ancient road, the first time users would
have been on foot, what road hazards would they have faced?

bearing in mind that I know
the road, have used it several times in each direction and still found
myself in situations that I'd rather not have been in - not all of them
being my fault.

The problem with the hypopthetical road as it now stands is the fact that the
road user is no longer able to modify the route to accommodate a different form
of transport. The horse rider would have cut down overhanging branches, the
carriage driver would have altered the route where possible to round out the
sharp corners. We now have good surfaces which allow rapid progress and rules to
prevent us from going too quickly. As motorists we tend to drive at, or slightly
above, the speed limit and assume that the road ahead will be clear. We expect
that 'They' will have designed a road which allows us to drive at that speed in
safety. There will be stretches of road which really require a motorist to slow
down to 10 mph in order to be able to deal with an unseen hazard like a car
waiting to turn right, but would motorists observe such a limit? It is only when
an occasional motorist actually meets the hazard that he considers the fact that
he might be travelling too quickly.

It is a scary road and has to be experienced before voicing
childish suggestions.

Roads are not generally dangerous in themselves, it is the way we use them that
creates a dangerous environment.

Grow up or shut up.

I shall do neither! Nor will I trade insults.


Intemperately yours

Vernon in Leeds





--
Terry Duckmanton.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/terry.duckmanton
A website mostly dedicated to cycling
http://tduckmanton.bravejournal.com
A daily log of my cycling exploits