The Bizness of Road Safety

Blog
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The other day I was sailing along the road in my DB's car, on a stretch that I must have done a million times and thus was lulled into thinking about other pressing matters than watching my speedometer. Pressing matters such as how to pay for a new (used) car seeing as my Alfa is basically dead, and I was going through the options. The road was not busy but I was keeping an eye on what was going on, except that I didn't register that a van with blue lights, probably bearing a mobile radar, was coming towards me - the cops!


The information eventually struggled through my thoughts on credits, savings and banks and I realised I was speeding slightly, so slowed down. Probably not enough though, so I warned my DB he could probably expect an envelope in the post (which I would of course pay!).


Funnily enough, this week too, I was sent a link to a video made by the Ligue de Défense des Conducteurs on the over-zealous use of radars by the cops. The LDC are particularly incensed at the blatant manipulation of the truth by the government which declares that the new repressive regime is all about road safety and saving lives. We are all for road safety and saving lives, but let's face it, the only way for there to be zero fatalities is to ban cars and motorbikes, so there has to be a balance.


At the heart of the new imbalance is business, money and jobs for the boys (who'd a thunk). The ethylotest (to test for alcohol) was the first main example. Manufacturers of the test lobbied the government and persuaded ministers that by making them obligatory they would show how dedicated they are to saving lives, and be able to introduce a new PV (fine) of €11 for non-possession. For their part, manufacturers were guaranteed 100% of a market of 40million drivers... Luckily there was an outcry and the law was quietly dropped, especially seeing as the test didn't even work properly!


Giddy with the prospect of other, more successful ideas, the government called upon the private sector to come up with products to fill the market, such as radars. Last year, the PV harvest brought in €1.6billion. To cope with the avalanche of envelopes, a lovely new processing centre of 11,000m² was built where operators seize 500 license plates per hour and send out around 60,000 envelopes per day.


Repression on the roads is reaching epic proportions here. In 2002 drivers lost 3million points on their license; in 2011 they lost 12 million points. About 85,000 people lost their license completely, often losing their job at the same time, and not because they are speed junkies - 95% of all speeding fines concern speeds of less than 20km/hr over the limit.


But surely, the number of deaths is going down so this must be a good thing... no? We are told that repression saves lives, but that is a gross exaggeration. What has been saving lives since the early 70s are safer cars, improvements to roads, airbags, making danger spots safe, quicker intervention by the rescue services, campaigns against drink driving, and more awareness by drivers of the dangers.
The virtuous circle of road and car improvements has led to fewer deaths on the roads

Recently, the money spent on improvements to roads, especially secondary roads, has been diverted to buying radars. This is a shame because it's on these roads that 75% of lethal accidents occur. How dedicated are politicians really to saving lives?


The truth is, repression brings in massive amounts of money. But it's not just all about speeding. The police have quotas to fill too - a certain number of PV for each type of offence: jumping a red light, parking, not stopping at a Stop sign, not wearing a seatbelt, and even 51 'refusals to comply' which means that the policeperson will have to provoke drivers to the point where they stop cooperating - definitely an important one that will save countless lives, no doubt.


If you live in France and don't agree with this 'matraquage du conducteur', the Ligue de Défense des Conducteurs has put an 8-question survey online to ask drivers what they think. They need 5million responses, so please please take a couple of minutes to fill it in here: Consultation Nationale sur la Securité Routière.


One proof that this is all about jobs for the boys was visible on Facebook today. I saw that someone had posted a picture showing a radar that had been out of service for three weeks because the company that owned it hadn't paid the electricity bill, a company whose CEO was none other than the brother of Gilles de Robien, former Minister of Transport, as it happens...


Repression for road safety my a**e, basically.

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I'm in two minds about this. My garden gate opens direct onto the road entering our village. It is a 30 kph zone, there are speed bumps 20 metres before my gate and 20 metres after my gate. Cars, mopeds, bikes and even the local service bus still fly past my gate accelerating between the bumps, but then i hear them decelerate to pass the Gendarmerie about 60 metres up the road.... I am scared every day that my 8 year old son is gonna take one step out the gate (which is all it takes on this narrow road) and he will be flattened... I'm all for harsher enforcement of the 30 kph limit.

On the other hand, i think that the margin of error allowed on speed limits in 70 zones is a bit harsh (ie up to 72 kph) as all it takes is a small downhill stretch and it is easy to pass 72 before the brakes return the car to below 70... even as someone who takes great care to drive within the speed limit it is difficult with a dial speedo not to waver sometimes to 74 or 75 before the brakes slow the car on downhill stretches..

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They did something odd with the breath tests. I think they said that they are still required, and you still need 2 per car, but that if you are checked and you don't have them then nothing happens. So it was a sort of half measure, but the companies that had experienced a boom in business for making the tests saw their market wither and die just as fast as it had appeared.

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thank you

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The breath test has been dropped. And dash cameras, although prevalent in Russia, are as much used to counteract police corruption there, as they are for avoiding insurance fraud.

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Has the breathe test been dropped now?

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Dash cameras are now responsible for Youtube videos of huge numbers of frequently unbelievable Russian road accidents. They are necessary there because so many people leave the scene and your insurance company won't believe you. :-)

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Time to plant my idea of using dash cameras again.

You may be squeaky clean, but faced with a gendarmerie which appears to be more concerned with revenue and targets, rather than road safety, and who will, if necessary exaggerate in order to achieve both, one is well advised to possess a degree of self protection, which, of course, a video of the incident will assist in doing evidentially.

Just my tuppence worth...

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As I understand it your car's speedo is required to err above the speed you are doing so that you cannot break the limit by driving at the correct indicated speed. Often this error is something between 5-10%. Thanks to the short-lived educational signs (assuming they are accurate) I have seen that my speedo reads 138 when I'm doing 130, for example.

Then there's the issue of the fine for doing 1km above the limit. In fact when you read the fine letter I believe they have already removed an allowance. Something like 5kmh under 100kmh, 5% over 100kmh. Not sure of the exact figures. So if you are fined for 51kmh, you were doing 56kmh measured by them. Factor in the over compensation of the speedo, and you could well have been doing an indicated 60kmh on your speedo. So you see 1kmh seems silly, but in fact you'd have been well aware that you were over the limit according to the speedo, and if you were keeping to approximately 50 you'd have been fine.

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Quotas.. for jumping red lights.. good luck there then..if you survive, you deserve to be fined.. failing to stop at stop signs.. same again, the STOP means just that.. what about the poor sod who had the right of way you just hit?.. i don't like radars any more than the next person, but have you noticed how so many french drop anchor at the 50 signs entering towns??.. many, and I have learnt how the fuzz set up laser traps randomly just after the limit signs.. many of the static Gatzo's are well signed over here.. unlike the ones in uk, which are frequently sited in know raceways.. and hidden behind obstacles.. and you may have noticed the uk cameras have calibrations on the deck and double flashes.. d/t=speed.. you're nicked.. i'm no angel, and frequently speed.. oops..

it's not speed that kills[32 in a 30 limit].. not paying attention and the inability to react to situations or for prevailling conditions will though, ??.. daydreaming about paying for the vehicle you're driving?

i won't be signing the survey, the questions are loaded and unbalanced. ye, there should be more money to repair the roads, also there is a need for techno control.. in reasonable measure!!

fortunately, i have a clean ticket since 1970[1 fine for no L plate]for truck, bike, car and buses..

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Recently I was asked to sign a petition against the introduction of yet more 30 kph limits. I declined. I am not against limits as such but I do feel that sometimes they are enforced in an unrealistic way. I cannot believe those who say that they have NEVER driven above the speed limit - I break it every day - as controlling your speed to within ONE kph is practically impossible. Even your cruise control cannot do that! Quite often, when approaching a lower speed limit, I allow the speed to fall off naturally but it would be a lie to say that I enter the reduced limit EXACTLY or slightly lower than that posted. It could be 1 or 2 kph over, enough to get a ticket with some cameras. It would depend on the accuracy of your £5 non calibrated speedo, though. The police have a £5000 calibrated scientific instrument to check your speed. At 30 kph, with an even throttle setting, your car will increase speed if there is a very slight downhill slope or even a strong gust of wind & unless your eyes are glued to the speedo you will not be aware until the ticket arrives on your doormat.

What if you drive a car with a speedo like this?![](upload://v7O4P6Cnnf5MOyGP9F4GTgvg1pk.JPG)Where exactly IS 30? At a glance? With your eyes refocusing from distance viewing?

Then there are those who say that pedestians are less likely to be killed at 30 kph. So drivers can expect a pedestian to step off a pavement inches in front of a car presumably without looking at all or giving the driver any time to respond - in fact, drive to allow pedestrians to accept absolutly no responsibility for their own safety! But they will need to watch out because with the zero tolerance enforcement of these new speed limits many more of them will be knocked over as drivers will be focussed on their speedometers rather than the road ahead.#

A couple of K's either way only equates to a few feet increase or decrease in stopping distance.

Speed limits? By all means, but enforced with common sense, not revenue, in mind.

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I don't think it is confessional, more acceptance of what people simply do, for instance on A and M roads. Sure it is wrong, fair deals if we're caught although most people howl down the fact that they were doing something wrong. As for radar. I am not sure. It is nearly a decade since I lived in Cambridgeshire which has a number of fast roads and good old Roman foundations to some of them that makes them good straight speed runs (A1(M), A10, A11, A14 and A141). The Cambs cops were very proud of the fact they had radar on cars and the difference between cameras and radars was very well known which I don't imagine has changed too much. As for other 'crimes' that was never Sarah's point, so there we do have 'relativity'!

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I know the difference between the systems in England and France, it's just that "radars" would not be understood in the UK. A question of language. If we're in confession mode, which people here seem to like, I've never driven above the speed limit or after a drink. In my early teens I shoplifted a bit. I was never caught, and outgrew that particular thrill. Anyone else? Of course, shoplifting is a crime, but is not life-threatening... I strongly take issue however with the statement that "it is all relative". It is very much not. There's nothing relative about death or injury caused by speeding or drunk driving. As Bob Dylan sang, "If something isn't right, it's wrong".

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I had a go at the survey, but had to pause for a giggle. I mean, eight questions is not a survey...

Interesting (ahem) dialogue there. Jane a speed camera (fixed roadside/above road position) and radar (on road patrol cars) in England and Wales work on a slightly different premise to here. In England the speed will be measured between two cameras, if the second camera records a speed lower than the limit and deceleration is proportionate to a vehicle having over taken another then no action is taken. Radar is controlled over a fixed distance and allows for speed limits/zones. What does not happen is somebody getting fined for going just above the limit at the single control point, which can be for any number of legitimate reasons. If people are going well above the limit of course they're done. Stopping times are also dependent on class and weight of vehicle and its load (only driver or several passengers and perhaps luggage makes a big difference), brakes, tyres (tread, pressure, etc), wheel alignment, weather, driver experience and skill plus more. Professional drivers can stop as efficiently from a 50km speed into parking space in around 120m as some people can do at a 10km speed. The MOT in the UK put out a study some years ago, I believe much of it is still pertinent.

Sarah makes a good point and in fact you are almost equally committing an offence if you drive watching your speedometer because then you are taking your eyes of the road... In my 40+ years of driving I have had one accident when a Range Rover drove into the rented car I was driving and to which I was unaccustomed. He was driving above the limit (so was I and he was faster than me...) and had the whiff of a few pints about him. I offered to call the police (it was pre-mobiles), so he gave me all his details for the rental people and went. Look at my present car with its many dents, scrapes and scratches and give my record credibility. Difficult is putting it mildly.

As for driving above limits, never been caught, ditto with a drink or two too many and other offences. Allowing for teetotallers and a few of those people who rarely go above 50km/30mph wherever, there are virtually no 'saints' anywhere to begin with. One might say, it is all relative.

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Yep. And every 1 km/hour increase has a commensurate effect on stopping time. And what it does it matter what I personally have done or not done? If I were over the speed limit and got caught I sure as hell wouldn't bitch about it. I'd know I'd made a voluntary donation to the government or local authority. Who ought to spend it on improving road safety. Which of course is another matter.

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So you've never been 1km/hr over the speed limit, ever? Unless you keep your eyes glued to your speedometer and not on the road, I simply don't believe that you have never ever gone faster than you should.

My former boss got a PV for doing 51km/hr in a 50km/hr zone. It's the same fine for doing up to 20km/hr over the limit.

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Don't speed.

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Really Jane? Tell us more.

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I agree that the French government is in a mess about road safety and drivers, as the ethylotest business makes clear. But it has to be remembered (in English "radars" are called speed cameras) that speeding fines are a voluntary donation. It's very easy indeed not to have to pay them. anyone who pays chooses to do so.

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Vic - my Dearly Beloved is my DB. :)

Brian - I'm glad I added fun and gaiety to your day, and I hope you then went and answered the survey. :)