Another road discussion!

#5 – Tailgating, is only a problem due to #2s,#3s and #4s on the roads, in the right hand lane. Get rid of these issues and #5s will likely go away too.
Some people on here seem to think that extreme driver training might be the way to go. When
I was young and naive, I did an awful lot of Scandinavian flicks, drifting and off road rally action which I still think today has improved my understanding of a vehicle’s limitations and how to control loss of traction. Yet at the same time it probably gave me a little too much confidence and I used these skills to place myself and others in a dangerous situation that ended up teaching me the biggest lesson of all, I am not indestructible. It took me several years before I stopped using a death grip on the seat as a passenger whilst traveling on gravel roads.
Perhaps some kind of real crash simulator may be the only way to teach our learner drivers the consequences of doing the wrong thing in a car. Unfortunately, many people have this experience and it ends up being the first and last lesson they ever get.

troll-sniffer said :

Clare248 said :

I get honked at all the time at stop signs for waiting the required 3 seconds

No wonder! There’s no legal requirement to stop for 3 seconds, all you need to do is come to a complete stop. If the road is clear and visibility good, there’s no reason you can’t procedd 1/4 of a second later. So next time you get honked for needlessly waiting at a stop sign, think about your own command of the road rules.

Just because there’s no legal requirement it doesn’t mean she isn’t entitled to do it. How is crossing an intersection in a car any different than tossing a road on foot? I teach my kids to stop, look left, look right and look left again when crossing the road. That’s an easy 3 seconds, closer to 5 if they’re doing it right.
I’d prefer inexperienced drivers were stopping and having a decent look, rather than the fleeting glance most drivers give at 5pm in the winter when it’s raining and they’re in a rush to get home. That glance isn’t going to spot the dark coloured Camry that’s only just left work and hasn’t realised that their lights aren’t on yet.

troll-sniffer said :

Clare248 said :

I get honked at all the time at stop signs for waiting the required 3 seconds

No wonder! There’s no legal requirement to stop for 3 seconds, all you need to do is come to a complete stop. If the road is clear and visibility good, there’s no reason you can’t procedd 1/4 of a second later. So next time you get honked for needlessly waiting at a stop sign, think about your own command of the road rules.

It might not be legal but I wouldn’t be surprised if some driving instructors teach students to count to 3 to prove to the examiner that they have stopped when they do their test. As for people honking – it’s such a silly thing for someone to get worked up about and arguably it’s not legal for such a minor issue (eg I bet they wouldn’t have tried it on behind a police car).

Felix the Cat said :

What about at a roundabout, if you are going straight ahead and there are two lanes and someone approaches from the right on the inside lane and you are in the outside lane are you allowed to proceed in the clear lane? I thought you could and had a guy road rage me quite badly two days in a row at the same roundabout. He had his own lane to go around in and was indicating that he was going right.

Forgive me if I’ve got this wrong, but are you asking if it’s okay to drive across traffic entering or that has already entered the roundabout on your right (not the adjacent lane running parallel to yours on your right)?

Clare248 said :

I get honked at all the time at stop signs for waiting the required 3 seconds

No wonder! There’s no legal requirement to stop for 3 seconds, all you need to do is come to a complete stop. If the road is clear and visibility good, there’s no reason you can’t procedd 1/4 of a second later. So next time you get honked for needlessly waiting at a stop sign, think about your own command of the road rules.

Having obtained my P’s just under a year ago (I’m not a hoon, I promise), indicating out of a roundabout is required in the log book and the test and they do pick on it. I now do it out of habit from the 80+ learner hours I did and the lessons I had.

In regards to driving in general but also stop signs in particular, I find that I am pressured consistently in situations where I do not feel safe to proceed. I get honked at all the time at stop signs for waiting the required 3 seconds, I get honked at when parking or getting out of a park. Yes, while parking, I may take a little more time but I’m sure you’d rather I straightened up or didn’t scrape your car.

Along with this, I get pressured to overtake people who for example are sitting on 80 (L platers) in a 90 along Parkes way. Slowing down behind them causes me no problem and I’m rarely in such a rush that 5 minutes at 80, rather than 90 means much to me.

The differences in licensing laws in the ACT and NSW causes me much grief in regards to my required speed limits. I have been pulled over multiple time along the Hume for allegedly speeding (over 90km) because my P Plates are red.
I have talked my way out of fines due to the NSW police not fully understanding that a) I am allowed to drive at the sign posted limit in NSW, and b) I have no passenger curfews.

I find that driving on the highway is unnerving as people assume I’m 90 restricted when I’m not, overtake, and pull in front of me, not more than 20 metres and drop to 100 when I’m at 110. As a result, I have to brake suddenly and significantly.

I feel as if holding my provisional license is a license for road users to hurl abuse at me assume I’m a bad driver.

At page 43 of the road rules link posted by Duffbowl there is a picture of two cars travelling side by side approaching an intersection and both wanting to turn left. I couldn’t see any reference in the rules as to if it is legal for a single car turning left to drift across the lanes as they turn the corner. Or if cars coming from the right are allowed to drift across the lanes while turning (stopping the left turning car from continuing). Gungahlin Dr/Gundaroo Dr Gungahlin intersection is a good one for this where the drivers coming from the Woolies/Coles servos and turning right to go to Nicholls often (mostly) drift across the lanes while turning.

What about at a roundabout, if you are going straight ahead and there are two lanes and someone approaches from the right on the inside lane and you are in the outside lane are you allowed to proceed in the clear lane? I thought you could and had a guy road rage me quite badly two days in a row at the same roundabout. He had his own lane to go around in and was indicating that he was going right.

Seems a few folk are unsure / unaware that some of the irritating habits of other drivers are actually law.

Might I recommend a refamiliarisation with the road rules?
http://www.legislation.act.gov.au/ni/2010-113/current/pdf/2010-113.pdf

KB1971 said :

Antagonist said :

Oh – and missiles mounted to the front of all cars to take care of those pesky cyclists.

Dont worry, I have my invisible force field to deflect missiles………….

Touche.

The only way real resolve these issues are as follows;

1) Technology,

Speed limiting devices on motor vehicles for offenders is the only way to control speeding properly. Kids will pretend to be safety sam and constable koala when they’re going for their license no matter what, to get your L’s these days requires a ridiculous amount of log book hours and pointless hazard simulation exercises that aren’t generalizable to real situations.

2) Obligatory licence applications at 65

Some government department needs to figure out on average when people start to experience degeneration in the senses then introduce legislation ensuring older drivers are capable of driving in existing conditions. The gov should look at modified licenses to address issues

3) Tougher lesislation

There is nothing more dangerous then when you fly up an exit only to find that the retarded muppet in front of you has stopped and you have to slam on your breaks because they don’t know how to merge and are ‘waiting for an opportunity’. Canberra is in desperate need of an advertisement campaign in this area.

4) Tougher legislation again

Only in the area of merging and indicating though, so many retarded Canberrans indicate that they’re turning when they’re half way through the roundabout rather then when they’re approaching it. This forces people to slam on their brakes.
I love seeing people indicating when exiting a roundabout though, because going straight and indicating left isn’t confusing and pointless (no sarcasm there folks, really)

5)

Pffft just slam on your brakes, if you get rear ended the tail gaters at fault they’ll end up a LOT poorer

Antagonist said :

Oh – and missiles mounted to the front of all cars to take care of those pesky cyclists.

Dont worry, I have my invisible force field to deflect missiles………….

Oh – and missiles mounted to the front of all cars to take care of those pesky cyclists.

I would like to see bombs installed in all cars. If you fail to merge properly, or if you fail to use your indicator … BOOM !!!

Bennop said :

But now that you mention it, things have improved a lot:”The number of road accident fatalities per capita during this time fell more significantly, from a peak of 30.4 per 100,000 people in 1970 to 6.9 in 2009.” ABS.

Half of that was the introduction of compulsory seat belts in the seventies. Most of the rest is due to better safety features on cars, especially air-bags and crumple zones. Very little would be due to improved driving skills.

Bennop said :

I’m not saying either of those things. I’m suggesting that many of the ideas presented here are based on little more than n=1 on the parkway one afternoon.

But now that you mention it, things have improved a lot:”The number of road accident fatalities per capita during this time fell more significantly, from a peak of 30.4 per 100,000 people in 1970 to 6.9 in 2009.” ABS.

I think some people on this forum have considerably more driving experience than others give them credit. Some of the ideas are probably not workable or effective but at least people are discussing it.

If you think there should be change rather than the status quo, perhaps you should suggest or support ideas rather than just criticising others who are having a go.

As for those who simply support more driver training only, I agree that training and testing could be improved (and hopefully retesting introduced). But I’ve seen too many young drivers who do supplementary driver training courses and, while their skills improve, their over confidence increases exponentially.

Elizabethany said :

Train them to do the difficult stuff, and they know what to do in an emergency.

That’s crazy talk!

I teach chemistry labs. Over the years I have been teaching, I have noticed more and more that we are removing the challenge and skill required to complete the labs in the name of safety and reducing our liabilty in case of an accident. What I have seen occur is students who finish the course know less, are less confident and more lax about safety, because it is “someone elses job to take care of that”.The more we mollycoddle them, the less they think and the more in danger they actually are (some of them can’t even pour from a bottle without spilling because they don’t have to in class!). They don’t read labels because things are colour coded. The number of incidents are increasing.

I think it is the same on our roads. The more we are “protected” with lower speed limits, less driver training (such as 80 for L platers over the border) and in car safety systems, the more risk we take on the roads (such as tailgating) because we feel safe. Make driving harder, and people have to pay more attention and generally drive more cautiously. Train them to do the difficult stuff, and they know what to do in an emergency.

KB1971 said :

Pork Hunt said :

KB1971 said :

bd84 said :

Thirdly, proper police enforcement of the road rules with additional funding. Speed cameras restricted to high speed accident locations only and widely used combined with red light cameras at intersections.

Yep, the speed cameras didnt stop the dick in the NSW registered Audi R8 from balsting past me at double my speed this afternoon on the Tuggeranong Parkway. I ended up reporting him after I saw him again heading north at Bonython, I could still hear his engine valve bouncing despite the fact he was on the opposite side of a 4 lane road & I had my window up.

Dobber

You know, when I saw him the first time I shook my head & thought; “piss off out of town & do that if you really must” but then I saw him again at Bonython doing it again & thought; “bugger it, he needs to be stopped”.

Normally I dont give a sh!t about people doing stupid stuff unless it directly affects me but this guy was way out there.

Screaming Banshee: Pedant.

Yeah, dobber, but sometimes you have to dob. And I did, on Friday night.

About 7.00pm, I was walking my dogs (for those who are regulars, Feral and Cheryl, and they’re very happy dogs, settled in well) down my street in Jerrabomberra, which is a bit of a throughway to Queanbeyan, particularly for those who are trying to stay off the main road. That is, those sneaking home from the Jerra pub after a few too many bevvies, for instance (and again for the regulars, I’m the person who had their house crashed into about 18 months ago by one such sneaky lad, so I’m a little sensitive on the subject). It’s a 50kmh zone.

A 4WD came screaming up the road, and I gave him the finger as an expression of my dislike of dickhe@ds speeding through the street, a street that has lots of kids, people walking dogs etc like any other suburban street. Yep, provocative, I know, but a friendly wave doesn’t quite send the message. The driver hit his brakes hard and skidded to a stop, unmindful of the cars behind him, but they avoided him. He threw it into reverse and floored it back towards me, jumping up the gutter and stopping a couple of metres from me. At that point, I pulled out my phone to call for help and mentally noted his rego, thinking that it could get ugly.

Then he seemed to change his mind. Me holding the phone? The realisation that his rego was on display? Or noticing the 6’3″ bloke standing next to me? He put his vehicle back into gear, and spun his tyres as best he could throwing up a bit of gravel then bumped back down onto the road and took off again at high speed. It was enough of a ruckus to bring the bloke from the house across the road out to investigate. I note the irony that my action sure didn’t slow him down.

Anyway, I called the local copshop and told them about it. I have no real expectation that they can do anything, but just maybe they’ll drive past the Jerra pub next Friday to see if its his regular. I know I will. And maybe the guy has form for using his car as a weapon?

So for any of you who are hooning through Jerra, I’m the mad dog woman giving you the finger. 😉

Simple. Make driving licenses really difficult to get, moderately difficult to renew, really easy to lose and almost impossible to re-attain post conviction. Sure, it won’t stop the complete idiots, but what will?

I think many just need to get the knot out of their knickers before they jump behind the wheel.
Sure, some things mentioned here are downright dangerous, but coming up behind an old guy doing 50 in an 80 zone is really only slightly annoying. Just let it go and you might live longer and be happier! 😀

Innovation said :

So are you saying (a) you’re happy with the status quo or (b) you think that the Government of the day already does a good job developing ideas and implementing any changes needed?

I’m not saying either of those things. I’m suggesting that many of the ideas presented here are based on little more than n=1 on the parkway one afternoon.

But now that you mention it, things have improved a lot:”The number of road accident fatalities per capita during this time fell more significantly, from a peak of 30.4 per 100,000 people in 1970 to 6.9 in 2009.” ABS.

Deckard said :

bd84 said :

First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph.

Stats to back this up? Or just a wild guess to suit your self?

Some interesting info here:

http://members.optusnet.com.au/carsafety/speed_control_oct03.pdf

Written by this bloke:

http://users.tpg.com.au/users/mpaine/vdr.html

What he has written in the first document is pretty well the information that has been gathered by manufacturers/researchers in the Automotive industry & is nothing new.

I am sure some of you will pick holes in it for your own benifit but I suggest you actually read it with an open mind rather than a cynical one.

PrinceOfAles said :

How about just having more police on the street? Like another 20 patrol cars at any given time of day or night. Speed limiters and phone jammers can`t book people for not indicating, tailgating and running red lights and stop signs.

Once again, this comes down to practicality.

I’d rather have those 20 patrol cars monitoring actual crime, vs people who’ve been too lazy with their cars. I guarantee you if they did decide to put 20 police on the roads, there wouldn’t be an extra 20 on the street protecting the general populace from more dangerous individuals.

I personally find the idea of making driving more brain-dead disturbing.
I tend to drive so I have a comfortable level of perceived risk, doubt I am alone.
One reason I prefer to commute by bicycle.

How about just having more police on the street? Like another 20 patrol cars at any given time of day or night. Speed limiters and phone jammers can`t book people for not indicating, tailgating and running red lights and stop signs.

Bennop said :

So many well meaning commentators with well meaning ideas. My immediate reaction is: ” How much of this is anything better than knee jerk reactions and typical prejudiced bullshit? Wheres the evidence for your ideas, or is this just your well intentioned bollocks?” I hope someone can indicate otherwise.

So are you saying (a) you’re happy with the status quo or (b) you think that the Government of the day already does a good job developing ideas and implementing any changes needed?

Lardman said :

…..[stuff about power limits, rev/speed limiters, license chips]….

I think that the OP might be referring to power to weight limitslike motorcycles

I agree rev limiters would not be effective and speed limiters on cars could be dangerous (if someone actually genuinely needs to speed to get out of the way of something).

Hasn’t done squat in NSW/Vic. Their crash stats are still pretty bad. That and there are some cars that have shit power to weight ratios, but still can do some serious speeds. (Audi A4 2.7 etc)

Also doesn’t take into account those that retune a vehicle above said power to weight. Police can look for physical mods, but an ECU retune can net you some serious gains and is impossible to check for without the specific hardware.

Lardman said :

As for people modifying their cars, most offenders are probably opportunistic and can’t be bothered thinking ahead to modify their cars (and of course the penalties for illegal modifications could be pretty severe eg crushing/selling their car).

Illegal modifications would show up pretty quickly if someone is driving aggressively or in a prang. Police could have the power to call in a mechanic for vehicles they suspect of illegal modification. (incidentally, as an example, police probably couldn’t spot a bicycle that is powered over 250 watts (some are up to 1000 watts but nobody says that we should have 1000 watt bikes just because police couldn’t spot them).

My point was that quite a number of ‘illegal modifications’ have little to no safety ramifications. How is an uncovered air intake a danger to the general public?

Lardman said :

Licenses could be programmed via their chip with expiration dates, conditions etc and deprogrammed during periods of suspensions. All the reader would do is read whatever is on the card for any licensed driver (including those supervising learner drivers) who insert their cardin the reader for the duration of the trip.

And if that system fails?

bd84 said :

[General common sense]

A rarely seen response. Hooray!

Lardman said :

Not sure about the accuracy of your stats but I don’t agree restricting new drivers is a knee jerk reaction. I agree that driver training could be improved but many young people (particularly males) have excellent driving skills (within normal limits) by the time they do their test but simply cut loose as soon as they have passed and are on their own (or with their friends).

Hence, make public transport a viable alternative, and enforce our licenses similar to EU – make them a test, as opposed to a cereal box. It takes serious levels of retard to not be able to pass the test.

Lardman said :

More visible police presence and enforcement would be lovely but I doubt much more money will be thrown at it (unless the Government can get another stream of revenue eg higher penalties to make it worthwhile for the time police spend pulling drivers over, completing paperwork and appearing in court for those drivers who appeal).

And you want to put a NFC system in all cars? With underlying infrastructure? And the staff to support it?

Lardman said :

Of all the suggestions in this and other posts, I think the most cost effective suggestions that most people seem to agree with is regular driver testing and tougher rules (of some sort) for provisional drivers and repeat offenders.

The biggest problem is that Gov’ts seem to use the copout argument that they can’t change road rules, driver licenses or vehicle modifications without the agreement of other States and/of Federal Government (eg re ADRs). Sometimes this is reasonable but they could change some rules and they should be seen to be doing more to lobby for other changes..

Adopt EU standards. NCAP, so on. Things like requiring a breathalyzer in your car, or a safety sign (like most new BMW’s come with for example). Simple stuff. Would also make our car allowance process cheaper. Globalize and reap the benefits, people.

Lardman said :

Our best bet now is for self drive cars asap.

And for those of us that enjoy the culture of cars?

Bennop said :

So many well meaning commentators with well meaning ideas. My immediate reaction is: ” How much of this is anything better than knee jerk reactions and typical prejudiced bullshit? Wheres the evidence for your ideas, or is this just your well intentioned bollocks?” I hope someone can indicate otherwise.

I reckon most people who’ve left comment watch ACA and TT and believe it.

KB1971 said :

KB1971 said :

Deckard said :

bd84 said :

First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph.

Stats to back this up? Or just a wild guess to suit your self?

I will try to find some tomorrow at work.

Dont need to wait that long, look at the last page, it a crude statistical report but it answers your question:

http://www.bitre.gov.au/publications/2012/files/RDA_0612.pdf

I just realised the stats in that one are for the “Posted speed Limit” not the actual speed of the vehicles involved.

I will have another go at it tomorrow.

Pork Hunt said :

KB1971 said :

bd84 said :

Thirdly, proper police enforcement of the road rules with additional funding. Speed cameras restricted to high speed accident locations only and widely used combined with red light cameras at intersections.

Yep, the speed cameras didnt stop the dick in the NSW registered Audi R8 from balsting past me at double my speed this afternoon on the Tuggeranong Parkway. I ended up reporting him after I saw him again heading north at Bonython, I could still hear his engine valve bouncing despite the fact he was on the opposite side of a 4 lane road & I had my window up.

Dobber

You know, when I saw him the first time I shook my head & thought; “piss off out of town & do that if you really must” but then I saw him again at Bonython doing it again & thought; “bugger it, he needs to be stopped”.

Normally I dont give a sh!t about people doing stupid stuff unless it directly affects me but this guy was way out there.

Screaming Banshee: Pedant.

So many well meaning commentators with well meaning ideas. My immediate reaction is: ” How much of this is anything better than knee jerk reactions and typical prejudiced bullshit? Wheres the evidence for your ideas, or is this just your well intentioned bollocks?” I hope someone can indicate otherwise.

KB1971 said :

Deckard said :

bd84 said :

First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph.

Stats to back this up? Or just a wild guess to suit your self?

I will try to find some tomorrow at work.

Dont need to wait that long, look at the last page, it a crude statistical report but it answers your question:

http://www.bitre.gov.au/publications/2012/files/RDA_0612.pdf

Deckard said :

bd84 said :

First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph.

Stats to back this up? Or just a wild guess to suit your self?

I will try to find some tomorrow at work.

Deckard said :

bd84 said :

First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph.

Stats to back this up? Or just a wild guess to suit your self?

Most crashes are low speed crashes.

As for fatal, there’s probably a higher number of high speed crashes, but a lot would be put down to fatigue, falling asleep at the wheel etc on the highway. I highly doubt that the majority would be ‘oh no, p-platers and hoons’ like TT and ACA would suggest.

KB1971 said :

, I could still hear his engine valve bouncing despite the fact he was on the opposite side of a 4 lane road & I had my window up.

Valves don’t bounce in modern cars, their engines are governed by a rev-limiter

00davist said :

… and for full licences, 3 or more demerits in any 6 months should put you on a 6 month probation requiring a test at the end, and 5 hours with an instructor during that 6 months.

Possibly a bit harsh. It’s pretty easy for someone to rack up 3 points (or 6 during double demerits season). I’d suggest moving them to a provisional license at 9 points and eventual retesting for anyone with a suspended license (including those who accrued 12 points).

Lardman said :

…..[stuff about power limits, rev/speed limiters, license chips]….

I think that the OP might be referring to power to weight limitslike motorcycles

I agree rev limiters would not be effective and speed limiters on cars could be dangerous (if someone actually genuinely needs to speed to get out of the way of something).

As for people modifying their cars, most offenders are probably opportunistic and can’t be bothered thinking ahead to modify their cars (and of course the penalties for illegal modifications could be pretty severe eg crushing/selling their car).

Illegal modifications would show up pretty quickly if someone is driving aggressively or in a prang. Police could have the power to call in a mechanic for vehicles they suspect of illegal modification. (incidentally, as an example, police probably couldn’t spot a bicycle that is powered over 250 watts (some are up to 1000 watts but nobody says that we should have 1000 watt bikes just because police couldn’t spot them).

Licenses could be programmed via their chip with expiration dates, conditions etc and deprogrammed during periods of suspensions. All the reader would do is read whatever is on the card for any licensed driver (including those supervising learner drivers) who insert their cardin the reader for the duration of the trip.

farnarkler said :

And you’re going to try and make someone who has a restored 55 Chev or EH Holden or E-type Jag put this kind of technology in their cars?

I think posters are referring to modifications to new vehicles although Gov’t could offer cheaper rego and there might eventually be evidence and justification for cheaper insurance for modified vehicles.

bd84 said :

Power or speed limiting drivers are the most idiotic suggestions and knee jerk reactions to trying to minimise road deaths. They do NOTHING to save lives, and the latter is likely to take more lives. Why? First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph. 99.9 percent of vehicles on our road can do that speed. It does not matter whether the car can get there in 4 secs or 10 secs. Speed limiting drivers just promotes a generation of inexperienced drivers who have never been taught how to safely handle a car going above 80kph and first legally drive a car above that speed when they get into the car by themselves for the first time.

There’s only a few things that will assist in reducing road deaths. First is proper and comprehensive drive training for new drivers, none of this mum and dad teaching bad habits, must have a minimum number of hours with a professional instructor in all conditions. Second, driver retraining at a minimum every 10 years, regularly with those with poor driving records. Thirdly, proper police enforcement of the road rules with additional funding. Speed cameras restricted to high speed accident locations only and widely used combined with red light cameras at intersections.

Not sure about the accuracy of your stats but I don’t agree restricting new drivers is a knee jerk reaction. I agree that driver training could be improved but many young people (particularly males) have excellent driving skills (within normal limits) by the time they do their test but simply cut loose as soon as they have passed and are on their own (or with their friends).

More visible police presence and enforcement would be lovely but I doubt much more money will be thrown at it (unless the Government can get another stream of revenue eg higher penalties to make it worthwhile for the time police spend pulling drivers over, completing paperwork and appearing in court for those drivers who appeal).

Of all the suggestions in this and other posts, I think the most cost effective suggestions that most people seem to agree with is regular driver testing and tougher rules (of some sort) for provisional drivers and repeat offenders.

The biggest problem is that Gov’ts seem to use the copout argument that they can’t change road rules, driver licenses or vehicle modifications without the agreement of other States and/of Federal Government (eg re ADRs). Sometimes this is reasonable but they could change some rules and they should be seen to be doing more to lobby for other changes. May be we will get some promises by some party or another this year butlittle if anything will ever be implemented.

Our best bet now is for self drive cars asap.

Why do we have to do anything? Natural selection will sort it out. Technology won’t do squat, it’s an attitude problem. Bring back smacking your kids and raising them to be decent thoughtful human beings, rather than the little shitheads they’ve become. Get people to be respectful to each other. Just the other day I was walking down Bunda street with my 2 small children and a van had obviously nearly run over a jogger as he was turning into the underground loading zone of the Canberra centre. Rather than anyone saying sorry the van driver was obviously mouthing off at the jogger so the jogger ran toward the van and gave the side panel a mighty boot before running off. The van driver then jumps out calling him every name under the sun (f word, c word, the lot) while I’m standing there not 5 metres in front of him holding the hands of a 6 year old and a 3 year old.
He’s kind of lucky the van was completely unmarked cause if there’d been any company name on it at all his manager would have been getting an unscheduled meeting with yours truly.

Honestly, general attitude in this town has turned to crap, and I’m not limiting my opinion to just motorists either.

HenryBG said :

Clogging up the fast lane for no good reason? NO LICENCE

Since when has there ever been a fast lane, I only know of an overtaking lane.

My proposal is bring on the google overlords and their driver-less cars. I for one welcome our new driver-less overlords.

Deckard said :

bd84 said :

First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph.

Stats to back this up? Or just a wild guess to suit your self?

I’ve read (and heard) this also. Not sure where the official numbers are, or even if they are collected in this country. I’d be hesitant to consider just ACT numbers, too, given the size of the driving population.

1) Proper driving training and regular re-testing
2) Yearly vehicle inspections
3) Reduce and simplify the rules, but police them more effectively. Adopt the ‘moving violation’ principle (ie tailgating, lane hogging, getting ‘cranky’, etc)
4) More marked police cars
5) Move the speed cameras to actual black spots.

Just my 2 cents.

So what will it take to slow drivers down and behave themselves on the roads? I would suggest the most effective and immediate method would be to instill a “fear of consequence” within the perpertrator.Yes that would require a heavy handed approach but it’s clearly obvious that the current system in place has done practically nothing to modify the behaviour of recidivists or those inclined to adopt the attitude of “fark you i’ll do what i want”!

KB1971 said :

bd84 said :

Thirdly, proper police enforcement of the road rules with additional funding. Speed cameras restricted to high speed accident locations only and widely used combined with red light cameras at intersections.

Yep, the speed cameras didnt stop the dick in the NSW registered Audi R8 from balsting past me at double my speed this afternoon on the Tuggeranong Parkway. I ended up reporting him after I saw him again heading north at Bonython, I could still hear his engine valve bouncing despite the fact he was on the opposite side of a 4 lane road & I had my window up.

Dobber

bd84 said :

First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph.

Stats to back this up? Or just a wild guess to suit your self?

bd84 said :

Thirdly, proper police enforcement of the road rules with additional funding. Speed cameras restricted to high speed accident locations only and widely used combined with red light cameras at intersections.

Yep, the speed cameras didnt stop the dick in the NSW registered Audi R8 from balsting past me at double my speed this afternoon on the Tuggeranong Parkway. I ended up reporting him after I saw him again heading north at Bonython, I could still hear his engine valve bouncing despite the fact he was on the opposite side of a 4 lane road & I had my window up.

00davist said :

-10 hours adverse weather

Not with an el nino coming from next year!

farnarkler said :

run their cars around the circuit to show how easy it is to get out of shape with a road car.

This, driver education is pitiful in this country. There is no way that a P plater is well enough equipped in their early years of driving.

I think this is a better starting point rather than dumbing cars down so people dont crash.

Electronic stability in cars really takes the skills away from you as a driver. My current 4by has traction control, ESC, ABS and hill descent control. I jumped into my brother in laws 100 series live axled Cruiser a couple of months back & had to concentrate again. My new car has made me lazy.

Not saying its not safer as it is a much better car to drive on the dirt as a result, it just means that if things go pearshaped its highly likely that it will be at a higher speed as all the electronics allow you to do it.

A driver who has been taught proper car control can compensate for little slides & emergencies much the way the ESC does. I was lucky, I learnt to drive in the country & we lived on a dirt road. I am just as home on the dirt as I am on the tar, I even know how to pass cars properly, a skill that seems to either be ignored or not taught.

00davist, you forgot road infrastructure, a lot more could be done to fix the road infrastructure. I dont mean dual carraigeways but looking after the surfaces, adequate overtaking lanes on roads BUT this still does not take the responsibility away from drivers to drive to the conditions.

Driving tests every 5 years.

Power or speed limiting drivers are the most idiotic suggestions and knee jerk reactions to trying to minimise road deaths. They do NOTHING to save lives, and the latter is likely to take more lives. Why? First, most fatal accidents happen about 60 kph. 99.9 percent of vehicles on our road can do that speed. It does not matter whether the car can get there in 4 secs or 10 secs. Speed limiting drivers just promotes a generation of inexperienced drivers who have never been taught how to safely handle a car going above 80kph and first legally drive a car above that speed when they get into the car by themselves for the first time.

There’s only a few things that will assist in reducing road deaths. First is proper and comprehensive drive training for new drivers, none of this mum and dad teaching bad habits, must have a minimum number of hours with a professional instructor in all conditions. Second, driver retraining at a minimum every 10 years, regularly with those with poor driving records. Thirdly, proper police enforcement of the road rules with additional funding. Speed cameras restricted to high speed accident locations only and widely used combined with red light cameras at intersections.

And you’re going to try and make someone who has a restored 55 Chev or EH Holden or E-type Jag put this kind of technology in their cars?

All good ideas but not going to happen. I was at Wakefield park yesterday watching a bit or racing. Now there is an ideal circuit that can be driven on with registered cars. Plod should hire the circuit, get WIN, Prime and Ten onboard and get a few of these rev heads to run their cars around the circuit to show how easy it is to get out of shape with a road car.

“Most modern cars have chips inside the keys that will not allow the car to start, unless a scanner in the car recognises the key, this helps prevent theft by forcing the lock, or cutting another key, could similar technology not be applied to licences in some way?”

It’s called near field communication, a contactless chip in the plastic handle of the key, but also increasingly a pocket device that allows the car to be opened and started with push buttons within a certain distance without even touching a key.

So the answer is yes, the technology exists. And yes, the NFC could be built into licences with minimal cost and without making it noticeable larger or heavier. You’d just swipe it near a point on the dash board.

But the car would need to know whether a licence is valid or not, and there’s no shortage of pencil neck geeks out there who can circumvent the technology already, no doubt making a buck out of it along the way.

My thought is Australia needs to hurry up with getting new road safety technology in cars. It’s ridiculous seeing the technologies in US and British cars become fairly common years ahead of Australia.
It took years for dual front airbags to be made standard, years for ABS to become common.

Traction Control and ESC should be made mandatory, they should have been long ago.

We’re only no seeing blind spot detection, correcting steering (via yaw breaking) and so on.

Car makers need to include more technologies like Volvo’s city-safe which can now detect even pedestrians. These are expensive technologies so perhaps some government subsidy required, I mean they’re raking in enough from ‘safety’ cameras.

On Power limits:
Power limits account for sweet shit all, really. Considering a Golf TSi isn’t a sports car and has 114kw? Or a Gen4 RX-7 has about 120kw? Still plenty to get in trouble.

On Rev limiters/Speed limiters:
You do realise how ludicrously easy it is to circumvent any of that? A Cobb AccessPort or similar is only a few hundred bucks.

On offenders removing them:
Also, how are you going to police it? Most cops don’t know what a turbo upgrade looks like, let alone ‘hey, lets check this ECU programming!” There’s no easy way of getting that info unless you download the cars tune and check it – and it does take quite a bit of knowledge to learn all those variables.

Additionally to that, rev limiters? Sure, that might work for any N/A or Rotary, but most cars make their peak torque around 2k rpm all the way through to redline nowadays.
And finally, Traction control: You can just unplug the unit. And when was the last time a burnout ‘killed’ anyone. You’re talking about safety and now you’re complaining about burnouts.

License chips:
Yeah, and if someone else ever wants to drive your car? You’re also talking about a lot of underlying IT stuff to make it happen. Not going to, for our population.

1: High speeds and young drivers? What about every middle aged woman in her SUV doing 20+ and talking on the phone? Oh wait, she’s got kids and is middle aged, she can’t POSSIBLY be breaking the law.

2: Older drivers, agree there.

3: Over cautious drivers, agree there. At the same time if they stay in the left lane and actually exercise that caution properly, no problem.

4: Yep: Drivers who don’t understand rules and courtesy’s surrounding lanes, merging and roundabouts.

5:Tailgating – it’s a problem everywhere. Not much you can do about it.

Inspections I agree with, or maybe policing some of the dumber things about? Lack of functional headlights/tailights, etc – instead of saying “oh no, your car is 99mm! defect!”

I suppose it’s wishful thinking to ask for a bigger skidpan facility and maybe a local track – wakefield gets mighty expensive.

I agree with the idea of having a track, I personally would be unlikely to use it, but there are people out there who have a passion for performance machines, and giving them a legal option to enjoy their hobby seems like a good idea to me.

I’m personally not to sure about using highways for Darwinism, simply because you need to remember that the level of stupidity we are talking about here would probably still find its way to killing others, however for major interstate routes I agree with higher limits, there are some roads that could definitely and safely handle the speed, and for those roads it could be beneficial to fatigue.

Highways in many area’s do need more division between the two directions, regardless of speed increase.

I personally think that we need a mix system for learners, log book based, however the requirement should be for your log book to show a diversity of experiences as a learner, lets say a log book requiring 120 hours, which must be a mix of:
-10 hours with an professional instructor
-20 hours outside the ACT (diversity of roads)
-at least 2 different people training you, aside from the instructor
-10 hours night
-10 hours adverse weather

Perhaps a few other requirements for diversity of experience would be good too.

P-Platers, 2 stages:

P1 18 months, 90KM limit outside residential, 50KM in residential, 10 hours under professional instruction, any demerit points means 6 months more, 6 demerit means start over as learner.

P2 18 months, 100km limit, 10 hours professional instructor, demerits as for P1.

After that, licences should be tested every 10 years, and for full licences, 3 or more demerits in any 6 months should put you on a 6 month probation requiring a test at the end, and 5 hours with an instructor during that 6 months.

Henry, strangely, i agree with you, simulators could be used to add more diversity for learners, and none of those things should be overlooked in a test.

Innovation, I agree with everything you have there, I particularly feel vehicle inspections should be brought back, I have seen some shocking cars driving around, tires bald to a racing slick, or even to the threads, nothing but high beams still working and plenty of bits missing!!!

I love the OPs idea re licenses. Perhaps there is technology out there to install chips on licenses and the cards need to be inserted in a reader before the car would operate. Determined people would still bypass the system but it might help reduce the numbers driving without a license, on a suspended license, on an expired license or outside the terms of their license (eg some people aren’t allowed to drive at night or outside a certain radius of home). It also might cut down on the number of thefts.

Pie in the sky but, as well as my comments re P platers in the other thread:

1/ GPS technology in cars that identifies correct speed limits in all areas (and possibly even overrides the car’s speed if the driver speeds for too long or too often). Government’s could be penalised (and drivers compensated) if the Government doesn’t have the correct road speeds recorded for GPS systems.

2/ Regular license testing (user pays) eg every five years would weed out a lot of poor drivers or encourage them to improve their skills. Obviously it wouldn’t help those who knowingly are idiots on the road but know how to behave when tested (or when police are visible).

3/ Bring back motor vehicle inspections (eg every two years) – there are a lot of unsafe cars on the road.

4/ Possibly new license and registration classes for .. people who drive very underpowered vehicles (eg, there is a big gap between an electric bicycle with 250 watts – top speed on the flat around 25km/h) and …. all for vehicles and people who only drive very short distances (eg to the closest major bus stop).

My biggest pet peeve is not indicating (or at least not indicating early enough) especially when I am a pedestrian. Another one is pedestrians who push the button to trigger the lights and then walk on the red anyway.

Wanon said :

Put up road dividers on all the highways, remove the speed limits and then let all the dickheads remove themselves from the gene pool without killing other drivers at the same time.

Either that or just make licenses much, much harder to earn. It seems rather hard to believe everyone who has a license is mature, and skilled enough to drive a deadly weapon.

I think a few dozen hours of simulator testing should be compulsory – this would allow you to test them for all situations before allowing them anywhere near the road on Ls even..
Fail to get out of the way of an emergency vehicle? NO LICENCE.
Fog lights on when there’s no fog? NO LICENCE
Clogging up the fast lane for no good reason? NO LICENCE
Frigging with your iPhone? NO LICENCE
etc…

Put up road dividers on all the highways, remove the speed limits and then let all the dickheads remove themselves from the gene pool without killing other drivers at the same time.

Either that or just make licenses much, much harder to earn. It seems rather hard to believe everyone who has a license is mature, and skilled enough to drive a deadly weapon.

I tend to agree with OP’s points, so I’ll throw in the contentious one – provide somewhere that these activities can be enjoyed in a more controlled manner that doesn’t put the rest of Canberra’s road users at risk. Take away the excuse that “there’s nowhere to have fun legally so I’ll do it where I want”.

Driving around Canberra can and should be an enjoyable experience, much closer to a leisurely drive through the countryside than you can get in any other Australian capital. It’s such a shame we have the small handful that insist on ruining it.