Just tattoo born to lose on the forehead

…either way, all those people will be required to demonstrate a high degree of vehicular capability and control prior to being able to drive under the new world order anyway. Bring it on, I say – the number of oldies I have nearly had accidents with because they ‘didn’t see’ or ‘got confused’ is huge.

its like trying to hold a discussion with a three year old.

what about…

what about…

seepi you are a softhead.

OK for city dwellers, but what about all the oldies that live in small towns along the fed hwy (Gunning, gundaroo etc) and come into Canberra on the hwy for food and petrol. Or the teens who need to get to work at Maccas Marulan?

“VY your driving scenario would be great for gun drivers who drove Canberra to Sydney often (or other long distances), but not so good for young people driving to their part time jobs, or oldies driving to their local shop for groceries. I just don’t think it is feasible.”

And therein lies the point. Young people driving to their jobs and oldies going to the shops wouldn’t typically be using major interstate freeways. One of the interesting things about Europe where average highway speeds can be quite high, is that urban speeds are often lower than in Australia. Part of being responsible is understanding what an appropriate speed is. For example, would anyone here drive at 60km/h through the windy mini-streets in some of our new suburbs? I sure don’t. But the Hume Hwy on a Wednesday afternoon in perfect conditions? 150km/h is entirely acceptable to me. As I mentioned earlier, it’s about making drivers take greater responsibility, which means selecting an appropriate speed, not just sticking to the speed limit and assuming that you must therefore be ‘safe’.

just as you refuse to acknowledge that other drivers on the road will not drive exactly as you do at all times.

wasnt the speed at fault here seepi – i could have been doing 65kmh and the idiot actions of failing to indicate or look in ones mirror would still have occurred.

but with your single focus on the evils of speed, its typical you wouldnt recognise this.

and you still think 170km p/hr is a good idea – says a lot.

the closest i have come to a major accident was when i was travelling at about 170kmh to work one morning and saw a car some distance ahead.

as i overtook, it just pulled out into the rh lane without indicating. i had nowhere to go except gravel and managed to squeeze past by a fag paper.

the reason this person pulled out ?

cyclists on the road.

two abreast.

if the fool had looked in his mirror before his maneuver, or used hsi indicator – i would have had ampel time to slow down. but when you are about 30 meters away and they pull out – you need to react quickly.

and before you get all hot and bothered, this was in the nt in the mid 90’s.

For arguments sake, how would a driver doing 110kph in the left hand indicate to the driver doing 160+ in the right hand lane, that he or she wished to change lanes?

ummm… with their indicator? Like they are *supposed* to now.

VY your driving scenario would be great for gun drivers who drove Canberra to Sydney often (or other long distances), but not so good for young people driving to their part time jobs, or oldies driving to their local shop for groceries. I just don’t think it is feasible.

bonfire – driving speed limits need to account for the unexpected, and also for drivers of all skill levels. It is unfeasible for some drivers to be doing extremely high speeds while veryone else is going slower.

It’s a shame that drivers can’t be ‘engineered’ as successfully as the hume.

For arguments sake, how would a driver doing 110kph in the left hand indicate to the driver doing 160+ in the right hand lane, that he or she wished to change lanes?

VY, the problem is, without massively increased public transport costs, a sudden raising of the minimum driving standards isn’t all that feasible. There’s quite a lot of flow-on effects if a large chunk of people previously licenced suddenly are not.

the majority of the hume is engineered for speeds above 160kmh. when it is all divided road it would be safe to travel at those speeds if people kept to the left.

ask any road engineer.

ther police shoudl then focus on peopel driving safely, sticking to the left, not weaving all over the road while they knit mung bean cardigans and sms their dope smoking mates in nimbin.

seepis ever more outlandish scenarios now extend to only driving at speeds at which its safe for a bird to fly into your car.

i suggest you stick to a monkey bike.

I guess the point I am making here is that if you raise the bar for who can drive, all of a sudden you dan’t have to consider “all citizens”, just those who have met the more stringent standards. Accordingly, you can adjust the laws given the new risk profile.

Personally I think we need to get away from the widely held view that we are all entitled to a drivers license, and move to a more stringent set of driver requirements. It is then up to the individual to get their skills up to scratch prior to getting behind the wheel. With better trained drivers who take their responsibilities more seriously, we are all better off.

In the example of the bird hitting your windscreen, I have had this happen at over 120km/h, and it made a loud thump. I seriously doubt, however, that adding 50% more energy (180 vs 120) to the equation would actually break anything (besides, we all have laminated windscreens anyway). An untrained driver will react to the unexpected noise – the problem is not failure of the car itself, and that can happen at any speed.

You can’t have traffic laws with endless different speed limits for different cars/drivers/ages/skill levels etc. It would be impossible to police, and I think the roads would be a nightmare.
bonfire laws have to be made to consider all citizens, gimps included. Unfortunately rules such as speed limits are not set with purely yourself in mind.
I also don’t want to be on teh road with anyone doing 180. What if a bird hit their windscreen and they swerved into me.

It comes down to how much responsibility we expect a driver to take. If someone driving a car at 160km/h on a straight, wide road with long gentle bends is alert and piloting a modern, well maintained vehicle, the dangers are considerably less than a drunk idiot in their HQ Kingswood at 100km/h. As a society, however, we have made a choice not to require drivers of motor vehicles to take full responsibility for their driving, which is why we have such prescriptive road rules and require very little in the way of driver training (with correspondingly low license requirements). An alternative (which I support), is to force people to reach a much higher standard of driving capability prior to giving them a license, including ‘attitude testing’. The idea is then to give the driver of a car the full responsibility for operating it in such a way that the risks are appropriately managed. If they fail to do so, the punishment (yes, punishment – not rehabilitation) is serious.

The result will be traffic that flows more freely, drivers who are generally more courteous, and vastly reduced travel time on longer trips.

I don’t want anyone travelling at 180kmh. They might crash into me. Especially if I change into their lane thinking they’re only doing 110kmh down the highway.

I agree – I look tough in front of my mates at 5kph….walking.

An enormous amount of people can’t seem to manage a low speed crawl in a car park, yet people should be allowed to do 180kph as long as they are in the right hand lane along the highway? What a joke!

What do you honestly think would happen if all of the morons who believed that they were immortal (not necessarily just teenage boys) were allowed to travel at such speeds? The road toll is high enough already!

I am constantly afraid that one of my friends or family members (especially the ‘precious cargo’; children) will have their lives destroyed because of some idiot who is trying to look tough in front of his mates.

If people could actually keep to the left lane, 180km/h wouldn’t be a problem.

Who shall be the arbiter of right car, right conditions?

Clearly, our 19-year-old mentioned here isn’t much of an arbiter of what’s in the best interest of his own (and partner and kid’s) safety.

once again seepi hysterically drones on about gimps and outlandish unlikely scenarios, ignoring my ‘right car, right conditions’ caveat.

it used to be you only lost your license in nsw or act – whihever state you were in.

Dont get me wrong, my car goes well at 140km and I know I can do 160km across the Hay Plains, but realistically, this moron is only 19, I have a few good years of driving up my sleeve, and oh my goodness Im a female!(Some of us can actually drive), and yes Dagget you do lose your licence in all states and territories, they use to put a hole in it, so when you get pulled over you have to show your licence it has a hole in it they know you dont have a licence, and no I havent lost mine!!!

180km/h feels GOOD.

Mael, that search gives us this.

Fact check my good man, fact check!

google ‘ACT’s favourite citizen’ Dagget.

“His licence is suspended, so what – he can still drive in ACT with no restriction.”

Correct me if i’m wrong , but last time my brother lost his license it was effective in all states, not just the one the offence occured in.

bonfire not everyone is such a gun driver as you are. Would you really want your 90 yr old neighbour, someone who jut got their license and someone who has impaired mobility burning around at 180? And if not, then noone should. Enough people have said that it causes accidents to have P platers going slower than the flow of traffic. Likewise people should not be going so much faster than the flow of traffic.

Kramer hit the nail on the head.

Right car, right conditions 180kmh is not an unsafe speed.

Unfortunately *YOU* the majority of gruel eating softheads have been brainwashed by social engineering dogooders to think that 100kmh is the fastest humans can possibly travel in safety.

A crock unsupported by any facts.

with the right conditions 180 can seem very slow.

Are you insane, 180k, a moron who has just got his licence, well we think he has a licence, was that actually mentioned that he has a licence at all, a child and a dumb female (obviously) in the same car, destined for death! Why didnt they just stack it in to a tree.

I reckon these losers should have a couple of months in a real jail, maybe that would give them a reality check – and the child should be taken off them at least, the child would be the one that would die in the accident or lose both or one of its parents, so might as well give it to Docs now, saves waiting 12 months till its grown up and learnt how to be a loser from the age of 3(just guessing the age)

What was the car? What were the road conditions like? In the right car, on the right road, with the right conditions 180 can seem very slow. The Federal/Hume highway is not far off an autobahn in some sections.

Headline for this story reminds me of an old Leunig cartoon. His little sad character was coming out of a tattoo parlour; tattooed on his chest was ‘Born Looser’.

…and the young wonder why the talk of ‘coming down on P-platers’

I don’t think my ’91 Laser could even do that speed – even falling off a cliff!

What a dumby

His licence is suspended, so what – he can still drive in ACT with no restriction. Yet another example of the twits we have in this town. I bet he was from Kambah…

Why only suspended?? Surely shredded would be better

He should have taken it out of third gear.