Mobile speed cameras not just checking speed!

[merc07]

65% of crashes within 5 miles of home? Thankfully I live in Wales and am unlikely to get much over 20mph.

More like the 65% of crashes that occur within 5 miles of their home is because that 65% don't ever drive further than 5 miles from their home in the first place !

 

[MSG2004]

More like the 65% of crashes that occur within 5 miles of their home is because that 65% don't ever drive further than 5 miles from their home in the first place !

Think about where we drive to and our children that live near us.
My workplace was just under three miles and my wife was 2 miles.
Our grandchildren's schools are between one and two miles
Our odds-and-ends shopping is within a mile
and within 3 miles we have choices of several supermarkets
on the whole, I guess our trips, well over 97% of them
are within 5 miles, easily.

Some traffic laws are silly, Eg, the 20mph on main roads. However, on the side roads, I often drive/drove slower than that
especially in narrow roads with lots of parked vehicles even before the intro of 20mph limits as it was safer for all.
The seatbelt rule for all passengers is very sensible, and stats heavily support the benefits of this.
Not wearing a seatbelt is not sensible IMO and also against the law. Yes, there may be a few examples where you can't see around
a corner etc, but I've loosened the belt and that works.

 

[BTB 500]

More like the 65% of crashes that occur within 5 miles of their home is because that 65% don't ever drive further than 5 miles from their home in the first place !

Many people who do drive further make lots of short / local trips as well.

But it doesn't really matter why it happens - statistically drivers are much more likely to be involved in a crash close to home, so deliberately not wearing a belt then because you aren't going far isn't a great idea. You might not get above 20 mph, but if someone else doing 30 hits you head-on you're still going to have a bad day.

I remember 'fixed' seat belts, which really did restrict your movement in the car compared to inertia reel ones. I still always wore them.

 

[StMarks]

On a (sort of) related theme, my littlest sister has recently purchased a Fiat 500.(No, not one of those. The original 60-70's minuscule one that single-handedly obliterated almost the entire Italian motorcycle manufacturing industry. )
Anyway, I was summoned to assess her acquisition wallbash: too late to try to warn her etc,, ). First thing I realised, when I went to drive it round the block, wasn't that it has a non synchro gearbox, it was that there are no seatbelts at all !!!
It actually felt unsettling (well, the whole experience of driving a toy sized car on the open road with less than 13hp and brakes that demand the driver have 20/20 foresite, in modern traffic was unnerving). -Have you ever tried joining a normal dual carriageway from a slip road, in a car that doesn't have a 0-60 time because that speed is simply unattainable.?????

Let's just say that the lorry drivers horn sounding acknowledgment of their appreciation for the unintentional brake testing, was barely masked by the screaming two cylinder aircooled engine behind me as I tried to coax it towards the 50mph that most of the HGV expect..

I think I know now why the Italians always wear dark glasses, and I really hope no one did recognise me.

Anyway, seatbelts...: No it doesn't have them. Yes, it felt wrong. No, I wouldn't have felt any safer wearing one anyway.

 

[BTB 500]

It actually felt unsettling (well, the whole experience of driving a toy sized car on the open road with less than 13hp and brakes that demand the driver have 20/20 foresite, in modern traffic was unnerving). -Have you ever tried joining a normal dual carriageway from a slip road, in a car that doesn't have a 0-60 time because that speed is simply unattainable.?????

I had a 1974 Fiat 126 with a claimed 23 bhp and 39 Nm of torque, and that was bad enough! IIRC the top speed was officially 64 mph. But at least it had seat belts

I once drove it home down the A3 on one cylinder after the screw contact on one of the plugs sheared off. That was entertaining.

 

[oldguy57]

It's a handful of years ago that mate's brother got flashed 3 times by the same mobile camera doing 30 in a 30 limit whilst he did his rounds in a van. On the third occasion he stopped and told the officer that he wasn't speeding. Response confirmed that he wasn't speeding but not wearing a seatbelt on each occasion. His mates laughed their heads off.

 

[Petrol Pete]

A mate of mine who is old enough to know better never wears a seat belt if he can get away with it , he drives a Transit van and on the very (odd) occasion I have been in it with him I can not click my seatbelt because he has one of those thick nylon seat covers on and he has not slit the part where the seatbelt buckle comes through.

80% of the time he has his eldest son in the van with him as he works with his dad and the youngster (21yr old) does not drive , he also take his dog out on a lot of (farm based) jobs .

So, in a minor head on with a big tractor on the lanes all 3 of them could be dead. When I questioned him about it he said 'they are uncomfortable' , How the hell he has not been fined for it yet is a mystery to me , as is his way of thinking.

PS: on occasion a bunch of us go out shooting , my other mate takes us in his new (ish) Discovery , the JLR will not let you sit in the front without beeping at you non stop, so my Transit driving mate connects the belt before getting in the car and sits on it.

No , me neither .

PS when we are in the Discovery I sit in the back because I don't want my (heavier than me) mate sitting behind me not wearing his seatbelt.

 

[Gollom]

A mate of mine who is old enough to know better never wears a seat belt if he can get away with it , he drives a Transit van and on the very (odd) occasion I have been in it with him I can not click my seatbelt because he has one of those thick nylon seat covers on and he has not slit the part where the seatbelt buckle comes through.

80% of the time he has his eldest son in the van with him as he works with his dad and the youngster (21yr old) does not drive , he also take his dog out on a lot of (farm based) jobs .

So, in a minor head on with a big tractor on the lanes all 3 of them could be dead. When I questioned him about it he said 'they are uncomfortable' , How the hell he has not been fined for it yet is a mystery to me , as is his way of thinking.

PS: on occasion a bunch of us go out shooting , my other mate takes us in his new (ish) Discovery , the JLR will not let you sit in the front without beeping at you non stop, so my Transit driving mate connects the belt before getting in the car and sits on it.

No , me neither .

PS when we are in the Discovery I sit in the back because I don't want my (heavier than me) mate sitting behind me not wearing his seatbelt.

Afraid me and your mate would have a falling out as I'd simply not move until all belted properly. As you point out, potential heavy projectile in the car. My kids never had to use belts - trouble was that the car would magical not move if they were not being used correctly. Odd that

 

[oldguy57]

A mate of mine who is old enough to know better never wears a seat belt if he can get away with it , he drives a Transit van and on the very (odd) occasion I have been in it with him I can not click my seatbelt because he has one of those thick nylon seat covers on and he has not slit the part where the seatbelt buckle comes through.

80% of the time he has his eldest son in the van with him as he works with his dad and the youngster (21yr old) does not drive , he also take his dog out on a lot of (farm based) jobs .

So, in a minor head on with a big tractor on the lanes all 3 of them could be dead. When I questioned him about it he said 'they are uncomfortable' , How the hell he has not been fined for it yet is a mystery to me , as is his way of thinking.

PS: on occasion a bunch of us go out shooting , my other mate takes us in his new (ish) Discovery , the JLR will not let you sit in the front without beeping at you non stop, so my Transit driving mate connects the belt before getting in the car and sits on it.

No , me neither .

PS when we are in the Discovery I sit in the back because I don't want my (heavier than me) mate sitting behind me not wearing his seatbelt.

"Uncomfortable" - not as uncomfortable as your head going through the windscreen and your ribs bust on the steering wheel.

 

[Mactech]

I simply cannot drive without a seatbelt on, and will not drive with anyone in my car who does not 'belt up'
In over 50 years of motoring this has only ever once been an issue. In the front seat of a taxi in Hong Kong. The others were already in the back when I got to the taxi and I had to take the front seat. The taxi driver gestured not to put the belt on but I insisted. It was only when I got out I noticed the black diagonal stripe across my white shirt....
But I'll take that as the shirt washed just fine, and is far preferable to a face full of windscreen

 

[TC350]

I simply cannot drive without a seatbelt on, and will not drive with anyone in my car who does not 'belt up'
In over 50 years of motoring this has only ever once been an issue. In the front seat of a taxi in Hong Kong. The others were already in the back when I got to the taxi and I had to take the front seat. The taxi driver gestured not to put the belt on but I insisted. It was only when I got out I noticed the black diagonal stripe across my white shirt....
But I'll take that as the shirt washed just fine, and is far preferable to a face full of windscreen

I’ve been known to put my seatbelt on just to drive out of my garage! I feel naked without it.

On several occasions I’ve found myself in the uncomfortable position of being in a taxi overseas that didn’t have working seatbelts. Brown trousers become essential and white knuckles the inevitable consequence.

Probably the most worrying incident was whilst being driven away from a hotel in Kenya. I couldn’t get my seatbelt to pull out of the pillar, then I turned round to see if my wife and daughter in the back were having any more success. I landed up in their laps because my seat wasn’t fixed to the floor!

 

[BTB 500]

A mate of mine who is old enough to know better never wears a seat belt if he can get away with it , he drives a Transit van and on the very (odd) occasion I have been in it with him I can not click my seatbelt because he has one of those thick nylon seat covers on and he has not slit the part where the seatbelt buckle comes through.

We've always had seat covers in the Vito (double plus single in the front), and they've all come with slots for the buckles??

 

[BTB 500]

On several occasions I’ve found myself in the uncomfortable position of being in a taxi overseas that didn’t have working seatbelts. Brown trousers become essential and white knuckles the inevitable consequence.

The company (large multinational) I worked for until retiring 4 years ago had someone killed overseas in a taxi crash ... it was considered likely he'd have been OK if he'd had a belt on. It became a disciplinary offence not to wear a belt in any vehicle (private or hire) when travelling on business. Everybody globally was issued a credit card size fold-out leaflet in multiple languages explaining this and also the fact that we wouldn't travel in the cab if the driver used his phone at any time (this was a disciplinary offence for employees too, even in countries/states where it was legal). Conference calls always started with a reminder that anyone who was driving must hang up immediately.

 

[markjay]

I have witnessed two separate accidents where young people were badly injured because they weren't wearing their seatbelts. They would have probably been unharmed if they did.

The first was a young girl, she must have been a teenager who just got her permit, and as her car approached a bend in the road she continued straight on and hit a parked van (she said she was tuning the radio and wasn't looking at the road), she was thrown forward through the windscreen, her body hit the side of the van, and she then fell back into her car with her leg in a very unnatural position, sadly.

The second time was a car in a supermarket car park, that accelerated out of control and collided with a parked car, the front passenger seat was occupied by a young boy of around 10 years old, who smashed the windscreen with his head and was later taken to hospital by an ambulance.

 

[TC350]

The company (large multinational) I worked for until retiring 4 years ago had someone killed overseas in a taxi crash ... it was considered likely he'd have been OK if he'd had a belt on. It became a disciplinary offence not to wear a belt in any vehicle (private or hire) when travelling on business. Everybody globally was issued a credit card size fold-out leaflet in multiple languages explaining this and also the fact that we wouldn't travel in the cab if the driver used his phone at any time (this was a disciplinary offence for employees too, even in countries/states where it was legal). Conference calls always started with a reminder that anyone who was driving must hang up immediately.

The very large multinational I worked for didn't appear to give a sh1t about any of us overseas. They just left us to it. One of my colleagues was shot dead during a carjack in Nigeria and another had to find his own way out of Somalia with rebels shooting at him at the start of one of their civil wars.

Actually, they did care a bit; I was occasionally supplied with packs of fresh plasma to take with me when travelling to countries with not so good blood transfusion facilities - just in case! Not too reassuring.

 

[190]

30% of car crashes occur less than 1 mile from home,

If any of those crashes involve taking kids to school then many of them shouldn't have been driving there in the first place. When we walk our grandkids to primary school we see other kids being driven as little as 0.25 miles to school, then causing chaos illegally parking near the school gates when they get there. To add insult to injury and also illegal, some park up for 10 mins with the engine running as hundreds of little kids file past them. No surprise that those sort of selfish ignorant people have crashes.

 

[BTB 500]

The very large multinational I worked for didn't appear to give a sh1t about any of us overseas. They just left us to it. One of my colleagues was shot dead during a carjack in Nigeria and another had to find his own way out of Somalia with rebels shooting at him at the start of one of their civil wars.

A few of my colleagues had done short stints in Nigeria ... not a great place to be, but the remuneration was tempting I think. I don't recall anything bad happening in the 30+ years I worked for the company but they did take security pretty seriously. Someone I knew (coincidentally, an ex-schoolfriend) was involved in an RTA there in which a local unfortunately died - he was taken out of the country in a matter of hours, just in case.

 

[190]

How times have changed for the better on seat belts, I never drive without a seat belt and we wouldn't be allowed to transport our grandkids without the correct child seats or booster seats. I was told the 190e had to go because it didn't have isofix.

65 years ago things were different. I was one of 5 children so including mum and dad that's 7 in the car. Dad had a Ford Zephyr with a bench seat in the front and a column gear change, so 3 fitted easily in the front and 4 in the back. Some how we all survived unscathed. Even 3 kids is an expensive challenge these days if you try to find a car with 3 sets of isofix in the back.

 

[BTB 500]

If any of those crashes involve taking kids to school then many of them shouldn't have been driving there in the first place. When we walk our grandkids to primary school we see other kids being driven as little as 0.25 miles to school, then causing chaos illegally parking near the school gates when they get there. To add insult to injury and also illegal, some park up for 10 mins with the engine running as hundreds of little kids file past them. No surprise that those sort of selfish ignorant people have crashes.

I used to walk my son to primary school (half a mile away), and on the way we went past a number of other parents (who obviously lived closer) loading their kids into cars. We always got there before they did.

 

[TC350]

I used to walk my son to primary school (half a mile away), and on the way we went past a number of other parents (who obviously lived closer) loading their kids into cars. We always got there before they did.

My daughter walks the 1.3 miles to her primary school every day. Her journey is mostly on footpaths well away from the 1.5 mile road route, so no sign of other kids travelling by car - until she gets to school and sees those who mostly live closer.