Road safety: UK set to adopt vehicle speed limiters from 2022

Mr Bump said:
I never said it does, in the motorway scenario an HGV is limited to is it 56mph: so even if a car was capped at 70mph there is plenty to get past it.
my point was simply in the real world of single track roads, the fastest car is the slowest car.
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Really? Limited to 56 you think, daily I see hgv doing more than that.
 
AgentOrange76 said:
I would question why with so little road left before you wished to exit you chose to overtake a lorry doing 60mph instead of staying in lane.
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In my example I would be in lane 2 a decent distance back from the lorry and be doing 70, gaining on said lorry with plenty of time to get past and back in again. As I get close to him he accelerates to 70 and despite the assertion that hgv/coaches are limited to 56 I beg to disagree, now I can't get past so have to drop back in with plenty of time left to do so. However drivers on the motorways I use will rarely let you back in, so the solution is to momentarily exceed the speed limit by say 5 or so mph and drop in front of the other vehicle with plenty of distance before the slip road. Speed limiters will make that impossible and dropping back, assuming you don't have someone on your bumper will be all bar impossible on the exceptionally busy motorways down south, it might be a good idea on French empty motorways but in parts of the UK it will be dreadful.
 
ecoleman said:
I see a glaring issue here.

We’ve already been told that we won’t have access to Galileo when we brexit. So no problems then.
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gman said:
Perhaps an interesting part will be the use of Galileo or not for the UK. The last I heard the EU were being infantile with regard to sharing it with the UK (despite our considerable investment and input, but I'm sure the anti-UK flock will arrive and defend the EU here). I presume the systems will be able to communicate will both GPS networks, if Galileo does end up fully operational and reliable.
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But one can still hope! :)
 
jonneymendoza said:
Better idea would be to ban driving in cities period!
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I'm glad I don't live in a city but I do occasionally have to go to one and wherever I am I'm often pushing a wheelchair and whilst young and able bodied people might be able to get along without a car it's often very difficult and sometimes pretty much impossible to get by without one. And of course there are many people who can get about without a wheelchair who have pretty limited mobility. For those with limited or indeed no mobility door to door transport is often pretty much the only way they can get out and without it their world gets ever smaller.

The UK seems to be getting ever more anti car and this causes me real problems when I'm trying to get someone in a wheelchair about. There are already places I just can't go to with wheelchair bound anymore and I can only see that increasing and things getting more expensive as we get ever more anti private car.
 
woof woof said:
I'm glad I don't live in a city but I do occasionally have to go to one and wherever I am I'm often pushing a wheelchair and whilst young and able bodied people might be able to get along without a car it's often very difficult and sometimes pretty much impossible to get by without one. And of course there are many people who can get about without a wheelchair who have pretty limited mobility. For those with limited or indeed no mobility door to door transport is often pretty much the only way they can get out and without it their world gets ever smaller.

The UK seems to be getting ever more anti car and this causes me real problems when I'm trying to get someone in a wheelchair about. There are already places I just can't go to with wheelchair bound anymore and I can only see that increasing and things getting more expensive as we get ever more anti private car.
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Not so much anti car matey, more anti pollution.
Cities and town centres are becoming so polluted something has to be done to improve the lives and health of people.
The diesel damage alone is just catastrophic.
 
Busses don't pollute? Odd how the dirtiest air here is collected on the High Street which is ONLY accessible to busses and pedestrians. Lob in the fact that the busses have to make their journeys even if there are no passengers and you have several trips of big, smelly trucks doing nothing but clog up the roads and lungs. Petrol cars are as polluting as (modern) Diesels, as someone's been told many, many times.
 
Mr Bump said:
Not so much anti car matey, more anti pollution.
Cities and town centres are becoming so polluted something has to be done to improve the lives and health of people.
The diesel damage alone is just catastrophic.
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The Govt could always just ban diesels. Completely. They're already doing ULEZ in London.
Nod said:
Busses don't pollute? Odd how the dirtiest air here is collected on the High Street which is ONLY accessible to busses and pedestrians.
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I'd have thought buses were perfectly suited to become electric vehicles.

I've always said that if you really want zero human fatalities, nuke the planet. The deaths in the first year will be astronomical but after that there will be zero fatalities. Y'know - because everyone's already dead.
 
Mr Bump said:
Not so much anti car matey, more anti pollution.
Cities and town centres are becoming so polluted something has to be done to improve the lives and health of people.
The diesel damage alone is just catastrophic.
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Latest diesels are cleaner than your petrol car.
 
woof woof said:
I'm glad I don't live in a city but I do occasionally have to go to one and wherever I am I'm often pushing a wheelchair and whilst young and able bodied people might be able to get along without a car it's often very difficult and sometimes pretty much impossible to get by without one. And of course there are many people who can get about without a wheelchair who have pretty limited mobility. For those with limited or indeed no mobility door to door transport is often pretty much the only way they can get out and without it their world gets ever smaller.

The UK seems to be getting ever more anti car and this causes me real problems when I'm trying to get someone in a wheelchair about. There are already places I just can't go to with wheelchair bound anymore and I can only see that increasing and things getting more expensive as we get ever more anti private car.
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Yea i was only kidding. I love driving. The independence of it and comfort. My parents use to drive me everywhere in london back in the day. We use to even drive and park up in Oxford circus Central London easily. O the good old days..

I hate public transport. I'd rather drive or cycle
 
Mr Bump said:
Not so much anti car matey, more anti pollution.
Cities and town centres are becoming so polluted something has to be done to improve the lives and health of people.
The diesel damage alone is just catastrophic.
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Well matey, some of the anti pollution measures have been shown to produce more pollution. Some examples of traffic calming and light phasing for example which don't do a good job of calming or controlling traffic and only succeed in heightening pollution and making driving private cars more problematic in the very areas you're talking about. And then there's more overt anti car measures which seem to serve no environmental purpose what so ever. Light phasing and traffic calming again and seemingly perfectly safe places to park being double yellow lined. I'm all for protecting the environment. No argument there and maybe it's different where you live but in my little world I could show you example after example of measures that serve no discernable purpose other than to make driving and parking private cars much more of a PITA. Even in these days when we're supposed to be more aware of the more special needs of some in our community it does often seem to me that restricting private car use is sometimes the priority.
 
One good thing with speed limiter is forcing people to drive at constant speed.

Motorway phantom congestion are usually caused by people changing their speed for no good reason. But in average speed checked 50mph zones, road flow much better because everyone is keeping their eye on the speedo. Artificial limit will make sure no one drives on the motorway at 70-80mph according to their whim.

But other side of the coin is inability to overtake safely. For example someone who unknowingly slowed down to 50mph on single lane road. You try to overtake but the numpty realises his speed drift and speeds up to speed limit. You are then stuck on the wrong side of the road unable to pull back in.

woof woof said:
I'm glad I don't live in a city but I do occasionally have to go to one and wherever I am I'm often pushing a wheelchair and whilst young and able bodied people might be able to get along without a car it's often very difficult and sometimes pretty much impossible to get by without one. And of course there are many people who can get about without a wheelchair who have pretty limited mobility. For those with limited or indeed no mobility door to door transport is often pretty much the only way they can get out and without it their world gets ever smaller.

The UK seems to be getting ever more anti car and this causes me real problems when I'm trying to get someone in a wheelchair about. There are already places I just can't go to with wheelchair bound anymore and I can only see that increasing and things getting more expensive as we get ever more anti private car.
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Hear hear!

Pushing a baby buggy on public transport is also less than ideal.

January, we pushed our baby to a hospital appointment in UCLH. No step free tube/train station anywhere near where we live North London. It was pouring down, but had to push back to King's Cross because Euston Square east bound doesn't have step free access.

February was his day surgery. We were told best to not take baby on public transport after operation in-case of vomiting and such. I drove my Leaf EV to a car park JUST outside the congestion zone, 10min away from hospital. It was quicker and much less stress with the buggy.

We'll likely drive to the same car park if we need to go anywhere around that area. Traffic was not as bad as I thought. Despite my diesel will not be exempt, I'm looking forward to ULEZ expanding, because hopefully there'll be even less traffic when I'm driving my EV into central London :D
 
jonneymendoza said:
Yea i was only kidding. I love driving. The independence of it and comfort. My parents use to drive me everywhere in london back in the day. We use to even drive and park up in Oxford circus Central London easily. O the good old days..

I hate public transport. I'd rather drive or cycle
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In London and some other big cities it's perfectly feasible for many with good mobility to live without a car. Where I live it's 10 minutes walk to the nearest bus stop and it's not easy pushing a wheelchair and there's the difficulty of getting on and off buses and trains are no better. Plus there are time limitations with public transport. Cycling has major limitations due to distance, weather and the amount of stuff you can take. I've never had a job I could have done using public transport or by cycling and even something as simple as shopping can effectively rule out public transport especially if you're also managing a push or wheel chair. Taxis have their own issue.

All in all my life would be very difficult, more limited and more expensive without the use of a private car and I do wish that our decision makers would consider the world outside of able bodied life in London a little more.

Having said all that I don't think that speed limiters will affect me so I'm not really too bothered about this latest scheme and in fact it could make life a little better as I live in a 20mph limit which people often drive through at 50mph+. If only there was a way of including motorbikes in this :D
 
Quote from relative who's a police driver in the traffic department: "Speed not only kills but it often kills or injures the innocent bystanders".
 
wuyanxu said:
One good thing with speed limiter is forcing people to drive at constant speed.

Motorway phantom congestion are usually caused by people changing their speed for no good reason. But in average speed checked 50mph zones, road flow much better because everyone is keeping their eye on the speedo. Artificial limit will make sure no one drives on the motorway at 70-80mph according to their whim.

But other side of the coin is inability to overtake safely. For example someone who unknowingly slowed down to 50mph on single lane road. You try to overtake but the numpty realises his speed drift and speeds up to speed limit. You are then stuck on the wrong side of the road unable to pull back in.


Hear hear!

Pushing a baby buggy on public transport is also less than ideal.

January, we pushed our baby to a hospital appointment in UCLH. No step free tube/train station anywhere near where we live North London. It was pouring down, but had to push back to King's Cross because Euston Square east bound doesn't have step free access.

February was his day surgery. We were told best to not take baby on public transport after operation in-case of vomiting and such. I drove my Leaf EV to a car park JUST outside the congestion zone, 10min away from hospital. It was quicker and much less stress with the buggy.

We'll likely drive to the same car park if we need to go anywhere around that area. Traffic was not as bad as I thought. Despite my diesel will not be exempt, I'm looking forward to ULEZ expanding, because hopefully there'll be even less traffic when I'm driving my EV into central London :D
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Even little things that aren't really noticeable to the able bodied unencumbered can make a huge difference, for example uneven pavements and difficulty getting off the pavement and crossing roads with push/wheel chairs.

I have a small folding chair that fits in a holdall that I can carry on and off transport etc but the wheels are necessarily small and it's just unusable in some areas due to uneven surfaces, pot holes etc and the difficulty of getting up and down curbs. I have a larger and much heavier chair with larger wheels but I can only carry it for short distances and neither chair will fit in some spaces on public transport. When shopping I can't carry a basket or bag or push an ordinary trolley whilst pushing the chair and not everywhere has wheelchair friendly trolleys / kit so I really need pretty much door to destination transport which is chair friendly.
 
woof woof said:
Well matey, some of the anti pollution measures have been shown to produce more pollution. Some examples of traffic calming and light phasing for example which don't do a good job of calming or controlling traffic and only succeed in heightening pollution and making driving private cars more problematic in the very areas you're talking about. And then there's more overt anti car measures which seem to serve no environmental purpose what so ever. Light phasing and traffic calming again and seemingly perfectly safe places to park being double yellow lined. I'm all for protecting the environment. No argument there and maybe it's different where you live but in my little world I could show you example after example of measures that serve no discernable purpose other than to make driving and parking private cars much more of a PITA. Even in these days when we're supposed to be more aware of the more special needs of some in our community it does often seem to me that restricting private car use is sometimes the priority.
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yes that is right because the same old people keep trying to fit the same square peg into a round hole.
Cars that burn fuel produce pollution, put loads of them in a confined space and you get a pollution hotspot.
You cannot have fuel burning cars in city centres anymore, it is really that simple.

i appreciate that certain sectors of society have different needs but when i wander round say Leeds most of the people driving through the city centre are not those people with those needs they are simply lazy people that we are pandering to.
 
omens said:
The Govt could always just ban diesels. Completely. They're already doing ULEZ in London.

I'd have thought buses were perfectly suited to become electric vehicles.
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York near me 21 Electric buses coming this year.
 
Mr Bump said:
yes that is right because the same old people keep trying to fit the same square peg into a round hole.
Cars that burn fuel produce pollution, put loads of them in a confined space and you get a pollution hotspot.
You cannot have fuel burning cars in city centres anymore, it is really that simple.
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Which shows how little you know about modern internal combustion engines and Euro 6.2 emissions.
 
nilagin said:
Which shows how little you know about modern internal combustion engines and Euro 6.2 emissions.
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I don't understand..... Mr Bump appears to be suggesting cars burning fuel in city centre is bad because of the tailpipe emissions in a confined area resulting in pollution hotspots. You are suggesting Euro 6.2 emission standard cars used in that way is not bad? because....... there are no tailpipe emissions???

Your logic is very strange...... because emission standard by definition would mean the car has harmful emission that must be restricted to an agreed standard.

:exit:
 
omens said:
I'd have thought buses were perfectly suited to become electric vehicles.
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We have a limited number around here, as I posted elsewhere,
A poster on the back of a local bus "I'm sorry that I'm not electric, but I'm here for you, while my brothers and sisters are charging"
Seriously?
:lol:
 
wuyanxu said:
I don't understand..... Mr Bump appears to be suggesting cars burning fuel in city centre is bad because of the tailpipe emissions in a confined area resulting in pollution hotspots. You are suggesting Euro 6.2 emission standard cars used in that way is not bad? because....... there are no tailpipe emissions???

Your logic is very strange...... because emission standard by definition would mean the car has harmful emission that must be restricted to an agreed standard.

:exit:
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Euro 6 ( pre Sept. 18)cars are 96% cleaner than a 1992 car when catalytic converters were first made compulsory. Post Sept 18 cars are even cleaner still.
In recent tests by ADAC (German equivalent of the AA) some Euro 6.2 diesel vehicles were found to be producing almost 0mg/km particulates at the tailpipe. Most cars being 8 times cleaner than the emissions standard.
 
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wuyanxu said:
But in average speed checked 50mph zones, road flow much better because everyone is keeping their eye on the speedo.
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Having lived with the m3 smart motorway roadwork abortion for god knows how many years... Disagree.
AndrewFlannigan said:
recklessness not only kills but it often kills or injures the innocent bystanders
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Fyp
 
neil_g said:
Having lived with the m3 smart motorway roadwork abortion for god knows how many years... Disagree.
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Other than where there are workmen or narrower lanes due to work being carried out, I have found that the reduced speed limits on motorways just creates congestion.

I am intrigued to know why speed limits are always a round number, why 50mph and not 55mph etc? That extra 5mph can make a lot of difference to easing the congestion caused by the speed reduction, yet still be safe.
 
We have electric buses around this area, and on the original topic I'm lead to believe that these cars will not be limited to the advertised speed but inform the driver of the setting, so if you wish to go quicker push the throttle and it will exceed the speed limit for that road.
 
mj4456 said:
We have electric buses around this area, and on the original topic I'm lead to believe that these cars will not be limited to the advertised speed but inform the driver of the setting, so if you wish to go quicker push the throttle and it will exceed the speed limit for that road.
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Aye with a black box that will no doubt be hooked up to the police so they can fire out automatic speeding fines! I did read that it was going to be an introductory system with full restriction to follow in subsequent years. Who knows....
 
The reason that there are too many vehicles (and too much of countless other problems) is that there are far too many people. Reducing vehicles etc. only addresses (for a short while only) the symptoms of the problem that will eventually consume the planet. Why is over population not being tackled ?
 
Mr Bump said:
According to DVLA it is actually 60 but most HGV operators limit there vehicles to 56/58 for fuel efficency

https://www.gov.uk/speed-limits
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All hgvs are legally limited to 56mph, no exceptions. An operator can limit to lower if they wish for fuel efficiency. However the legal speed limit on motorways for hgvs is actually 60mph.. go figure.
You may find our eastern cousins have found methods to override the limiter and go everywhere at 70mph though.
 
TCR4x4 said:
All hgvs are legally limited to 56mph, no exceptions. An operator can limit to lower if they wish for fuel efficiency. However the legal speed limit on motorways for hgvs is actually 60mph.. go figure.
You may find our eastern cousins have found methods to override the limiter and go everywhere at 70mph though.
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Glad you added that, I was beginning to think my speedo needed checking. Lots of lorries and coaches seem to be doing at least 60 if not more, I know coaches are allowed to do 70 which seems a bit odd.
 
arclight said:
The reason that there are too many vehicles (and too much of countless other problems) is that there are far too many people. Reducing vehicles etc. only addresses (for a short while only) the symptoms of the problem that will eventually consume the planet. Why is over population not being tackled ?
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It's just a guess but in the UK I would probably put cheap access to cars via PCP as the main reason for there being so many vehicles on the road. I'm sure when I was younger it was not a common sight to see a brand new car but now they are everywhere. I suspect used cars may make a major comeback post-2021.

As for population growth in the UK, I did read that 55% of the growth is due to net migration between 1991 and 2016 and whether or not there is a related issue of larger families and exponential growth I don't know. People living longer will be a pretty major factor also I suspect.

Globally, again people living longer probably has had a fair impact on things also which can also tie in with net migration because according to the UN because it is expected that people migrating to safer and more developed areas will live longer. They have also backed up predictions that of the estimated 2.4 billion people to be added to the global population to 2050 more than half will have occurred in Africa. Whether this is down to better living conditions and healthcare, poor education or due to the more horrific reasons which we can certainly guess.
 
There are a lot more cars on the road for sure, young people now pretty much all have a PCP car its not unusual now for a lot of families to have 3 or 4 cars.
 
Mr Bump said:
There are a lot more cars on the road for sure, young people now pretty much all have a PCP car its not unusual now for a lot of families to have 3 or 4 cars.
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I remember a time when you either needed to save up or get a loan to buy a car. There were fewer cars and fewer new ones than now. I now see a lot more people with a lot more cars, chopping and changing every three years or so. It's more like renting a car than owning one.

Then again, I bought my Golf on PCP because the repayment was better than a loan. I've still got it 12 years on.
 
Mr Bump said:
There are a lot more cars on the road for sure, young people now pretty much all have a PCP car its not unusual now for a lot of families to have 3 or 4 cars.
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Does it matter whether a young person has a car on pcp. If they want a car they will have one regardless of whether it is on pcp or not. I know several 20-30yr olds with older 2nd hand cars and a new car on pcp. But regardless of how many cars someone has they can only drive one at a time. We are a 3 car family. But right now only one of them is "on the road" and that is parked at the kerb. The other two are in car parks. So it doesn't really matter how many cars people have.
 
gman said:
It's just a guess but in the UK I would probably put cheap access to cars via PCP as the main reason for there being so many vehicles on the road. I'm sure when I was younger it was not a common sight to see a brand new car but now they are everywhere. I suspect used cars may make a major comeback post-2021.
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I can remember seeing lots of new cars as a kid in the 60's. Just about everyone in our road had new cars, some changing them more often than others.
As for pcp, that will ensure there will be a plentiful supply of used cars should people want one. I won't have a problem buying a speed restricted car, it won't have any bearing on how quick you reach that speed limit.
 
nilagin said:
I can remember seeing lots of new cars as a kid in the 60's. Just about everyone in our road had new cars, some changing them more often than others.
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Lol ok then.
 
gman said:
I'm sure when I was younger it was not a common sight to see a brand new car but now they are everywhere. I suspect used cars may make a major comeback post-2021.
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Totally agree with this (y)
(and I'm a older than both of you ;) )

nilagin said:
I can remember seeing lots of new cars as a kid in the 60's.
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Seriously? how old are you again?
 
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