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[...] It is clear that a significant minority of British drivers put their time and their 'needs' above the safety of other road users and pedestrians. In a few decades, the driverless car will be perfected and the driven car must be made obsolete, preferably by law.
Until then the Government and the insurance industry should take radical steps to help residents of rural and urban communities reclaim their neighbourhoods from the lorries, the lunatics - and those Great British Motorists who like toddlers think they can do what they like, and explode with rage and indignation when questioned about it.
Black boxes compulsory in every vehicle, with improved technology that detects speed limit breaking and careless or aggressive driving.
Insurance companies encouraged to hike premiums immediately and punitively as bad driving is revealed.
Insurance companies obliged to hand over to DVLA and / or police all data that reveals traffic offences and dangerous driving.
Legal framework to allow prosecution and driving bans relating to offences revealed by black boxes.
Legal changes to encourage use of dashcam / helmet-cam / CCTV evidence to prosecute motorists.
Comprehensive review of 30mph speed limits, with local consultations on which should be lowered to 20mph.
Limit revs to 3,000rpm on all vehicles - as condition of passing MOT - to cut noise and dangerous acceleration.
Funding for technology that will limit all vehicles automatically to the local speed limit (and in the case of national speed limits, a safe speed for the road conditions); and will prevent heavy goods vehicles from using inappropriate rural and urban roads.
Source: This is Money
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 22 2016, @12:41AM
but, as many have pointed out, this list is a bunch of fucking fascist bullshit!
Seriously, though, we don't need more laws to prevent bad driving--we have enough laws already. I'm in the U.S., in WA state; here's our state's 404-page title of motor vehicle statutes [wa.gov]. And these don't even include DUI or other criminal driving offenses which are in another title!
At least here, we have shitty driving because none of the laws are actually effectively enforced. The only traffic enforcement I've seen local police for the last several years is to sit on the side of the road with a radar gun; since everyone speeds, they usually just pull over every tenth car (or, more probably, cars that look like they're being driven by a minority) and write them a ticket. Occasionally state patrol will announce they're cracking down on left-lane cruising (which is a huge problem here), but I still see people doing it all the time regardless.
Heck, on the radio now I've heard enforcement warnings about texting and driving saying that, it's "dangerous, even at stop lights." Umm, how is it dangerous, exactly? If I'm waiting in a line of cars for two or three light cycles trying to get through an intersection (as will happen every rush hour here), are you really saying that reading something on my phone while I'm stopped is dangerous? Whatever, we all know the goal of this is to allow police to just chill by an intersection for their whole shift and write a ticket to the poor bastard who pulls his phone out in boredom.
Why are the police allowed to half-ass their jobs this much? I regularly see trains of cars tailgating each other at 60mph on the freeway, cars with either improperly adjusted headlights or that just have their high-beams on, grey cars driving with no lights on at all in the pouring rain, last-minute lane changes across multiple lanes of traffic, speeding up to block merging traffic, failure to yield to emergency vehicles, etc., and the police are nowhere to be found, probably too busy writing speeding tickets. Please, pull these people over and fine them harshly--you guys have dash cams which should make proving their actions easy, right?
If it were up to me, I'd seriously consider abolishing speed limits, since the police have shown they can't effectively prioritize enforcement of the actually dangerous offenses when they have easy offenses available to them.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday August 22 2016, @06:08PM
Unfortunately I'm out of mod points for the day :P
While this argument is particularly true for driving, it also applies to a number of other legal areas in the U.S.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"