399 road deaths in 2005 leave us the worst in Europe

boardy

"IRELAND is the only major developed economy in Europe where motoring casualties are on the rise." - From the Irish Independent today.

One word will fix this problem:

Enforcement.

Hobbes

They need to enforce a lot of things though.

- L plates.
- Tax + Insurance (which they do somewhat).

I would also go as far as to boost up the premiums on current drivers until they sit and pass the exam again and have it expire every 3 years. They already lower your premiums for taking the advanced driving test.

Ireland just has a lot of piss poor drivers. Not sure about deaths but there are accidents nearly daily on the M50.

mike65

We are not the worst in Europe, go to Portugal for that! We are bad no question but this subject has been beaten to death many times over.

We all know the solutions, the government knows the solutions but cant be arsed to do what needs doing cos 400 people are'nt getting killed in a single crash. One here, two there is apparently okay by them (and us, after all we're the idiots actually driving).

Mike.

boardy

mike65 wrote:

....but this subject has been beaten to death many times over.

Mike.

I understand Mike, but now it's official ..... we are horrible drivers.
From my experience driving in foreign countries, it was second nature for native drivers to drive lawfully, otherwise they would get a ticket in the mail or stopped by the traffic corps and issued a substantial penalty.

Driving in Melbourne recently, the backseat drivers were continuously telling me to drive within the stated speed limits or the car's owner would get a ticket. Even my insistence that I was only going a couple kilometers above the limit wasn't a sufficient argument.

Most of the time when driving from Cork to Limerick, I seldom see any presence of a Guard on the road. And if there is a Guard, between the flashing of the flights to warn us and the knowledge that we can speed with impunity after the speed check is laughable.

Regarding the enforcement of L-plates, tax and insurance:
maybe it would help, but what we need is an inherent 'fear' of breaking traffic laws.

mike65

I just realised this topic should be in commuting/transport really.

Mike.

boardy

Wasn't quite sure where it should have been posted.

I figured since it dealt with death and carnage, and changing our perceptions ...... Humanities would be a good spot for it.

But feel free to move though.

Sleepy

It might help if we sped up the process of modernising our road network. I assume this is why the government is so happy to hand our public infrastructure to the toll-road companies in the middle of a boom economy. Or am I giving them too much credit?

Gilgamesh

kind of agree with sleepy.
imho I think a big factor is the quality of our roads in comparison to germany for example.
the patchworking they do here is an absolute joke.
travel up the N2 on a regular basis, you always see workers filling craters (not potholes anymore) with tar, and then bang, two days later that crater is back.
I think they should invest a larger amount of Dosh into the modernisation of the streets.
but hey, it's more important to have pretty buildings than safe roads

boardy

Put one relative of each of the 399 victims into an open area and focus the camera on the face of one person. Then zoom out from a height to see the enormity of the devastation.

Then pan to another open area to see another 400 people, waiting to be victims for the coming year.

Graphic ads on TV doesn’t appear to be working, so maybe this one might.
Improving the infrastructure would indeed help, but I still believe that enforcement is the key.

CJhaughey

What the problem consists of is a surfeit of cars and people that have no clue on the rules of the road, couple this with a substandard road network and inadequate enforcement and you end up with the current situation.
I don't see any evidence of pretty buildings here either.

Dades

Any stats available within that 399 figure? As in how many can be attributed to drink, speed, tiredness etc. or just plain stupidity?

And how many of us are willing to have speed limitors or ignition-connected breathalysers put in our cars? That would surly prevent most deaths.

BigCon

Is it only me or do a large percentage (at a guess 50%) of these deaths occur at the weekends, in the early hours of the morning?

It would be interesting to see exactly what percentage of these crashes that drink played a part.

Definatly agree that enforcement is necessary. You take any village or town in Ireland at midnight on any given Saturday night - the streets are full of cars, the driver of the majority of these are in the pubs drinking (I can't prove this, but know it from personal experience).
The guards need to target a random town/village each weekend and test each and every driver for alcohol between say 11pm and 3am.
This would see a huge decrease in drink driving and hopefully a reduction in the road deaths.

I also think that driving safety/skills sohuld be added to the school curriculum, a lot of poor driving is plain ignorance where the drivers just don't know any better...

Join us next week for the rant on the poor road design and how it's also responsible for many of the deaths.:)

Dman_15

The Atheist wrote:

Any stats available within that 399 figure? As in how many can be attributed to drink, speed, tiredness etc. or just plain stupidity?

And how many of us are willing to have speed limitors or ignition-connected breathalysers put in our cars? That would surly prevent most deaths.

You dont even need figures.
You can bet the majority were saturday and sunday mornings between 12 midnight and 6am. Mostly males ages 18-25. Therein lies the problem

Gilgamesh

get rid of the L plates and send people to decent driving schools as a requirement

kirving

boardy wrote:

.... but what we need is an inherent 'fear' of breaking traffic laws.

Thats exactly what we need, huge fines for speeding (government subsidised speed limitors would be nice too), really drunk drivers should have their picture displayed on tv ads along with famailies of people killed by drunken drives.:eek:

Dades

Kevin Irving wrote:

Thats exactly what we need, huge fines for speeding (government subsidised speed limitors would be nice too), really drunk drivers should have their picture displayed on tv ads along with famailies of people killed by drunken drives.:eek:

Problem is people already know the potentially terrible consequences of drink driving. No-one can ignore the recent spate of ads or general media coverage. But false confidence causes people to ignore their conscience.

I think fear of being caught is a more realistic fear. And the only way to do this is to start catching enough serial offenders that people are no longer so sure they can get away with it.

Sleepy

I don't think Ads will ever make a significant change to our driving behaviour, boardy.

We need to tackle this problem from a number of angles:

1. Ensuring people have adequate driving skills before allowing them on the road. A secondary school driving course consisting of an hour a week in 5th year and Leaving Cert, provided by properly licensed driving instructors (unlike our currently unregulated driving instruction industry) could easily be timetabled (take an hour from the less useful subjects timetables, maybe Irish or Religious Instruction) and would certainly have a quickly noticeable impact on the road-death statistics of young men with provisional licences. Obviously, this would be expensive to provide for every student in the secondary school education system so perhaps it could be funded (at least in part) by the insurance industry who would obviously stand to gain from reduced numbers of car crashes (remember, the 399 deaths only represent a small number of all crashes for 2005).

This should be coupled with a thorough overhaul of the driving test itself. By the very fact it tests one's ability to reverse around a corner (which is of limited use in the real world) but not one's ability to parallel park (a daily task for most modern drivers) it can be clearly seen to be out of touch with reality.

2. Ensuring that people have safe roads to drive on. Given our booming economy and the ready availability of cheap, efficient labour from Eastern Europe our Government has no excuse for not investing heavily in our transport infrastructure. And, while the issue of Toll Roads is a whole other debate, I don't think this is the answer.

3. Finally enforcement, and I put this last for a reason. Only when people know how to drive properly and have safe roads to drive on, is it fair to come down hard on those who drive unsafely. Obviously, offences like drink-driving can be clamped down upon immediately and personally, I love BigCon's idea of a random town or village being thoroughly checked every weekend (though some level of monitoring would need to be kept up in other towns across the country too).

So, there you go: a simple 3 step plan to reducing our road-deaths.

Doubt there's a politician in the country sensible enough to implement it though...

jimbling

The Atheist wrote:

Any stats available within that 399 figure? As in how many can be attributed to drink, speed, tiredness etc. or just plain stupidity?

There was an article a few weeks back in the Sunday Independent (i think - I did save it so ill check later). It was all about the rise in road deaths etc. But there was - for the first time I can ever recall seeing - some stats associated with it.

These were not in-depth stats, but just what area was the cause of the crash (ie more so than times and ages etc that Dman is talking about)

What most caught my eye was what the absolutely overriding majority of crashes were caused by.
NOT drink driving
NOT speeding


At the top of the list - at approx. 45% was cars - for whatever reason - been on the wrong side of the road. It was talking about peoples just lack of observation - of falling asleep - of passing out when you shouldn’t etc etc.
Just below that was other driver errors - I think at 30 something.

Speeding was at about 12% and Drink Driving was around there somewhere as well.

YET almost every add and discussion we see or hear is about either speeding or drink driving (note there has been one or two general observation adds - although again it is likely to be of the "one pint decreases your observation" type). The need to build a campaign about actual driving. People dont seem to understand that it is dangerous - WITHOUT SPEEDING OR DRINKING - never mind with.

Im in cars with people all the time - and am amazed how they get through the day without crashing. just complete lack of awareness of whats going on around them. (It was when I started to drive a motorbike I realised how serious this actually is)

The Atheist wrote:

And how many of us are willing to have speed limitors or ignition-connected breathalysers put in our cars? That would surly prevent most deaths.

This, i think is a completely different argument. You kinda have to get into personal freedom etc... very tricky argument. The oppressive state / big brother atmosphere in the world today is already enough, without having these sort of stringent rules and regulations coming into place.

And as well as that, I would hope you can see, from my point above that this would only stop a small minority of the deaths on the road - --- you dont need to be drunk and speeding to kill someone. You need to be either be very unlucky (ie get a puncture on the motorway and skid across the road etc) or do something very stupid - this can include speeding irrationally or drink driving.

Dman_15 wrote:

You dont even need figures.
You can bet the majority were saturday and sunday mornings between 12 midnight and 6am. Mostly males ages 18-25. Therein lies the problem

I'm not so sure about this stat. I know a lot of the young peoples deaths are at night etc, but not sure its the majority.... but I really don't know.

The point I would make about this is - if this is true - then it is less and less likely that the guards can do anything about it. Firstly - there will be far less cops around at this time of night. And it would be impossible to get the manpower to manage it so people actually fear meeting cops at this time. Also you have the problem that most of these crashes are in rural areas on the backroads of our country. This again makes it impossible for cops to manage.


The only solution that i can see, is as said - change the campaign a bit. And START TEACHING PEOPLE HOW TO DRIVE. The current system is a shambles - and I am sure you will find that that is the main reason we have so much deaths on the road. Its peoples carefree mindset.

JackieChan

I see that today a man in Cork and another in Kerry have died in seperate accidents. Are these the first of 2006?

Dades

jimbling wrote:

The only solution that i can see, is as said - change the campaign a bit. And START TEACHING PEOPLE HOW TO DRIVE. The current system is a shambles - and I am sure you will find that that is the main reason we have so much deaths on the road. Its peoples carefree mindset.

Driving, like singing, chess, or golf is something that not everyone can be good at. No matter how much training. Everyone has different levels of spacial ability, concentration, confidence etc. I still think what needs to be tackled are people who flaunt the speed/drink limits.

Sleepy

The Atheist wrote:

Driving, like singing, chess, or golf is something that not everyone can be good at. No matter how much training. Everyone has different levels of spacial ability, concentration, confidence etc. I still think what needs to be tackled are people who flaunt the speed/drink limits.

Even if they only account for 20% of the deaths?

Proper instruction in anything will ensure that the student is better at that task than poor instruction. In Ireland at present there is total absence of licensing, legislation or even guidelines for driving instructors. You don't even need a full driving licenece to set up a school of motoring!

If people haven't the ability to pass a *proper* driving test (i.e. nothing like the current one), they haven't the ability to drive and therefore *shouldn't* be driving.

jimbling

The Atheist wrote:

Driving, like singing, chess, or golf is something that not everyone can be good at. No matter how much training. Everyone has different levels of spacial ability, concentration, confidence etc. I still think what needs to be tackled are people who flaunt the speed/drink limits.

lol, im not a fool atheist, although perhaps i sound it sometimes

of course not everyone will be the exact same level - Some will still be terrible, some will be excellent - but if you can raise the average it will have done more good than a load of extra cops on the road.

And of course we still need to tackle the speed/drink driving problems. I fully support this. My grandmother was killed by a speeding driver and I have a friend who I fight with every weekend I see him having a few pints and driving. But catching people doing 45 in a 40 zone that should probably be 60 anyway is not going to help this. Or someone doing 80 on a motorway. These are the places they generally catch people, not in the places where the accidents happen - for obvious reasons - (ie night time, and country roads)

But people (and politicians) are using these two problems as the whole problem because its easy to blame them. becuase, in these situations its obvious what the problem is, and there is someone to blame other than themselves (the cops/government).

They try and ignore the fact that it is the stupidity and naivity of people that cause the accidents (speeding and drink are two of the stupidities - but there are others)

NEVER will we be rid of deaths on the roads, its an unavoidable result in the use of cars. People die horse riding, people die skiing, people die jogging, people die, people die, people die. What we are talking about is trying to decrease it.


my overall point in the whole thread was that speeding and drink driving DO NOT make up the majority cause of road deaths.

Even if you completely eradicated drink driving and speeding (which of course is impossible) we would still have had 300 deaths this year, and this thread would still exist.


that is all

mike65

Whats most 'interesting' is the high number of deaths which occure in single vehicle crashes. The crash in Kerry this morning 4 guys in a BMW hit wall and one dies, no other car in involved, the driver is 20 years old.

Mike.

Dman_15

jimbling wrote:

But catching people doing 45 in a 40 zone that should probably be 60 anyway is not going to help this.

A pedestrians chance of survival is twice as good, being hit at 30mph as opposed to 35mph

boardy

Sleepy wrote:

I don't think Ads will ever make a significant change to our driving behaviour, boardy.

We need to tackle this problem from a number of angles:

1. Ensuring people have adequate driving skills ....

2. Ensuring that people have safe roads to drive on .......

3. Finally enforcement, ......... personally, I love BigCon's idea of a random town or village being thoroughly checked every weekend (though some level of monitoring would need to be kept up in other towns across the country too).

This looks like a reasonable mandate to me.

Why are the guards not using random breathalyzer tests? I understand that they are considering it. In the States, it is second nature to expect to be breathalyzed while driving.

What annoys me most though is the lack of sufficient prison time for people convicted of drunk driving, which resulted in a death. To me, this is manslaughter at the very least.

JackieChan wrote:

I see that today a man in Cork and another in Kerry have died in seperate accidents. Are these the first of 2006?

Unfortunately, according to the news at 5:30 pm, three people died today from road accidents.

Endurance Man

I think the state of the roads in this country play a huge part in all of this. I have never seen roads in such a bad state, it is as though the road builders where trained by monkeys . Why is it when they fill in a pothole they cant find the energy to try and level out the new tar. Instead they just leave a big bump in the road and move on. I think the pace of road building is also not great, it seems to take months and month to construct 100m of road .

jimbling

Dman_15 wrote:

A pedestrians chance of survival is twice as good, being hit at 30mph as opposed to 35mph

There chance of survival is multiplied to the Nth degree if the person driving is concentrating and avoids hitting them at all.


but this is not what I was talking about - more talking about on some of the jewel carriage ways and some main roads etc.... not villages and school areas. But again i was ONLY making the point that doing what you say will save some lives - fixing the system will save many lives.

Do both if they can - and hopefully will.

jimbling

boardy wrote:

Why are the guards not using random breathalyzer tests? I understand that they are considering it. In the States, it is second nature to expect to be breathalyzed while driving.

There is a problem with it - to do so would break the law. Its infringing on someones privacy. There is talks of changing the legislation to suit.

boardy wrote:

To me, this is manslaughter at the very least.

At the very least? you reckon it could be called murder?

also on this note - if someone falls asleep at the wheel and kills someone - is that murder/manslaugher? Or some kid who passes a car out on a bend? what about the old lady who cant see properly and didnt even see the guy on the bycycle.

It def should be punished, but you can not compare it to one guy beating another to death for eyeing up his girlfriend.

(in saying that, I think the violance crimes are getting off way too easy too, so its just the scale really)

boardy

jimbling wrote:

At the very least? you reckon it could be called murder?

In some countries, it can be classified as 2nd or 3rd degree murder. If a person gets into a car and drives 5 miles to a pub and then kills someone on the way home while drunk, and they admit that they knew they were drunk getting into the car, then there is a certain level of premeditation involved. Hence, a 2nd/3rd degree murder charge.

Dades

Sleepy wrote:

Even if they only account for 20% of the deaths?

The point is I believe they are the only causes that can be realistically tackled.

Where did that 20% spring from BTW? Speed doesn't necessarily mean doing 110mph - it just means fast enough that you can't react. Virtually any situation can be avoided if you go slow enough. I'm dubious that 80% of road deaths had nothing to do with how fast the vehicle was travelling.

Sleepy wrote:

Proper instruction in anything will ensure that the student is better at that task than poor instruction. In Ireland at present there is total absence of licensing, legislation or even guidelines for driving instructors. You don't even need a full driving licenece to set up a school of motoring!

You can raise the bar for the test as high as you like and keep some people off the road - but I don't suspect they are especially the ones that cause road deaths. Retesting everybody every 10 years might solve some problems but this is never going to happen. Will a stricter test slow down the large %'age of young adults who fly around the roads in the middle of the night?

jimbling wrote:

They try and ignore the fact that it is the stupidity and naivity of people that cause the accidents (speeding and drink are two of the stupidities - but there are others)

You can't legislate against stupidity. You can train people how to drive better, but it's not going to prevent them doing stupid things on the road. Once a test is passed people believe they can drive, and will continue to do so whether tired, or distracted by something within or without the car.

boardy wrote:

In some countries, it can be classified as 2nd or 3rd degree murder. If a person gets into a car and drives 5 miles to a pub and then kills someone on the way home while drunk, and they admit that they knew they were drunk getting into the car, then there is a certain level of premeditation involved. Hence, a 2nd/3rd degree murder charge.

At worst, that information is complete rubbish, at best it is bad law on the part of whoever proposed it. There is no premeditation to murder someone unless it is your intent to go out and run someone over.

Sleepy

The Atheist wrote:

The point is I believe they are the only causes that can be realistically tackled.

Where did that 20% spring from BTW? Speed doesn't necessarily mean doing 110mph - it just means fast enough that you can't react. Virtually any situation can be avoided if you go slow enough. I'm dubious that 80% of road deaths had nothing to do with how fast the vehicle was travelling.

I was quoteing the twenty-something percent referred to by jimbling. I'm sure that virtually any situation can be avoided if you go slow enough but frankly, suggesting that everyone drives 30mph regardless of the road they're on is just giving in to tunnel vision.

You can raise the bar for the test as high as you like and keep some people off the road - but I don't suspect they are especially the ones that cause road deaths. Retesting everybody every 10 years might solve some problems but this is never going to happen. Will a stricter test slow down the large %'age of young adults who fly around the roads in the middle of the night?

Why won't retesting everyone every 10 years happen? It's one of the most sensible means of ensuring that only qualified people are allowed to drive. A stricter test, coupled with proper enforcement of current laws requiring that provisional drivers must be accompanied by full licence holders would indeed cut down on the number of idiots on the road. I'm sure people would still drive fast on roads where it was safe to do so, but I, for one, don't see any problem with that.

You can't legislate against stupidity. You can train people how to drive better, but it's not going to prevent them doing stupid things on the road. Once a test is passed people believe they can drive, and will continue to do so whether tired, or distracted by something within or without the car.

You can train people properly so that they're aware their driving ability will be impaired if they drive when tired and alert them to the dangers of allowing themselves to be distracted.

BTW, if you can't legislate against stupidity, what exactly is the purpose of speed limits? Only a stupid person will drive faster than the surrounding conditions make it safe to do so. Strangely, however, many of the speed limits posted around the country are significantly below, or even significantly above a safe speed level to drive at on that given stretch of road.

At worst, that information is complete rubbish, at best it is bad law on the part of whoever proposed it. There is no premeditation to murder someone unless it is your intent to go out and run someone over.

That's why it's second or third degree murder, because while not pre-meditated (or first-degree) murder, your decisions and actions have lead to the death of an innocent party. Personally, I'd consider it a far worse crime to kill someone while drink driving than the simple manslaughter of a driving accident caused by the driver being distracted / swerving to avoid an animal/child. Presumably it was on this grounds that the legislation referred to was based.

jimbling

The Atheist wrote:

The point is I believe they are the only causes that can be realistically tackled.

I just can't agree with you on this point. And please return to my point that even if you eradicated these completely (obv impossible) then you would still have had 300 deaths.

The Atheist wrote:

Where did that 20% spring from BTW?

I presume this comes from my post that 12% of accidents were caused by speeding and another 10 or so by Drink Driving - making approx 20/25%

The Atheist wrote:

Speed doesn't necessarily mean doing 110mph - it just means fast enough that you can't react. Virtually any situation can be avoided if you go slow enough. I'm dubious that 80% of road deaths had nothing to do with how fast the vehicle was travelling.

Naturally this is true - but by this note we can solve the problems by banning driving altogether.

100% of road deaths have something to do with how fast the vehicle was traveling, but when we talk about death caused by speeding we mean that the death would not have happened if this person was driving under the speed limit.

If someone drives around a hairpin corner on a country road (speed limit 60) doing 55. skids - flips the car and ends up dead. This death was not caused by speeding (ie breaking the speed limit). It was caused by inaccurately judging the speed he was safely able to take a corner.

Are we to change the speed limit on every corner... its nonsense - people HAVE to be able to decide for themselves. But people dont seem to know. More and more people are relying on signposts to tell them what to do. Some of the people who dont know are scared and go even slower - and some just dont care and try and find out.

The Atheist wrote:

You can raise the bar for the test as high as you like and keep some people off the road - but I don't suspect they are especially the ones that cause road deaths. Retesting everybody every 10 years might solve some problems but this is never going to happen. Will a stricter test slow down the large %'age of young adults who fly around the roads in the middle of the night?

It is not stricter tests and retesting that is most needed- it is the TEACHING that most requires change.

In saying that the test at the moment is just based on a simple rule book. People learn the rules, pass the test. Driving is more than just rules (and people dont seem to understand these either)

There is a lot of things that can be done to improve the system. Some of them are beginning already - bringing it more into schools - teaching how to drive (in a realistic fashion) / how not to drive - showing them how the deaths are caused / how they are avoided. Teach the destruction.

The Atheist wrote:

You can't legislate against stupidity. You can train people how to drive better, but it's not going to prevent them doing stupid things on the road. Once a test is passed people believe they can drive, and will continue to do so whether tired, or distracted by something within or without the car.

Do you realise that no matter what you do you wont prevent people from drink driving or speeding either? no matter what.

boardy

The Atheist wrote:

At worst, that information is complete rubbish, at best it is bad law on the part of whoever proposed it. There is no premeditation to murder someone unless it is your intent to go out and run someone over.

Would you tell the relatives of the victims it is complete rubbish. And it is not only a 'proposed' law. It is being used extensively. First result on google relating to drunk driving and murder charge:
http://www.al.com/news/mobileregister/index.ssf?/base/news/1133432157291290.xml&coll=3

The premeditation is where you intentionally get into a car while you are drunk.

Dades

I just can't agree with you on this point. And please return to my point that even if you eradicated these completely (obv impossible) then you would still have had 300 deaths.

The problem is you're missing my point which is simply thus: I believe the only area where real improvement can be hoped for is in speeding and drink driving. As long as you allow people drive they will do other stupid, unpredicable things. Hense yes, of course we are left with a lot of road deaths according to your stats. This doesn't mean we ignore everything else - I just can't see too many ideas being effective.

jimbling wrote:

I presume this comes from my post that 12% of accidents were caused by speeding and another 10 or so by Drink Driving - making approx 20/25%

Since everything said so far hinges on your stats, I don't suppose a source other than your previous post is too much to ask?

Would you tell the relatives of the victims it is complete rubbish. And it is not only a 'proposed' law. It is being used extensively. First result on google relating to drunk driving and murder charge:

Calm down people, please! ps We aren't bound by the Alabama Judicial System.

Sleepy wrote:

You can train people properly so that they're aware their driving ability will be impaired if they drive when tired and alert them to the dangers of allowing themselves to be distracted.

In the same way that people are alerted to the dangers of drinking and speeding? Isn't the point that making people aware of the dangers doesn't seem to have much effect?

Sleepy wrote:

BTW, if you can't legislate against stupidity, what exactly is the purpose of speed limits? Only a stupid person will drive faster than the surrounding conditions make it safe to do so.

You are muddying the waters here for no reason.

Sleepy

The Atheist wrote:

In the same way that people are alerted to the dangers of drinking and speeding? Isn't the point that making people aware of the dangers doesn't seem to have much effect?

I think we need to change the way in which we make people aware of the dangers of drink-driving, driving too fast, driving carelessly, not knowing how to react to changing road conditions etc: by providing them with proper driving instruction.

If needs be, this could be extended to the point of getting students pissed, placing them behind the wheel of a car and making them complete an obstacle course where they're in no danger of damaging anyone other than a traffic cone. Extreme maybe, but far more effective than another Fleetwood Mac-scored television ad. I would contend that a proper instruction could be given without the need to go to this extremity though.

You are muddying the waters here for no reason.

jimbling put my argument forth much better than myself - it is not the breaking of speed limits that's to blame for the vast majority of car crashes: it's simply poor driving.

boardy

The Atheist wrote:

Calm down people, please! ps We aren't bound by the Alabama Judicial System.

I am completely relaxed - I am not the one using exclamation marks (meant in jest). Re-reading your previous post just to confirm but you did say that the information I provided was "complete rubbish"? I responded with a link to refute that claim. I was not making up the fact that drunk drivers involved in fatalities are being charged with murder. There are plenty of other examples out there.

Some jurisdictions outside of Ireland initiate murder charges in certain cases of drink driving fatalities. In my humble opinion, it should be a prosecuting option here too.

rubadub

boardy wrote:

Some jurisdictions outside of Ireland initiate murder charges in certain cases of drink driving fatalities. In my humble opinion, it should be a prosecuting option here too.

I was watching oprah (shut up!:o ) the other day and there was a woman in the US done for murder since she didnt use a child seat in a car, she was getting a lift from a friend and the car overturned, her 2 kids fell out and off a 50ft bridge, the baby died and they blame her, not sure if she got a full on sentence for it, but they did say "murder".
There was another guy racing another guy on the road who crashed into a car, he killed the driver who turned out to be his own mother. He was also done for murder and was in prison. (no mention of manslaughter or criminal negligence or something else, just murder)

Dades

boardy wrote:

Some jurisdictions outside of Ireland initiate murder charges in certain cases of drink driving fatalities. In my humble opinion, it should be a prosecuting option here too.

You'll recall I did give two options boardy - rubbish and bad law. I'm therefore surprised to see outside of Ireland it seems to be making headlines in certain jurisdictions. Personally I hope it does not become an option here as I see it as twisting the law. Calling vehicular manslaughter "murder" is dramatic but legislation is a better method of increasing the associated penalties (IMHO). I speak from a purely legal POV (I have an LLB) rather than a victim's POV which I understand is completely different.

Re the question of road deaths statistics, does anyone actually have any? I can't find any that break down the driver/passenger/pedestrian stats. Not that they are particularly relevant here anyway - we'd all surely agree that every area related to road death dererves debate.

jimbling

The Atheist wrote:

The problem is you're missing my point which is simply thus: I believe the only area where real improvement can be hoped for is in speeding and drink driving. As long as you allow people drive they will do other stupid, unpredictable things. Hence yes, of course we are left with a lot of road deaths according to your stats. This doesn't mean we ignore everything else - I just can't see too many ideas being effective.

I am not missing your point at all. That is exactly the way I saw your point. I just happen to disagree with you.

I didn’t post here to say that we shouldn't bother trying to reduce speeding and drink driving.
I posted to show people that these evils are not responsible for all the deaths on the roads (which the vast majority seem to believe). In fact they are not even responsible for the majority. People need to look to themselves to solve the problem. Some will do so, some will ignore it.
I posted to explain my belief that a huge amount would be gained from properly training a nation how to drive. And properly showing people the dangers of driving.


And I started debating with you because you believe that Drink Driving and Speeding are the only causes that can be realistically tackled.

The Atheist wrote:

Since everything said so far hinges on your stats, I don't suppose a source other than your previous post is too much to ask?

Well I did say that it was one of the major papers. You do not have to believe me. Surely someone else here saw it?

Anyhow, I did mean to check which last night, but didn’t actually make it home
Ill find out this evening.

The Atheist wrote:

In the same way that people are alerted to the dangers of drinking and speeding? Isn't the point that making people aware of the dangers doesn't seem to have much effect?

Are you for real. 30 years ago, almost everyone drank and drove. 15 years ago it was still a pretty standard.

It has had a massive effect. It is totally un cool to drink and drive. If you know someone who does it you berate him. The campaign has worked.
We are now at the stage however - where more and more campaigns won't improve it anymore - the people that still do it, just wont learn unless you catch them - and even then it rarely does any good.


Can you understand how much of an impact a campaign (including teaching practices) for the driver errors would have on the other 75% of deaths. I know some people are stupid. But we were all stupid once.
Do you think the nation incabable of learning? Do you think the extra teaching will have no effect on how people drive there cars.

I think that less people will be inclined to drive on when there eyes are shutting. That less people may play with there cd albums while driving. That less people will swivel around checking out some girl they just passed.
the list goes on -

jimbling

Also another thing to note Athiest. Really if you believe that the nothing can be done about all the other causes to road deaths. That would mean they will always be there.

By that logic we really only have 100 road deaths - since all others are un avoidable. - now thats not so bad is it?

Victor

jimbling wrote:

There is a problem with it - to do so would break the law. Its infringing on someones privacy. There is talks of changing the legislation to suit.

Random alcohol testing (perhaps we could extend it to boisterous pedestrians at 4:30am) if you are in a public place driving something that requires a licence - remember licence, not right.

JimmySmith

Its clear something drastic has to be done. The punishment isnt severe enough for drink drivers.

Ban drinking at all for driving.
More roadside breathelyser tests. Anyone caught should be banned for life.
If you are banned and caught again, a massive, and i mean massive €20,000 fine.

Sleepy

Sure, €20,000 is massive to me and probably most of the posters on these boards but all of us have friends or familiy-members to whom that would be a drop in the ocean...

Dades

In the same way that people are alerted to the dangers of drinking and speeding? Isn't the point that making people aware of the dangers doesn't seem to have much effect?

jimbling wrote:

Are you for real. 30 years ago, almost everyone drank and drove. 15 years ago it was still a pretty standard.

It has had a massive effect. It is totally un cool to drink and drive. If you know someone who does it you berate him. The campaign has worked.
We are now at the stage however - where more and more campaigns won't improve it anymore - the people that still do it, just wont learn unless you catch them - and even then it rarely does any good.

Hey you're jumping on my comment here and then make the very same one I was making.

Namely that the current drink drive ad campaigns are falling on deaf ears and that only a real fear of getting caught will change things. Of course things have change since the 70s - but in the last 5/6 years since the ads have started getting graphic things haven't got any better.

Do you think the extra teaching will have no effect on how people drive there cars.

Undoubtably it will have some effect - nobody can talk in absolutes here - but as I've said all along I simply don't believe the effect would be that great. That's just an opinion - you'll be glad to know I'm not the Minister for Transport in disguise.

The problem with our stats is there are so many other factors to take into account like the improving roads, more traffic, the fact that cars get better, the fact that cars get faster... It really is impossible to say where improvements or disprovements in road deaths occur without analysing them in detail.

If you are banned and caught again, a massive, and i mean massive €20,000 fine.

20K is a lot of cash - but thats not the point. People need to be truly afraid that they will get caught. Don't raise the stakes - lower the odds.

jimbling

okay.. I must make an apology to a few people as I am looking at the paper now, and I did misrepresent some figures.

Drink Driving statistics are not mentioned at all - I honestly don't know how I thought they were.

Even though I was using the DD as an example, It honestly does not change my argument. I see drink as just another impairment. I will write out the stats in a moment, and leave it at that. But just to say (as I dont think I've made myself too clear) that my point all along was not to avoid putting more cops on the road, catch more people drink driving / speeding, have harsher punishments for DD.

The only point I was trying to make was that more cops on the road was not the only answer - my belief is that the answer is to increase the awareness / knowledge of the drivers. Teach them properly, test them properly. There will still be deaths, there will still be drunk drivers, there will still be speeders. But I think that this is more important than just throwing more cops at the problem. They are fine for an immediate solution to a permanent problem - but we, as a country, must look at the future.

and for the stats:

Major causes of Fatal collisions in 2004:

40% Wrong side of the road / sleep
26% Other action
13% Exceeded speed limit
12% Drove through stop/yield
9% Improper overtaking
1% Drove through traffic signal

A total of 374 people died in 334 fatal accidents.

35 young drivers (18-24) died - 28 of them male.

70 pedestrian deaths

50 motorcyclists

11 cyclists


What I think is an interesting point is that driving through a stop/yield sign is cause of 12%. almost as much as exceeded speed limit, and more so than improper overtaking.




Another intersting part of the article is the comparison with other countrys

scale as follows:
per 100,000 pop 2003

Sweden: 5.9 (lowest)
UK
Netherlands
Finland
Germany 8.0
Denmark
IRELAND 8.4
France
Italy
Austria
Lux
Spain 12.8
Belgium
Portugal
Greece 19.3

JimmySmith

The Atheist wrote:

20K is a lot of cash - but thats not the point. People need to be truly afraid that they will get caught. Don't raise the stakes - lower the odds.

why not do both?

Victor

JimmySmith wrote:

Anyone caught should be banned for life.
If you are banned and caught again, a massive, and i mean massive €20,000 fine.

In Germany you can fire your crossbow on the main street of a town all day and provided you do not hit anyone, you only have to pay the €25 fine each time.

Increasing the fine in line with incomes may be a possibility, as they do in Finland.

boardy

Good work on the stats Jimbling.

So adding more cops, improving the infrastructure, teaching driver education in school, providing more safe driving ads, increasing fines, and changing the law for a more severe punishment for drink driving fatalites ..... will not make a difference to 40% of the people who will die on Irish roads this year, because they will be asleep at the wheel or driving on the wrong side of the road. That's shocking.

Dades

JimmySmith wrote:

why not do both?

Yeah whatever. Just not only the first one.

Nice juicy stats Jimbling, even if they don't elaborate of the booze element. It's seems people are even stupider than we feared. I wish I could believe that advanced driving instruction would stop people being people. I've driven when tired myself, but in recent years have avoided long motorway drives whenever possible for the simple reason that your life is not in your own hands.

jimbling

The Atheist wrote:

Yeah whatever. Just not only the first one.

Nice juicy stats Jimbling, even if they don't elaborate of the booze element. It's seems people are even stupider than we feared. I wish I could believe that advanced driving instruction would stop people being people. I've driven when tired myself, but in recent years have avoided long motorway drives whenever possible for the simple reason that your life is not in your own hands.

it won't stop people being stupid, but perhaps it will mean they will act stupid just a little less often.

The Atheist wrote:

for the simple reason that your life is not in your own hands.

When, pray tell, do you manage to have your life in your own hands?

boardy

The Atheist wrote:

...... your life is not in your own hands.

That is a good point. My biggest fear on the road is from other road users.