guard speed camera in phoenix park

burnedfaceman

i was driving home today at 3 o clock and seen there was a garda car parked on far side of roundabout parked slyly between two cars, as I was driving past i seen one of guards had a speed camera out the back window trying to catch people speeding. the speed limit is 40 km/h in park which is ridiculus. have the gardai nothing better to be doing with their time than petty crap like this??

skywalker

stick it up on http://www.irishspeedtraps.com/

biko

and http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=474

burnedfaceman

done

Mossy Monk

burnedfaceman wrote:

the speed limit is 40 km/h in park which is ridiculus

Stay within the speed limit and you shouldn't have a problem.

Judt

burnedfaceman wrote:

i was driving home today at 3 o clock and seen there was a garda car parked on far side of roundabout parked slyly between two cars, as I was driving past i seen one of guards had a speed camera out the back window trying to catch people speeding. the speed limit is 40 km/h in park which is ridiculus. have the gardai nothing better to be doing with their time than petty crap like this??

Have the gardai nothing better to do than catch speeding people?

Err.


The reason why the speed limit is so "low" in the Park (though watch what your Ford Mondeo can do to a person at 15km/h.....) is because it's full of pedestrians and wildlife. It makes perfect sense - just because you have a long straight road doesn't mean it should be a motorway.

This is real Irish... We complain and complain about road accidents and then we complain and complain about the Garda Traffic Corps. If the speed limit is 40km/h then it's 40, and you obey it. All drivers think they're the special one to whom no accident can happen. If you get caught speeding, then you've been caught speeding. If you kill someone, then you've killed someone. Whoosh. Gone. Goodbye. That's what we're talking about here - your intelligence versus my life.

*goes on ranting and raving*

burnedfaceman

i was under the speed limit and am merely commenting on the gardai wasting time with speed cameras on this road. how many country roads have speed limits of 100 km/h and are clearly not designed for this purpose and are often where accidents occur?

why are the gardai not manning speed checks on these type of roads instead of wasting time on a road which is obviously not a road traffic blackspot.

i pass through twice daily and have only seen two crashes in 5 years..neither were serious.

robinph

burnedfaceman wrote:

how many country roads have speed limits of 100 km/h and are clearly not designed for this purpose and are often where accidents occur?

It is an upper speed limit, not a speed target.

Just because the number on the signs say 100km/h does not mean that it is safe to do that speed on that part of the road or that you will get done for doing 80 instead.

Pherekydes

The in-park limit is 50 km/H.

There is a Phoenix Park Transportation study available at:

http://www.opw.ie/phoenixpark/Final%20Report_Rev2.pdf

Have a read and see what the real purpose of the Park is. Coming up: 30 km/H limits, road closures, one-way systems (at gates) and speed cameras!

themole

burnedfaceman wrote:

i was under the speed limit and am merely commenting on the gardai wasting time with speed cameras on this road. how many country roads have speed limits of 100 km/h and are clearly not designed for this purpose and are often where accidents occur?

True, the problem is that there is less traffic on these side roads. But they do sometimes have gardai on them, i was in the car with a friend of mine who was caught doing 81kph 100m from a 100kph zone.

burnedfaceman wrote:

why are the gardai not manning speed checks on these type of roads instead of wasting time on a road which is obviously not a road traffic blackspot.

i pass through twice daily and have only seen two crashes in 5 years..neither were serious.

Actually seeing two crashes yourself in the same place in 5 years is a lot to me or maybe not, i dunno.

They are trying to get people to obey the speed limit, whatever it is in that location. That should carry over to anywhere else. You should not obey the limit because you think you will get caught in a particular location.

burnedfaceman

two crashes i seen where at different roundabouts in this 2.5mile stretch, i wouldnt consider that alot considering the volume of traffic that passes through each day

Pherekydes

burnedfaceman wrote:

two crashes i seen where at different roundabouts in this 2.5mile stretch, i wouldnt consider that alot considering the volume of traffic that passes through each day

It's quite a lot. I've been in and around the PP for years and I haven't seen any, yet there have been hundreds, including a fatal accident only two weeks ago. Read the report, there's a whole section on accidents.

Heisenberg.

This post has been deleted.

Gaspode

burnedfaceman wrote:

i was driving home today at 3 o clock and seen there was a garda car parked on far side of roundabout parked slyly between two cars, as I was driving past i seen one of guards had a speed camera out the back window trying to catch people speeding. the speed limit is 40 km/h in park which is ridiculus. have the gardai nothing better to be doing with their time than petty crap like this??

Typical bloody Irish - complain the guards are brutal, but then complain when they are out doing what they are supposed to be doing. "Enforce the law, but not when I'm around" seems to be the attitude these days.
As a user of the park, I've often wondered why the guards dont put up more speed traps as the majority of motorists using the park seem to think its a race track.
As said before the speed limit is slow because its a park, not a speedway. Stay at the right speed and the guards wont be a problem for you.
I look forward to the day they close the park to all through traffic.

burnedfaceman

robinph wrote:

It is an upper speed limit, not a speed target.

Just because the number on the signs say 100km/h does not mean that it is safe to do that speed on that part of the road or that you will get done for doing 80 instead.

Im not advocating driving at high speed but reality is that people usually drive near to speed limit on these roads and in my experience on these roads i have observed other drivers breaking the speed limit on these rural roads.

i have had no problems with the speed limit on this road thank you very much and if you check OP you shall see i was driving below speed limit. I noticed garda car as i passed it.

i have looked at report and it is quite interesting i was not aware of the level of accidents that occur in the park.

i believe that the phoenix park should be utilised as a recreational facility for the dublin area and would welcome if it became blocked off to traffic. however i wont stop using it until this happens as it reduces my journey time when driving.

could anyone hazard a guess as to the amount of revenue generated from speeding drivers in the state??

scientist you langer, how i reacted to being pickpocketed is of no relevance to this thread.

Away to the Dublin forum with ye!

mogsy

burnedfaceman wrote:

Im not advocating driving at high speed but reality is that people usually drive near to speed limit on these roads and in my experience on these roads i have observed other drivers breaking the speed limit on these rural roads.


could anyone hazard a guess as to the amount of revenue generated from speeding drivers in the state??

good point you make especially when you consider the number of road deaths in countryside as opposed to urban areas.

couldnt tell you how much revenue speeding takes in each year but i think it definitely is a government scam to take money out of drivers pockets. why do they need to charge fines, surely if your caught speeding you should have points added to licence or a court appearance. i fail to see what good fines do to stop this problem except expand the governments bulging coffers!

sceptre

burnedfaceman wrote:

i have had no problems with the speed limit on this road thank you very much and if you check OP you shall see i was driving below speed limit.

Can't see why you've a problem with the speeding law being enforced on this road the very odd time then (you use it twice a day, is this the first time you've seen the coppers out there?)

burnedfaceman

yes, its the first time i have seen them here, i have never seen anyone drive at crazy speeds through park...

i just think that guards could be doing better things with their time than monitor speed on this road, i read the report linked above and majority of accidents have been people rear ending people on roads other than main one in park (these were type of accidents i seen at roundabouts)

if gardai are monitoring speeds they should do so were their is a likelihood of road accidents occuring. if someone is driving at 51kph on a straight road or 101kph on a winding rural road who is more likely to lose control and cause a road accident...

alot of roads have really low speed limits and i rarely here of accidents on these type but always see gardai trying to catch people speeding but yet i rarely see gardai speed checks on rural roads yet reading papers road deaths usually occur on rural roads by young men driving on these roads.

i just feel if gardai were concerned with anything other than raising funds through speed fines they would focus their efforts on roads were people drive at high speeds and are more likely to have an accident then wasting time trying to catch people on urban roads were serious accidents rarely occur

mobby

burnedfaceman wrote:

i was driving home today at 3 o clock and seen there was a garda car parked on far side of roundabout parked slyly between two cars, as I was driving past i seen one of guards had a speed camera out the back window trying to catch people speeding. the speed limit is 40 km/h in park which is ridiculus. have the gardai nothing better to be doing with their time than petty crap like this??

"Slyly" would you rather they put up a few warning signs to let you know there around?


"the speed limit is 40 km/h in park which is ridiculus. have the gardai nothing better to be doing with their time than petty crap like this??"

should be even less in my opinion.

Speeding is a constant problem in the park. I see it every day, there is a continuous white line down the main road that if you stick to the speed limit you get over taken by every lunatic driver. Down near the Zoo, family’s visiting the park or zoo itself with Kids, Park their cars on both sids of the road its a very dangerous area, All it takes is one moment for a parent to be distracted, one driver 5mph over the limit, and you have a dead or seriously injured child. It’s a pity there was not more done about speeding Motorists and Bikers in particular in the park. Fair play to the guards.

kdevitt

Didn't think they can do you for speeding the the Park - its private property after all and it has its own bye laws which refer to speeding.

ballooba

People speed in the Park the whole time, myself included on occasion. It's lethal, especially at night. If you hit one of those deer at 50mph in the dark you won't know about it. There are pedestrians everywhere during the day and cars parked bumper to bumper on either side.

Hagar

Wait until you're picking a deer out of your radiator.
Then wait until you realize that the deer has no insurance.
Afterwards when the shock has worn off you'll thank your lucky stars it was only a deer.

Slow down, get home safely.

BostonB

Slow coach wrote:

It's quite a lot. I've been in and around the PP for years and I haven't seen any, yet there have been hundreds, including a fatal accident only two weeks ago. Read the report, there's a whole section on accidents.

What fatal accident 2 weeks ago?

As a heavy user of the PP I often see minor accidents in the park, mainly shunts and small collisions at the junctions. But lets face it. All the junctions in and out of the park, and most of them in it are woeful and were dire 20yrs ago never mind these days with all the extra traffic forced through it because of the over development around it. A child could design better junctions. The report also says that the lack of paths, and cycle lanes is a major part of the problem. Why not fix that?

Speed is a problem but its not the major cause of accidents in the park. Its the dire junctions. The reality is that park is a major route into town. If they want to reduce traffic and prevent accidents. Improve the junctions, run a bus through the park. Loads of people would walk from the bottom of the park. Enforce the limits if they want, but in an obvious way if they want to reduce speed limits. Hidden cameras catch a tiny fraction and the majority of people will never hear about it.

Since 99% of people exceed the speed limit in the park, its an easy target but it won't solve the fundamental problems in the park.

BostonB

Hagar wrote:

Wait until you're picking a deer out of your radiator.
Then wait until you realize that the deer has no insurance.
Afterwards when the shock has worn off you'll thank your lucky stars it was only a deer.

Slow down, get home safely.

You don't have to be speeding for a deer to hit you. We had one (a Stag) jump the bonnet one evening when we were stopped on the main road at the Wellington monument. We we stopped because the car in front almost hit another one.

Victor

Are you sure it wasn't the OPW park constables, not the Garda?

BostonB

I've seen guards pull people over in the park before. But I also thought it has its own bye laws.

Pherekydes

BostonB wrote:

What fatal accident 2 weeks ago?

http://www.rte.ie/news/2007/0408/rta.html

Almost four weeks ago now. Seemed like 2 when I posted.

Mitch Connor

the best speed camera i have ever seen was a gardai staning on the quays accross the road from Tara street, during rush hour traffic. Unless the sped limit was 5kph, he wasn't going to catch anyone! Now that was an utter waste of time and resourses.

Seth Brundle

Tauren wrote:

the best speed camera i have ever seen was a gardai staning on the quays

<pedant mode>
Thats not a speed camera then!
</pedant mode>

Mitch Connor

kbannon wrote:

<pedant mode>
Thats not a speed camera then!
</pedant mode>

oops.... yeah - speed check:o

same waste of time and resources though!