RSA plays down online speed trap finder

HelterSkelter

http://www.rte.ie/news/2007/0719/roads.html

RTE News wrote:

RSA plays down online speed trap finder
Thursday, 19 July 2007 14:10

The Road Safety Authority has played down the significance of a website that offers an interactive map of locations of speed cameras around Ireland.

The RSA says it is aware of Irishspeedtraps.com, but says it is interested in the volume of people changing their driving behaviour, not how many people the gardaí catch for speeding.

Noel Brett, CEO of the RSA, said that the purpose of fixed and mobile cameras is to reinforce the message how dangerous excessive speed is, noting that in 40% of collisions on Irish roads speed is the main factor.

'The critical issue is to change behaviour', Mr Brett said, and pointed out that the new speed cameras, the contract for which is being outsourced at the moment, will be clearly identified to motorists.

Mr Brett also pointed out that on the official Garda Síochána website, details of the most dangerous stretches of road are documented, and said that gardaí have openly stated that enforcement is targeted in those areas.

MrPudding

Seems like a sensible attitude.

MrP

blastman

I was just thinking that. Most other countries have no problem with it, why should we?

OldmanMondeo

These type of web site are probably pretty useless. Most people travel the same routes 99% of the time and who k=now where the usuall check points are, the other 1% people probably don't speed as they don't know the roads etc.

Stephen

Heh, they just featured this on the six-one news, now the site is down. Obviously can't cope with the sudden load.

MrPudding

OldmanMondeo wrote:

These type of web site are probably pretty useless. Most people travel the same routes 99% of the time and who k=now where the usuall check points are, the other 1% people probably don't speed as they don't know the roads etc.

Yeah cos no one can go over 100 on a straight road or over 120 on a motorway if they dont know the road.:rolleyes:

MrP

unkel

Stephen wrote:

Heh, they just featured this on the six-one news, now the site is down. Obviously can't cope with the sudden load.

Site still down. I bet the boards user "irishspeedtraps" is delighted with all the attention for his site. No doubt he'll be back here to comment

Well done, irishspeedtraps

agent_smith

I think he is doing the general populace a great service.
Tuesday night driving down the templeogue road there was a biker garda. He had his bike half parked in a drive way and he himself was hiding behind a tree with his gun. Car in front was going a little quicker than 50... say 53 -55 (which is likely to be way out due to way diff speedos are calibrated). As driver noticed the garda he/she jammed on braked and dropped to 30kph.
I was more than following 2 sec rule in car so didnt' affect me too much. i did have to slow up considerably. However how many people today have you noticed rubber necking you on the roads.
Personally i dont give a rats arse about the rights and wrongs of following two close behind. I dont care fi somebody else is in the wrong. I dont want to be hit because i dont want the type of life long ramifications that can come with a rear end shunt... shoulder and back pains.
I would be much happier to see gardaí in plain sight. I think there shoudl be better guidelines for the gardaí on monitoring and recording speed.
A good example is the checkpoint i saw set up on the N11 about 2 weeks ago. The gardaí could be seen from miles around. There were not sudden hammering on the brakes. People just took it easy.

MrPudding

Exactly. I highly visisble and advertised speed check will slow people down where you need them to be slowed down with no emergency braking.

MrP

Eoin

RTE News wrote:

Mr Brett also pointed out that on the official Garda Síochána website, details of the most dangerous stretches of road are documented, and said that gardaí have openly stated that enforcement is targeted in those areas.

Hmmm, and that's why they still have speed checks in ridiculous spots on the N11. For example: north bound at Kilmacanogue where the speed limit has no need to be lowered to 60 (large slip lane available for both exiting and entering). Also, southbound on the N11 at Loughlinstown just before the Cherrywood fly-over.

OKenora

noting that in 40% of collisions on Irish roads speed is the main factor.

LOL, ROFL, ROFLMAO. You would think these guys would read their own statistics and reports before waffling garbage in public....

http://www.nra.ie/PublicationsResources/DownloadableDocumentation/RoadSafety/file,1948,en.pdf

On Page 16....

Contributory Factors to Road Collisions
The contributory factors listed by members of An Garda Siochana on collision report forms changed little from 2003 (see Table 17 on page 20). Driver error accounted for 88 per cent of all contributory factors identified, while the next most-listed factor, pedestrian error, accounted for 8 per cent. Road Factors accounted for 2 per cent of all listed contributory factors, while the figures for vehicle and environmental factors were 0.2 and 1.3 per cent respectively.
In two vehicle only fatal collisions - see Figure 9 - the most frequently cited contributory factor is ‘went to the wrong side of the road’ (40%), followed in turn by ‘other action’ (26 per cent), ‘exceeded safe speed limit’ (13 per cent), ‘drove through stop / yield’ (12 per cent), ‘improper overtaking’ (9 per cent) and ‘drove through traffic signal’ (1 per cent).

The above is supported by Figure 9 on Page 17.

Also see table 36 page 42 which shows 91.1% of all accidents had nothing to do with excess speed and that includes driving too fast for the conditions and not simply exceeding the speed limit.

Either they are trying to say that their own statistics are a pile of cr4p or telling us that their spokepersons haven't a clue what they are on about, one of the above has to be true.

EDIT: Oh he's the CEO, well then he definitely hasn't a clue about the figures.....

wingnut

What about crap Irish roads, I believe they contribute to accidents too. Drive between two cities down south and your looking at stretches of crappy winding roads, no safe overtaking opportunities and countless little villages.

OKenora

Thats actually a big missing statistic in the NRA road safety document. Not one single accident was attributed to road condition as a contributory factor. Funnily though 2 counties which traditionally had the worst roads, Monaghan and Cavan, have the worst fatality per capita figures too. Longford also fares badly and all 3 of them are noticeably higher (double or more) than the national average.

88% attributed to driver error though is way too high, a country full of L drivers would not be as bad.........mmmmmm........there's food for thought.

seamus

OKenora wrote:

88% attributed to driver error though is way too high, a country full of L drivers would not be as bad.........mmmmmm........there's food for thought.

"Driver Error" though is a catch-all, it shouldn't be used as a specific statistic. There's a fair argument to say that unless you experience catastrophic failure, or the earth opens up underneath you, that the driver made an error in some form.
Excess speed is driver error, poor overtaking is driver error, driving through a red light is driver error, hitting a pothole is driver error.

mike65

Hitting a pothole is fupping council error! seamus it rains a lot in this country so most of the bleedin' holes are invisible for much of the time.

Mike.

seamus

"Failure to avoid a hazard". So said the bastard when I failed my driving test anyway.

mike65

Ah, you're bitter!

Mike.

OKenora

Excess speed is driver error, poor overtaking is driver error, driving through a red light is driver error

I would agree except they list all those above as seperate events which kinda narrows down what can be classed as driver error.

Excess speed acounts for 9.9% of accidents according to the NRA stats, thats not only exceeding the speed limit it includes excess speed for the road conditions at the time.

OFF TOPIC A BIT: where is the N53 ? good or bad road ? Aparrently you are more likely to have an accident on it than any other N road....If you wanna feel safe drive the N31, N32 or N82 (wherever they go) as they are the safest, again are they good or bad roads ?

EDIT: answering my own question now that i located the N53, I have been up and down it a load of times, it's the Castleblaney to Dundalk road and it's no surprise it is the most dangerous one in Ireland. Loads of bad bends, crests, hidden dips, no hard shoulder in places (no verges in places) plus a smattering of bad surface all with a 100kph limit.

Victor

OKenora wrote:

If you wanna feel safe drive the N31, N32 or N82 (wherever they go) as they are the safest, again are they good or bad roads ?

All are relatively short.

N31 From M50 - Dun Laoghaire Port - mix of suburban/urban dual carriageway and generally wide 2 lane roads, some 90 degree turns. Mostly 50kh/h limit.
N32 Northern Cross Route Extension - M1 to Malahide Road - wide 2 lane road with only a few entrances. Hard shoulders converted to bus lanes. Very straight. Mostly 60kh/h limit.
N82 Citywest Road - N81 to N7 - wide 2 lane road with regular roundabouts. I think mostly 50kh/h limit.

I.S.T.

unkel wrote:

Site still down. I bet the boards user "irishspeedtraps" is delighted with all the attention for his site. No doubt he'll be back here to comment

Well done, irishspeedtraps

Hiya!

Actually with all the attention it was a nightmare as regards keeping the site up and running on Thursday and Friday. There was so much traffic the site just couldn't cope and took down all the other sites on the shared server with it also!! I had the hosting company ringing me up telling me I had to go on a dedicated server at 300 lids a month :eek: Not an option though as I don't have that kind of cash lying around. It's eased back to manageable levels now. I never thought I'd be hoping for less hits on the site!

Our man in Havana

IrishSpeedTraps wrote:

Hiya!

Actually with all the attention it was a nightmare as regards keeping the site up and running on Thursday and Friday. There was so much traffic the site just couldn't cope and took down all the other sites on the shared server with it also!! I had the hosting company ringing me up telling me I had to go on a dedicated server at 300 lids a month :eek: Not an option though as I don't have that kind of cash lying around. It's eased back to manageable levels now. I never thought I'd be hoping for less hits on the site!

Fair play to you!

PlainMan

Hope this doesn't come accross as blatant advertising but am interested in what the board contributors have to say about a product we have developed for the Irish Market. It is called Speed Nanny and while it does not have camera locations on it it has all of the accident risk locations in the country. It is GPS based and checks your speed as you approach these locations warning you only if you are over the limit. We have also mapped all of the Garda Collision Risk Zones and Speed Nanny will tell you when you are entering and leave these zones... belive this is the limit of what can be legally done regarding Penalty Points avoidance in Ireland. www.Speednanny.ie

~~SKYHIGH~~

PlainMan wrote:

Hope this doesn't come accross as blatant advertising but am interested in what the board contributors have to say about a product we have developed for the Irish Market. It is called Speed Nanny and while it does not have camera locations on it it has all of the accident risk locations in the country. It is GPS based and checks your speed as you approach these locations warning you only if you are over the limit. We have also mapped all of the Garda Collision Risk Zones and Speed Nanny will tell you when you are entering and leave these zones... belive this is the limit of what can be legally done regarding Penalty Points avoidance in Ireland. www.Speednanny.ie

Great product dude, however I hope the government dont try and manipulate this product, I mean they may classify that device like thoses Snooper Devices and Road Angels. Although since it's generaly a POI alert system I would think there is nothing wrong with it.