Woman guilty of dangerous parking after crash death

opti0nal

Woman guilty of dangerous parking after crash death

It was the prosecution case that Meade had parked her black Opel Astra outside Mr Corbett's home, facing the traffic in a dangerous position with the headlights on. It was alleged that Meade had acted recklessly by disregarding a warning that the lights from her car were blinding oncoming motorists.

I think it's quite widespread that drivers cross over onto the wrong side of the road and park with their headlamps blinding oncoming traffic. Should parking tickets be given to cars parked facing the wrong way so as to discourage this potentially dangerous practice?

gbee

opti0nal wrote: »

Should parking tickets be given to cars parked facing the wrong way so as to discourage this potentially dangerous practice?

AFAIK, it's already on the statutes

RobAMerc

The first case of common sense in a court room have heard of in a long time. I think however more should be make of the prosecution in order to highlight the issue.

Atlantic Dawn

I see ministerial cars parked against the traffic with headlights on outside government buildings almost every single day, good to see we lead from the top.

keithclancy

There is a Duty of care when parking in a Public space.

Parking on a bend of a 100km/h road for example would be dangerous.

Wexfordian

gbee wrote: »

AFAIK, it's already on the statutes

Is it? I know its completely illegal in a lot of European countries, didn't know that it was here as well.

Seasoft

I always knew this was the case, and I never park facing traffic. This is not the first death attributed to similar parking, I'm aware of one case of a motorcyclist going to the left of a car only to slam into a wall.

Bad enough parking facing the traffic, but at night dipped lights are equivalent to full beams in such situations. At least turn them off and leave parking lights only on.

Rasmus

I'd like to know if the 4 x 4 bears any accountability for the accident. While the woman should not have been parking erratically, the moving vehicle has responsibility to be acutely aware of their surroundings. (The poor man, too, RIP, maybe needed to take better care).

woppi

opti0nal wrote: »

Interesting article and a tragic case. I notice the following:

Judge Moran also said there was no question of imposing a fine as this might be seen as putting a value on someone's life "which would be obscene".

What do others think about 5 penalty points on the drivers license of a 70 year old? Is that obscene?

keithclancy

What would think of a scenario where the handbrake fails on a car and rolls out onto the road causing a crash ?

Is it negligence if there is no NCT on the car ?

corktina

Rasmus wrote: »

I'd like to know if the 4 x 4 (driver)bears any accountability for the accident.

well yes he does. He should have slowed more and anticipated that someone might have been exiting the car in the middle of the road. That he couldn't see because of the lights of the parked car is not an excuse, in fact it is the reason why the accident should have been avoided.

Matt Simis

corktina wrote: »

well yes he does. He should have slowed more and anticipated that someone might have been exiting the car in the middle of the road. That he couldn't see because of the lights of the parked car is not an excuse, in fact it is the reason why the accident should have been avoided.

In this case that argument does have some merit, however I glad this case will highlight the problem. Only last night I was driving home in the dark, on a straight but "wavey" backroad and some moron in front of me pulled across the lane and stopped in a gateway nose out facing oncoming traffic, not only with the Low Beams on, but full on 100watts of foglights for good measure.

I flashed several times, no reaction (assume the retard thought I thought his full beams were on) and yes it was blinding. While I slowed and went by, such extreme light creates a blind sport about 2meters either side of the vehicle. Being a typical backroad I couldnt slow to a crawl as some jackass behind me in a TDI Audi was attached to the rear bumper, also with those certain other lights on, ensuring blindness all round.

pred racer

Matt Simis wrote: »

In this case that argument does have some merit, however I glad this case will highlight the problem. Only last night I was driving home in the dark, on a straight but "wavey" backroad and some moron in front of me pulled across the lane and stopped in a gateway nose out facing oncoming traffic, not only with the Low Beams on, but full on 100watts of foglights for good measure.

I flashed several times, no reaction (assume the retard thought I thought his full beams were on) and yes it was blinding. While I slowed and went by, such extreme light creates a blind sport about 2meters either side of the vehicle. Being a typical backroad I couldnt slow to a crawl as some jackass behind me in a TDI Audi was attached to the rear bumper, also with those certain other lights on, ensuring blindness all round.

To add to this, all people who have a large halide lamp shining out onto the road need a good kicking, and why do houses need lights on their gateposts? On country roads it can be very difficult to tell whether its a parked car or not, esp if you approach from round a bend.

corktina

Matt Simis wrote: »

In this case that argument does have some merit, however I glad this case will highlight the problem. Only last night I was driving home in the dark, on a straight but "wavey" backroad and some moron in front of me pulled across the lane and stopped in a gateway nose out facing oncoming traffic, not only with the Low Beams on, but full on 100watts of foglights for good measure.

I flashed several times, no reaction (assume the retard thought I thought his full beams were on) and yes it was blinding. While I slowed and went by, such extreme light creates a blind sport about 2meters either side of the vehicle. Being a typical backroad I couldnt slow to a crawl as some jackass behind me in a TDI Audi was attached to the rear bumper, also with those certain other lights on, ensuring blindness all round.

They might not have been full beams, when you are oparked on the wrong side your dips (which throw to the left) are beamed right in the face of oncoming cars. The eejit should have turned them off, leaving just parking lights (and hazards as that is what he was)

Tea 1000

woppi wrote: »

What do others think about 5 penalty points on the drivers license of a 70 year old? Is that obscene?

In what way is that obscene?

I think more should be done to highlight to people that your dipped beams are designed to throw most of the light to the left, because we drive on the left. Therefore when you park on the right with the car facing traffic, your dipped beam is now pointing towards the oncoming cars. It's a big difference, and almost as bad as full beams.
I'm glad the RSA are doing round-about ads on the TV now, but they should add the info about the lights, and tell people that Parking lights are for Parking only, never driving, and driving lights are dips and fulls, and should never be used when parking.

I once (similar to Matt's story) was driving along only to be blinded by a car facing me with dips on, on an incline. I slowed to almost a crawl as I couldn't see, despite the fact that the road was wide I still couldn't take a chance. I flashed at them to dip, but the stupid gobshíte actually flashed back at me, compounding the issue. Ignorance can't be legislated for, but information can help.

Matt Simis

corktina wrote: »

They might not have been full beams, when you are oparked on the wrong side your dips (which throw to the left) are beamed right in the face of oncoming cars. The eejit should have turned them off, leaving just parking lights (and hazards as that is what he was)

But I said Low Beams! :P

Werent Fulls/High but as you said, they angle is pointed wrong when on the other side of the road.

corktina

Matt Simis wrote: »

But I said Low Beams! :P

Werent Fulls/High but as you said, they angle is pointed wrong when on the other side of the road.

oops my brain read what it thought you said rather than what you did say... thats Old Age for you...:rolleyes:

CiniO

Tea 1000 wrote: »

In what way is that obscene?

I think more should be done to highlight to people that your dipped beams are designed to throw most of the light to the left, because we drive on the left. Therefore when you park on the right with the car facing traffic, your dipped beam is now pointing towards the oncoming cars. It's a big difference, and almost as bad as full beams.

No it's not that much difference, and not even close to how full-beams dazzle.
NCT gives bracket for adjustment of lights between 0.5% and 2% for lights not higher than 85cm from the ground (most cars).
So in general it means that if your lights are f.e. at 80cm above the ground, they can be set to give light on 40 metres in front of the car at the minimum, up to 160 metres on the maximum. All those settings are legal and within NCT limits.
As you can see those are horendously huge brackets, and fact that light are bit higher on the left is not that important here. If you lights are set at the lowest position possible, then on the left side they will be lower, than your lights would normally be if set up at maximum.

I've driven tens of thousands of kilometres on the continent in Irish car with left-aligned lights, and I wasn't dazzling anyone.

CiniO

I might be wrong, but I think it's illegal to park and leave your dipped beams on.
Whenever you park, you are obliged to turn off your headlights, dipped ligths, fog ligths, etc.
All you can leave on is side lights / parking lights.

langdang

pred racer wrote: »

To add to this, all people who have a large halide lamp shining out onto the road need a good kicking

GRRRRRR! Brings out the angry redneck in me, feel like driving by them taking hillbilly target-practice potshots at the things. :mad:

650Ginge

CiniO wrote: »

No it's not that much difference, and not even close to how full-beams dazzle.
NCT gives bracket for adjustment of lights between 0.5% and 2% for lights not higher than 85cm from the ground (most cars).
So in general it means that if your lights are f.e. at 80cm above the ground, they can be set to give light on 40 metres in front of the car at the minimum, up to 160 metres on the maximum. All those settings are legal and within NCT limits.
As you can see those are horendously huge brackets, and fact that light are bit higher on the left is not that important here. If you lights are set at the lowest position possible, then on the left side they will be lower, than your lights would normally be if set up at maximum.

I've driven tens of thousands of kilometres on the continent in Irish car with left-aligned lights, and I wasn't dazzling anyone.

What a load of tripe? Off course you where dazzling people and breaking the law? Unless you believe that all those countries are wrong. Probably more likely u are.

CiniO

650Ginge wrote: »

What a load of tripe? Off course you where dazzling people

Dazzling oncoming drivers is dangerous. If I was to dazzle them, I wouldn't driver like that. How can you know I was dazzling them?

My lights are 65cm above the ground. I have them set up slightly more than 1% down. That means that they light up to about 60 metres in front of the car.
It's about 20% longer distance on the left side, so it's up to 72 metres in front on the left side.

Legally, if I wanted, I could have my lights set up to light up to 130metres in front of my car, and it would still pass NCT and be roadworthy. So how can I be dazzling someone in right hand traffic with only 72 metres light in front of me on the left side?

Beside I made empirical test - and no - I don't dazzle anyone.

and breaking the law? Unless you believe that all those countries are wrong.

What law? What countries?
Do you know how many countries require drivers to mount beam-benders when travelling with other side type of car? Because I don't.
But countries in which I drove the most don't have such requriements.

Even in Ireland there doesn't seem to be any requirement to install beam-benders on LHD cars, unless you want to register them here.

Chuck_Norris

CiniO wrote: »

No it's not that much difference, and not even close to how full-beams dazzle.
NCT gives bracket for adjustment of lights between 0.5% and 2% for lights not higher than 85cm from the ground (most cars).
So in general it means that if your lights are f.e. at 80cm above the ground, they can be set to give light on 40 metres in front of the car at the minimum, up to 160 metres on the maximum. All those settings are legal and within NCT limits.
As you can see those are horendously huge brackets, and fact that light are bit higher on the left is not that important here. If you lights are set at the lowest position possible, then on the left side they will be lower, than your lights would normally be if set up at maximum.

I've driven tens of thousands of kilometres on the continent in Irish car with left-aligned lights, and I wasn't dazzling anyone.

On my Octavia, I've always had to drive the car with the level adjuster set to the lowest possible setting. Otherwise if I'm behind a car, it throws a lot of light into the car in front, thereby dazzling the driver. Oncoming traffic would be flashing, thinking I had my main beams on.

And whatever way the projector unit is designed, the near side light throws the light up extremely high on the left, so overtaking cars on dual carriageways etc, on a dark night was a pain in the whole. Because the overtake thought I was being a pr1ck by having my main beams on, and would return the "favour" once I got back into the driving lane. It's bad enough doing this with the leveller set at its lowest level anyway.

The kicker in all this is, I've had my headlight level checked on numerous occasions, and every time it's gone through the NCT, there's never been an issue.

So unfortunately, this argument doesn't stack up.

Supergurrier

Also whats with people thinking it's fine to have their full beams on because they are parked up facing traffic, i bloody hate this

CiniO

I'm not 100% sure what you mean...
Did you have RHD octavia or LHD octavia?
A assume RHD (normal for Ireland) as your post seem to say it.

Chuck_Norris wrote: »

On my Octavia, I've always had to drive the car with the level adjuster set to the lowest possible setting. Otherwise if I'm behind a car, it throws a lot of light into the car in front, thereby dazzling the driver. Oncoming traffic would be flashing, thinking I had my main beams on.

That means most likely that your lights were adjusted too high.

And whatever way the projector unit is designed, the near side light throws the light up extremely high on the left,

It doesn't throw the light extremely high on the left. 20% further distance is about average.

so overtaking cars on dual carriageways etc, on a dark night was a pain in the whole. Because the overtake thought I was being a pr1ck by having my main beams on, and would return the "favour" once I got back into the driving lane. It's bad enough doing this with the leveller set at its lowest level anyway.

I don't really get this.
Person being overtaken was thinking you had you full beams on, and therefore they were turning full beams as well? Right?
So again it looks like you had your lights to high.

The kicker in all this is, I've had my headlight level checked on numerous occasions, and every time it's gone through the NCT, there's never been an issue.

Because as I said, brackets of lights setting for NCT is extremally big, and therefore probably on the highest setting you might be dazzling oncoming drivers.

So unfortunately, this argument doesn't stack up.

It does, and it's explained in my other post.
Light on the left is up only a small bit compared to rest of the light, still very far from the border setting that NCT accepts as properly adjusted lights.
Beside as I said I checked properly I wasn't dazzling anyway (by letting my wife drive the car, and me coming opposide side in the other car f.e.)
Also no one ever flashed me that I was dazzling, and that's the best argument I wasn't as otherwise in places where I was, you would be flashed at all times if you were dazzling.

Curly Judge

I suppose that five penalty points and the knowledge that you were instrumental in killing one of your best friends is punishment enough for a seventy year old woman.
I feel really sorry for the oncoming driver who actually killed the man.
Yes, I know he should have been more careful and driven within his visibility comfort zone but having come within an ace of killing a child one Halloween in similar circumstances I can but say that the unforgiving minute that punished him let me off the hook.

Matt Simis

Supergurrier wrote: »

Also whats with people thinking it's fine to have their full beams on because they are parked up facing traffic, i bloody hate this

You should check out this thread!
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056784881



:pac:

Curly Judge

CiniO wrote: »

No it's not that much difference, and not even close to how full-beams dazzle.
NCT gives bracket for adjustment of lights between 0.5% and 2% for lights not higher than 85cm from the ground (most cars).
So in general it means that if your lights are f.e. at 80cm above the ground, they can be set to give light on 40 metres in front of the car at the minimum, up to 160 metres on the maximum. All those settings are legal and within NCT limits.
As you can see those are horendously huge brackets, and fact that light are bit higher on the left is not that important here. If you lights are set at the lowest position possible, then on the left side they will be lower, than your lights would normally be if set up at maximum.

I've driven tens of thousands of kilometres on the continent in Irish car with left-aligned lights, and I wasn't dazzling anyone.

I can't get my head around your logic!
Why would continental cars have their lights aligned to the right and Irish/ British cars have their lights aligned to the left if ,as you claim, it makes no difference. It just doesn't make sense!

650Ginge

Curly Judge wrote: »

I can't get my head around your logic!
Why would continental cars have their lights aligned to the right and Irish/ British cars have their lights aligned to the left if ,as you claim, it makes no difference. It just doesn't make sense!

Regular poster of BS is CiniO.

CiniO

Curly Judge wrote: »

I can't get my head around your logic!
Why would continental cars have their lights aligned to the right and Irish/ British cars have their lights aligned to the left if ,as you claim, it makes no difference. It just doesn't make sense!

I didn't say it doesn't make difference.
Of course it makes difference.
Your lights are aligned higher on the left, so you can see side of the road better (and potential dangers like cyclists or pedestrians).

But saying that dipped headlights dazzle on the left side the same as full-beam headlights (as this was a statement that I initially replied to) is definitely not true.

What I was trying to say, that if RHD dipped lights are adjusted low, then they can be lighting even lower to the left, than highly adjusted LHD lights. And therefore there is no need for use of beam-benders in that case.

Hope this makes sense now to you

CiniO

650Ginge wrote: »

Regular poster of BS is CiniO.

Says who?
Some misterious way my posts get "thanks" a bit more often than yours :P

gurramok

Seasoft wrote: »

I always knew this was the case, and I never park facing traffic. This is not the first death attributed to similar parking, I'm aware of one case of a motorcyclist going to the left of a car only to slam into a wall.

Bad enough parking facing the traffic, but at night dipped lights are equivalent to full beams in such situations. At least turn them off and leave parking lights only on.

I never knew it was bad practice or potentially illegal to park facing traffic on a public street. Oh, the high horse brigade will realise a high chunk of the public do not know of it too.
I've heard of cars been ticketed in foreign countries for the practice though, just not here.

CiniO

gurramok wrote: »

I never knew it was bad practice or potentially illegal to park facing traffic on a public street. Oh, the high horse brigade will realise a high chunk of the public do not know of it too.
I've heard of cars been ticketed in foreign countries for the practice though, just not here.

I never heard it was illegal.
But I heard that parking without turning off dipped lights / headlights is illegal.

jackofalltrades

t was the prosecution case that Meade had parked her black Opel Astra outside Mr Corbett's home, facing the traffic in a dangerous position with the headlights on. It was alleged that Meade had acted recklessly by disregarding a warning that the lights from her car were blinding oncoming motorists.

He recorded the conviction for dangerous parking but said there was no question of sending Meade to prison because of her good character.

So let me get this straight, she parked in a dangerous spot, blinded other motorists, was warned that what she was doing was blinding other motorists, dismissed these warnings and then someone died as a result.

And she's considered to be off "good character".

gurramok wrote:

I never knew it was bad practice or potentially illegal to park facing traffic on a public street. Oh, the high horse brigade will realise a high chunk of the public do not know of it too.
I've heard of cars been ticketed in foreign countries for the practice though, just not here.

http://www.rulesoftheroad.ie/rules-for-driving/parking/general-rules.html

Where possible, park in the direction of traffic flow.

Doesn't seem to be illegal here.

Lived in New York where doing it would get you a ticket. Makes a lot of sense from a safety point of view.

SniperSight

I find the results of this case unsettling.

Its described as a sad, freak accident. Sad it definetely is....but the parties involved put themselves in a (what should have been an obvious) dangerous situation.

This crash was always a likely scenario if you blind oncoming traffic, and the death too if you stand next to the car thats likely to get hit.

Its no more a freak accident then if someone was speeding, lost control on an icy bend and hit a tree.

I can't help but feel that if this was a 18 year old in a Civic that they'd be absolutely slaughtered by the judge!

I get theres no point in sending her to jail, being 70 as she is, but 5 points IS NOT ENOUGH! A man died, she was warned before the fatal crash that it was a danger, but she persisted with the situation as it was. All she had to do was heed the first drivers warning, THAT IS IT! But she didn't and caused a pile up and a death.
5 Points is not enough punishment for this stupidity, she should at the very least no longer have a license.

Saying she has to live with having been the cause is not fair punishment. Everybody thats done anything has to live with what they've done as well as the additional punishments they get.

A sad story, but we've all seen this kind of stupidity too many times on the road.

opti0nal

CiniO wrote: »

I never heard it was illegal..

It's not explicitly illegal. Dangerous parking is a matter of the opinion of a Garda. In this case there was plenty of evidence to support a prosecution.

Driving on the wrong side of the road is generally illegal and this is how drivers who park facing traffic arrive and depart from their stopping places.

I think that parking on the wrong side of the road should be an explicitly ticketable offence carrying 2 penalty points if it happens in daylight. Doing so at night should be prosecuted as driving without due care or consideation.

Indricotherium

gurramok wrote: »

I never knew it was bad practice or potentially illegal to park facing traffic on a public street. Oh, the high horse brigade will realise a high chunk of the public do not know of it too.
I've heard of cars been ticketed in foreign countries for the practice though, just not here.

The high horse brigade!?!? Seriously!?!?

There is actually a man dead, because of this. I hardly think you can call high horse on this one?? Parking facing oncoming traffic with your lights on is clearly lethally dangerous.

gurramok

Indricotherium wrote: »

The high horse brigade!?!? Seriously!?!?

There is actually a man dead, because of this. I hardly think you can call high horse on this one?? Parking facing oncoming traffic with your lights on is clearly lethally dangerous.

Calm down, I never said anything about lights on, the other posters did. I was talking about general parking and not this specific case.

deandean

In the U.K I got a ticket for "Parking facing opposing traffic at night".

In the interests of decency I won't mention where the ticket ended up....but it is a parking violation, over there at least.

gbee

deandean wrote: »

....but it is a parking violation, over there at least.

We'd be the same. I'm almost certain it's an offence for many a long year already, just one that has been Irishised.