Wrong way..again!!!!

Frank Black

Alun wrote: »

It happens all over the world, even in that bastion of well trained motorway drivers, Germany. They call them 'Geisterfahrer', or 'ghost drivers'. So not a typical Irish problem, nor apparently, a lot to do with lack of suitable motorway training.

[Warning ... graphic images of some very nasty car crashes]
http://www.google.ie/search?q=Geisterfahrer&safe=off&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=5DmjUYrtHeSM7Aap14D4BQ&ved=0CEIQsAQ&biw=1280&bih=871

When I lived there, the RDS traffic alerts would alert other drivers to these incidents ... quite a chilling thing if all of a sudden your music is interrupted by a (loud) 'Geisterfahrer auf der A8' blaring out of the radio if that's the road you're on.

Of course you will have some incidents of this despite any amount of signage or training, but that doesn't mean we should therefore not train people appropriately.
I have no idea of the relative frequency of these incidents in Ireland or Germany (or even if a proper register of such events is maintained), but it would be interesting to compare the number of events, factoring in for the amount of motorway km's travelled by drivers in each country.

Victor Meldrew

Frank Black wrote: »

given the 100's of km of motorway that has been constructed over the last 5-6 years it is crazy we are not teaching learner drivers how to safely drive on these roads.

I agree that all learners should be given tuition on how to drive at speed on motorways.

But....

How many cases are there of learner drivers (typically young people) doing this versus old people (many of whom have never sat a test) doing this.

I see this as a combination of Eyesight, Age, confusion and (lack of any) training.

gutteruu

Victor Meldrew wrote: »

But....

How many cases are there of learner drivers (typically young people) doing this versus old people (many of whom have never sat a test) doing this.

I see this as a combination of Eyesight, Age, confusion and (lack of any) training.

So lets train everyone. Lets do a safepass type, 1 day revision course every 10 years, to bring all people in Ireland up to date on the new roundabout rules that changed 6 or 7 years ago with no notice, motorway driving and all the other things they were never trained properly on or have changed since. Driving on Irish roads for work now is like an extreme sport.

If I was to ask everyone on here, what was the cause of a near miss or accident they had, I would bet my arm it had nothing to do with drink driving or speed. I would say it was because someone drove stupidly. But yet all our focus goes on drink and speed, even though the highest percentage of accidents occur between 10am and 4pm on the slowest driving day of the week (Sundays, according to RSA's stats)!

Why do we put up with it?

Tails142

It's the at-grade junctions where people go wrong... yes its their stupidity but cost skimping by the government also has a part to play.

ardmacha

Driving on Irish roads for work now is like an extreme sport.

Let's not lose the run of ourselves, driving in Ireland has improved enormously and is one of the safest countries in the world.

That said a rules test every 10 years when you renew your licence seems reasonable. This could be multimedia test in this day and age.

hoodie6029

ardmacha wrote: »

Let's not lose the run of ourselves, driving in Ireland has improved enormously and is one of the safest countries in the world.

That said a rules test every 10 years when you renew your licence seems reasonable. This could be multimedia test in this day and age.

Most sensible comment I've heard in Motors for a long time.

Driving standards have improved greatly. The drop in drivers and economic activity has contributed but has also given us the breathing space to educate and improve roads that we didn't have during the boom.

With the centres available already for the theory test this should be something very easy to implement.

Anyone Noel Brett or Leo Varadkar's numbers?

ardmacha

With the centres available already for the theory test this should be something very easy to implement.

And I would even go beyond these centres, have 10 year tests in your local school on a Saturday morning or Wednesday evening. Its not mean to be inconvenient, just to check that you are fully up to speed on the rules of of the road.

hoodie6029

And if you get below a certain score, you have to resit and do a road test.
It'd probably have to be done a year before your licence is due to expire to give people the chance to do it and pass.

Frank Black

Tails142 wrote: »

It's the at-grade junctions where people go wrong... yes its their stupidity but cost skimping by the government also has a part to play.

What do you mean cost skimping?
It's not feasible or sensible to grade separate every junction.
Even grade separated junctions have roundabouts or T's at the end of the slips.

Victor Meldrew

ardmacha wrote: »

Let's not lose the run of ourselves, driving in Ireland has improved enormously and is one of the safest countries in the world.

That said a rules test every 10 years when you renew your licence seems reasonable. This could be multimedia test in this day and age.

A rules test and a few hours safety lectures would be sensible.

However, "Failure" , or fear of failure would make it political suicide.

That is why they can't get old people to hand over their licences in the US.

hoodie6029

With Gay Byrne as our road safety ambassador it would be more palatable to the retired/older community. It would have to be handled better than the medical card fiasco a few years ago.

This something for everyone not just old drivers. When it comes to road safety there is no real or broad opposition to real efforts to reduce deaths and injuries.

Europe tends to be better than America on road safety, a country than shunned airbags for decades because it meant you needed to wear a seatbelt.

gowley

Tails142 wrote: »

It's the at-grade junctions where people go wrong... yes its their stupidity but cost skimping by the government also has a part to play.

lol. the government even get blamed for peoples stupidity on the roads. what a load of rubbish. clearly it is a case of driver and nothing to do with the government. how many times have you driven down the wrong side of a motorway

TwoShedsJackson

This morning witnessed someone attempting to turn right from Kiltipper Road onto the N81 (at the football stadium) and promptly attempt to drive down the wrong side of the road. They only pulled up when they saw three lanes of traffic facing them. A kindly white van man then blasted them out of it as a warning

The mind boggles.

username123

TwoShedsJackson wrote: »

This morning witnessed someone attempting to turn right from Kiltipper Road onto the N81 (at the football stadium) and promptly attempt to drive down the wrong side of the road. They only pulled up when they saw three lanes of traffic facing them. A kindly white van man then blasted them out of it as a warning

The mind boggles.

Ive seen similar there before too.

Solair

To be honest, I don't find the standard of driving in Ireland that bad.

I drive in Belgium now and then and it's FAR FAR worse! No lane discipline at all, people cutting you off, old junctions that seemed to have been designed to get you killed, a very outdated give way to traffic entering roads rule that results in a lot of side-on-collisions.

The standards are much better than Belgium in the Netherlands and the standards of roads in France are far better than Belgium but the drivers are often terrible!

Statistically speaking, Ireland's road safety record is better than most of the world and slightly worse than the British and Dutch buy the same as Scotland.

The road mix and largely rural driving account for it being more accident prone than urban parts of the UK.

I'd rate Irish driving way better than what I've experienced in the US too. Americans are fine until any kind of hazard or complication confronts them! They also tend to cut everyone off in urban motorway scenarios In my experience anyway.

In general in Ireland you've three hazards :

Ridiculously slow / nervous drivers causing blockages.

Lack of familiarity with dual carriageways - especially in the West where they're a relatively new thing.

American and Continental tourists who are used to driving on the right.

I came face-to-face with a car blasting the horn at me in West Cork last week. She was on the wrong side of the road. Turned our she was German. Somehow got confused at a junction and turned into the opposite side of the road.

She rolled down the window to apologise.

I also have nearly had head on collisions with French and Polish registered cars near the ferry port in Cork. For example someone entering a roundabout the wrong way and proceeding anti clockwise!

I've also had a Spanish car cut me off and blast me out of it as he took the 4th exit in the outside lane (completely legal in Spain)

We need to mark junctions more clearly with arrows to avoid confusion as there are a lot of foreign drivers on the roads.

It would also help some of the more bewildered locals too !