TV Car Crash documentary

[Access Denied]

Licence to kill

Pretty powerful stuff to be honest. Told by the victim of a car accident that left her paralysed. It's certainly made me think and it's made me glad that I didn't take and pass my test until I was in my mid 20's. Thinking back to the person I was at 18, I would've probably been just like the kids are these days. Completely heedless of any danger to myself or others and thinking myself immortal.

I think education is the answer. Real education. Before people are even old enough to get a provisional licence. The documentary tells of a scheme that's being run in Surrey that has cut the number of young drivers being injured or killed on the roads by 70%. 70%!!

Steps also need to be taken to introduce new parts to driving lessons. The current standard was fine 20 years ago but there are more drivers on the roads and cars are generally getting more powerful and cheaper/easier to upgrade. I would personally make advanced driving lessons part of the standard set.

I know it's an iplayer link but I reckon a proxy would work?

 

[Gwadien]

OAPs cause more accidents, but tbats ageist, you cant be ageist against teenagers

 

[rynnor]

OAPs cause more accidents, but tbats ageist, you cant be ageist against teenagers

They are certainly involved in more driving fatalities - its a bit clouded by OAPs having heart attacks while driving and crashing.

Those are counted as road fatalities where really its natural causes.

 

[Mabs]

i have no sympathy for these people "oh i didnt mean to do it", no you sily bastard, you just assumed you were better and/or luckier than everyone else including people with decades of experience driving who decided that the speed limit was there for a reason

i really dont give a shit what they do to themselves, i just hate the fact that invariably they kill or main random passers by

/edit
just wanted to add, and i cant recall the exact details

but motorbike license holders are limited in the power of bike they can drive for a certain time after passing their test, why is there no something similair for cars

 

[Chilly]

i have no sympathy for these people "oh i didnt mean to do it", no you sily bastard, you just assumed you were better and/or luckier than everyone else including people with decades of experience driving who decided that the speed limit was there for a reason

i really dont give a shit what they do to themselves, i just hate the fact that invariably they kill or main random passers by

/edit
just wanted to add, and i cant recall the exact details

but motorbike license holders are limited in the power of bike they can drive for a certain time after passing their test, why is there no something similair for cars

Because even a ford fiesta 1L can do 100mph.

 

[Mabs]

Because even a ford fiesta 1L can do 100mph.

but yet they can put engine limiters on trucks and stuff ?
as i said, i dont know the mechanics behind it, but surely its a lack of effort rather than a lack of options

 

[Chilly]

but yet they can put engine limiters on trucks and stuff ?
as i said, i dont know the mechanics behind it, but surely its a lack of effort rather than a lack of options

yeah, fair enough.

 

[old.Tohtori]

but yet they can put engine limiters on trucks and stuff ?
as i said, i dont know the mechanics behind it, but surely its a lack of effort rather than a lack of options

Though those limiters (allegedly) are easy as piss to circumvent.

It's a fair point still.

 

[Mabs]

Though those limiters (allegedly) are easy as piss to circumvent.

It's a fair point still.

that doesnt surprise me at all, but end of the day, if you get 100 limiters, and 50 get circumvented, thats still 50 less so

 

[Raven]

I think all new drivers should have those black boxes that some insurers offer, at least for a year. If they are seen to drive like ball bags then their insurance goes up. If they don't pay their insurance then someone can come round and tow their car and then proceed to crush it...in front of them.

 

[DaGaffer]

but yet they can put engine limiters on trucks and stuff ?
as i said, i dont know the mechanics behind it, but surely its a lack of effort rather than a lack of options

Because a moped restricted to 30 doesn't hold up all the traffic in the universe the way a restricted car would. And restrictions don't work anyway; most under 20s aren't killed by absolute speed, they're killed by inappropriate speed for the conditions.

Licence to kill

I think education is the answer. Real education. Before people are even old enough to get a provisional licence. The documentary tells of a scheme that's being run in Surrey that has cut the number of young drivers being injured or killed on the roads by 70%. 70%!!

70% of what? When the absolute number of people being killed is quite small (and it is - between 30 and 70 people a year) then big swings in the percentage drop is easily possible; and ascribing the drop entirely to education when the Surrey figure dropped by 55% in total between 2007 and 2011, seems like a bit of an overstatement. The reality is likely to be much more prosaic; there are fewer young drivers on the roads because the recession and general rising costs of motoring have forced them onto public transport. Never trust statistics, and never trust TV documentaries at face value.

I think all new drivers should have those black boxes that some insurers offer, at least for a year. If they are seen to drive like ball bags then their insurance goes up. If they don't pay their insurance then someone can come round and tow their car and then proceed to crush it...in front of them.

This is almost certainly what's going to happen. Which if it resulted in falling premiums would be a horrible intrusion on civil liberties, but probably worth it. However, I guarantee it won't result in falling premiums over the mid to long term, in fact quite the reverse (because insurance companies are scum), so we're just stuck with the civil liberties thing for no real benefit.

 

[Aada]

Put the age limit on driving to 20.

 

[Moriath]

Put the age limit on driving to 20.

Better still only allow me to drive and then I would have no one to crash into and could go as fast as I like and not have to worry about others on the road. Would decrease the fatality crashes to a maximum of one hehe

 

[Raven]

This is almost certainly what's going to happen. Which if it resulted in falling premiums would be a horrible intrusion on civil liberties, but probably worth it. However, I guarantee it won't result in falling premiums over the mid to long term, in fact quite the reverse (because insurance companies are scum), so we're just stuck with the civil liberties thing for no real benefit.

They wouldn't necessarily need to have GPS location data, just speeds by road limit, acceleration, top speed driven, breaking distances etc. You could tell a bad driver just from the way they drive, regardless of location.

 

[DaGaffer]

They wouldn't necessarily need to have GPS location data, just speeds by road limit, acceleration, top speed driven, breaking distances etc. You could tell a bad driver just from the way they drive, regardless of location.

And if you were looking at it "fairly" (from a customer perspective), that would be fine, but this is insurance companies, so, 1mph over the limit, premium goes up. Brake hard because a kid walks out in front of you. Kid saved, premium goes up. And so on. I'm not being a cynic about this; the first black boxes were used by car rental firms in the US, and the results were entirely as I've described. Its inevitable.

 

[Gwadien]

I think driving attitudes are pretty equal, the fact is, youts have shit cars that will cause more damage to the people in the car, insurance companies charge so much that it's only realistic to buy a shit car that will crumple when it hits a curb, you can have inexperienced safe drivers that die because of it.

If the insurance wasn't so high, people wouldn't die.

 

[throdgrain]

"Whenever something bad happens, governments respond by taking rights away from people who have done nothing wrong"

/paraphrase

 

[Gwadien]

I think we should limit all 18-21 drivers to drive at 50mph, because they could be a boy racer = I think we should keep tags on all muslims because one could be a suicide bomber.

Just saying.

I know the shit drivers and the good drivers among my mates, and I can honestly say the better drivers are the younger more nervous ones who take their time, who are 'lads' out of the car, and the boy racers are the ones in their mid 25's tbh.

 

[rynnor]

As a young driver when I had just passed the test the most dangerous thing I found was passengers distracting me - restricting people from carrying passengers for a year after the test would save a lot of lives.

 

[Tom]

Fuckoff bot.

 

[caLLous]

Aw don't be so rash Tom. Amphrax hasn't even got here yet.

 

[Raven]

I'd hit it. I wonder if she will enter into email conversations and then marry me. I can send money for the flight!

 

[TdC]

I'll have to do a poll. I'm losing my edge

 

[TdC]

oooh from the Caucasus 0o

 

[Shagrat]

she love you long time

 

[caLLous]

Sofia, you were only with us for a short time but I truly cherished the time we spent together. RIP.

 

[Job]

I drove like a fucking lunatic when I was 17..it was just pure luck and teenage reactions that kept me alive..then again there was a lot less traffic and everyone drove slower..but it was before the speed camera...drove to cornwall at 2am in my 4x4 sierra and had my foot to the floor in top all the way.

 

[Raven]

50mph isnt very impressive.

 

[Himse]

In all honesty the driving test is complete tosh. It needs to be a lot harder rather than just 'reverse around this corner please' people have no idea how to drive in the snow for example.

I passed 5 years ago now, no accidents either, I can see why people have accidents though, windows down music blaring sunglasses on with all their mates.

Also, I wouldn't drive if there was a decent public transport system in my area.

 

[Raven]

The problem is, you can't teach people to drive in snow if there is none. I was lucky that it snowed while I was learning to drive. I had two hours a day driving lessons for a week when it was snowing, not because of the snow, it just so happened that it snowed the week I had booked off to do some intensive driving lessons.

Not had an accident either, the near misses I have had were from other moron drivers where I have been able to avoid it or predict what they were going to do. Audi driver trying to cut inside on a roundabout to get in front to dive into the single lane coming off. Audi driver pulling out from a roadside parking space and trying to sideswipe me etc.

Basically, if they are driving a medium range German saloon then they are most likely a bad driver.