Whose Fault...

[Grahar]

I suspect in general the majority of people who are currently reading the HC are learners, advanced drivers, instructors and police drivers.

It would be nice to think that the general driving public refresh their knowledge of the HC every year or when a new version is released is but somehow I think this is unlikely!

[TripleS]

So, if the current HC is not being read sufficiently widely, and it is felt that a slimmed down version would not receive any better attention, what do we advocate?

Is it adequate to just aim the HC at new drivers, and work on the basis that established drivers will cope sufficiently well based on their driving experience, and a vague recollection of the HC? If I am justified in believing that drivers are doing reasonably OK, maybe it would be satisfactory to settle for that.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

[apple tango]

I think that too much is being made of whose fault is it, was the camera car overtaking or not, etc etc - I am not sure that is relevant. What is important is to consider how we would approach the situation to avoid the same outcome and whether there are lessons we can all learn.

Yesterday I was approaching a T-junction on the left with a car waiting to emerge. There were two cars in front of me, the lead one signalled and slowed to make a left turn - the driver of the car behind it was impatient and overtook the turning car. As I watched it develop I had this incident in my mind and braked quite hard, holding right back to see what happened. In this case the car waiting at the junction did not emerge and there was no collision, but the similarities were there. It was quite interesting to see the situation developing and based on that video my plan was much more focussed than it might have been otherwise.

[IVORTHE DRIVER]

The above happens all the time with impatient drivers, perhaps overtaking turning cars should become a "MUST NOT" rather than a "SHOULD NOT" .

At the end of the day though it will always come back to the drivers willingness (or lack of) to conform with any rules that there might be or to drive in such a manner that these situations do not arise.

A large majority of the drivers I come across every day in my work continue to drive with little or no thought about other road users, until that attitude can be changed easily avoidable "accidents" will continue to happen.

I wonder if patience was a sin would more drivers practise it

[lyndon]

So, if the current HC is not being read sufficiently widely, and it is felt that a slimmed down version would not receive any better attention, what do we advocate?

Is it adequate to just aim the HC at new drivers, and work on the basis that established drivers will cope sufficiently well based on their driving experience, and a vague recollection of the HC? If I am justified in believing that drivers are doing reasonably OK, maybe it would be satisfactory to settle for that.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

When it's my turn to be president of this country, I intend asking a group of writers to rework the HC to make the darned thing readable. I work quite hard at keeping up to date with it, but even with a strong interest I find it hard going.

On your second point, I wish I could agree that drivers are doing reasonably ok, but 2,500 deaths a year is 2,500 too many for me.

[jont]

When it's my turn to be president of this country, I intend asking a group of writers to rework the HC to make the darned thing readable. I work quite hard at keeping up to date with it, but even with a strong interest I find it hard going.

On your second point, I wish I could agree that drivers are doing reasonably ok, but 2,500 deaths a year is 2,500 too many for me.

So when you're president are you also going to insist we all live in bungalows to stop accidental deaths from people falling down stairs?

[Stephen]

If we work on the principal that both drivers involved are not AD drivers,and we have got a 8 page write up god only knows how many pages it would be at if they were Advanced Drivers.

Stephen

[lyndon]

When it's my turn to be president of this country, I intend asking a group of writers to rework the HC to make the darned thing readable. I work quite hard at keeping up to date with it, but even with a strong interest I find it hard going.

On your second point, I wish I could agree that drivers are doing reasonably ok, but 2,500 deaths a year is 2,500 too many for me.

So when you're president are you also going to insist we all live in bungalows to stop accidental deaths from people falling down stairs?

No. You'll be ok there. I don't mind people killing themselves. It's when their activities kill other people that I start to worry. You will still be free to choose to live dangerously.

[lyndon]

If we work on the principal that both drivers involved are not AD drivers,and we have got a 8 page write up god only knows how many pages it would be at.

Stephen

Don't worry. Once it has been edited to get rid of the repetition, deviation and hesitation it will be down to a single side of double spaced A4.

[TripleS]

So, if the current HC is not being read sufficiently widely, and it is felt that a slimmed down version would not receive any better attention, what do we advocate?

Is it adequate to just aim the HC at new drivers, and work on the basis that established drivers will cope sufficiently well based on their driving experience, and a vague recollection of the HC? If I am justified in believing that drivers are doing reasonably OK, maybe it would be satisfactory to settle for that.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

When it's my turn to be president of this country, I intend asking a group of writers to rework the HC to make the darned thing readable. I work quite hard at keeping up to date with it, but even with a strong interest I find it hard going.

On your second point, I wish I could agree that drivers are doing reasonably ok, but 2,500 deaths a year is 2,500 too many for me.

So you want it reducing to zero, is that it? Well quite frankly I can't see the sense in that, and you're never going to achieve it anyhow, no matter what draconian regime of laws and restrictions you seek to impose on road users. Despite what you may think, I'm very concerned that we should reduce the toll of deaths and injuries from road accidents, but that toll is relative insignificant if you look at all the other causes of unnecessary suffering. Some of these cause major suffering to huge numbers of people.

Rather than us making such a fuss about premature deaths from road accidents, if we're really concerned to reduce human suffering, would we not be better employed in pressing for improved performance from the medical profession? I wonder how many people die before their time due purely because of errors in that sector? I suspect it might be rather more than 2500 per annum; and what about all the other causes of premature death? What about the very damaging effects of smoking, bad diet, lack of exercise, obesity, heart disease, and various other problems resulting from or exacerbated by modern unhealthy lifestyles, which, if you look around, seem to be affecting a great many people.

When you consider the nature of the driving task, and consider how much travelling we do, I still maintain that road users are, on the whole, achieving a very high degree of reliability. Of course lots of mistakes are being made, but to a large extent we're working round tham and compensating adequately, and I think that should be recognised.

Let's focus our main attention where there is real scope for improvement.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

[lyndon]

On your second point, I wish I could agree that drivers are doing reasonably ok, but 2,500 deaths a year is 2,500 too many for me.

So you want it reducing to zero, is that it? Well quite frankly I can't see the sense in that, and you're never going to achieve it anyhow, no matter what draconian regime of laws and restrictions you seek to impose on road users. Despite what you may think, I'm very concerned that we should reduce the toll of deaths and injuries from road accidents, but that toll is relative insignificant if you look at all the other causes of unnecessary suffering. Some of these cause major suffering to huge numbers of people.

Wow. There's a strawman argument if ever there was one.
I was questioning whether drivers are really doing reasonably ok, on the grounds that I think 2,500 deaths a year is far too many. You put the words into my mouth that I want to reduce the rate to zero by draconian means, and then refute what I didn't say. Yes, of course I would like to see it reduced to zero. Wouldn't we all? But so far, in this thread, I have only questioned whether we should be complacent about the fact that many drivers don't read the HC, because the accident rate is too high. Not very draconian, surely?

[TripleS]

On your second point, I wish I could agree that drivers are doing reasonably ok, but 2,500 deaths a year is 2,500 too many for me.

So you want it reducing to zero, is that it? Well quite frankly I can't see the sense in that, and you're never going to achieve it anyhow, no matter what draconian regime of laws and restrictions you seek to impose on road users. Despite what you may think, I'm very concerned that we should reduce the toll of deaths and injuries from road accidents, but that toll is relative insignificant if you look at all the other causes of unnecessary suffering. Some of these cause major suffering to huge numbers of people.

Wow. There's a strawman argument if ever there was one.
I was questioning whether drivers are really doing reasonably ok, on the grounds that I think 2,500 deaths a year is far too many. You put the words into my mouth that I want to reduce the rate to zero by draconian means, and then refute what I didn't say. Yes, of course I would like to see it reduced to zero. Wouldn't we all? But so far, in this thread, I have only questioned whether we should be complacent about the fact that many drivers don't read the HC, because the accident rate is too high. Not very draconian, surely?

Well I don't suppose you'll agree with me, but I am still suggesting that we'd be better off looking at the major causes of premature deaths and other suffering, rather than the 2500 deaths per annum from road accidents.

Since I made my previous post I have read that approximately 94,000 lives are lost annually in the UK because of heart attacks. I hope that's not a misleading figure, but I do admit I'm not really into statistics. Anyhow, I'd have thought that aiming to reduce that by 10% would yield far more benefit that a fruitless attempt to reduce road deaths to zero.

Incidentally, we might bear in mind that depending on the methods adopted in the search for zero road deaths, the measures taken might well have a considerable cost in terms of lives lost in other ways.

I'm sorry to say this, because I don't wish to be rude to you, and I'm sorry if it comes across that way, but for my taste your approach is too close to that of Brake. In my view they are crackpots, with whom no sensible dialogue looks likely until they change their stance.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

[lyndon]

Well I don't suppose you'll agree with me, but I am still suggesting that we'd be better off looking at the major causes of premature deaths and other suffering, rather than the 2500 deaths per annum from road accidents.

Since I made my previous post I have read that approximately 94,000 lives are lost annually in the UK because of heart attacks. I hope that's not a misleading figure, but I do admit I'm not really into statistics. Anyhow, I'd have thought that aiming to reduce that by 10% would yield far more benefit that a fruitless attempt to reduce road deaths to zero.

Incidentally, we might bear in mind that depending on the methods adopted in the search for zero road deaths, the measures taken might well have a considerable cost in terms of lives lost in other ways.

I'm sorry to say this, because I don't wish to be rude to you, and I'm sorry if it comes across that way, but for my taste your approach is too close to that of Brake. In my view they are crackpots, with whom no sensible dialogue looks likely until they change their stance.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

I think you are doing it again. I said that 2,500 deaths a year is 2,500 too many. It's a long way from that view, which I really did hope would be commonly held, to proposing measures to try to achieve zero fatalities. For the record, I do not believe that zero fatalities is achievable, but that doesn't stop me from believing that 2,500 fatalities is 2,500 too many. The statement was made in response to your stated view:

If I am justified in believing that drivers are doing reasonably OK, maybe it would be satisfactory to settle for that.

I'm afraid I don't agree with you that we should just forget about road accidents and concentrate on other causes of death. I believe that people should be free to kill themselves by over-eating, lack of exercise, smoking, or driving too fast for the conditions. I just don't think they should be allowed to kill other people.

[Gareth]

I do not believe that zero fatalities is achievable, but that doesn't stop me from believing that 2,500 fatalities is 2,500 too many.

If you believe both clauses then either you're not saying anything worth listening to, (as in x many deaths are 'regrettable' but so what) or you have some ideas on how we should do something about the 'too many' aspect, the priority for doing so, and how willing you are for what many consider draconian measures to be implemented.

I believe that people should be free to kill themselves by [...] driving too fast for the conditions. I just don't think they should be allowed to kill other people.

How do you propose the former be allowed while guarding against the latter?

Given that some of the 2,500 fatalities are single vehicle driver/rider only fatalities, I think your comments are not consistent.

[lyndon]

I do not believe that zero fatalities is achievable, but that doesn't stop me from believing that 2,500 fatalities is 2,500 too many.

If you believe both clauses then either you're not saying anything worth listening to, (as in x many deaths are 'regrettable' but so what) or you have some ideas on how we should do something about the 'too many' aspect, the priority for doing so, and how willing you are for what many consider draconian measures to be implemented.

If you consider my remarks as a response to the suggestion that we don't need to do anything about making the HC more accessible because drivers are doing 'OK', it may be easier to follow my argument.

Remove the 'but so what' from your interpretation above, and try 'x many deaths are regrettable, and I have no expectation that we will reduce it zero, but that should not stop us from trying.'

I believe that people should be free to kill themselves by [...] driving too fast for the conditions. I just don't think they should be allowed to kill other people.

How do you propose the former be allowed while guarding against the latter?

Given that some of the 2,500 fatalities are single vehicle driver/rider only fatalities, I think your comments are not consistent.

I don't consider there to be any inconsistency. I can see difficulties in separating out that which is endangering your own life and that which endangers the lives of others. But if someone was able to demonstrate that their actions were not putting other lives at risk, I could live with that. I'd still regret any loss of life though.