Re: Victory for green lanes

The message <67vuatF2qgl11U1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
from Peter Clinch <p.j.clinch@xxxxxxxxxxxx> contains these words:

On the one hand, yes, but on the other hand lots of drivers (and if you
think it's confined to lunatics then you're living in a dream world)
have shown they're not good judges of a safe, appropriate speed, so it
follows from that that since there is a single set of rules for everyone
there is required to be a degree of lowish (/not/ low*est*) common
denominator about what the limits are.

One of the reasons that there are so many drivers about these days who
lack the ability to drive safely is precisely because we are hedged
about with silly limits in situations where the driving is easy. Those
who see it as their duty to drive below the set limit and impede even
those who may not actually want to break the law are getting little if
any experience to cope when they venture onto the many highways and
byways where the national speed limits have about as much relevance as
the socialist manifesto (from which flowed the national limit in the
first place) or when the conditions deteriorate to the extent that even
they need to slow down.

Ideally you'd have safety limits set for every combination of car and
driver according to ability, but until you can come up with a way of
doing that reasonably and objectively we're stuck with one rule for
everyone. And the sad fact of the matter is that if you break that
you're liable for a fine, so either pay up or drive inside the rules.

Turning the majority of motorists into common criminals doesn't help the
situation particularly when what has been perfectly legal for years gets
criminalised for no better reason than a non driving socialist not
wanting the rich to drive any faster than the volk in their volkswagons.

The number of deaths on British roads has been on a downward curve since
before the advent of the socialist curse and that despite the huge
increase in traffic and the higher speeds today. There must be more
motorists routinely exceeding the national speed limits today that there
were in total when the blight first struck. IIRC I worked out a few
years ago that the total should eventually decline to about 2000 pa if
the oil doesn't run out first. If we return to horses for transport
expect the deaths to rocket.

Meanwhile deaths from hospital acquired infections didn't even register
on the public radar until the total exceeded that on the roads. Are we
to see hospital staff penalised for failures in hygiene?

You won't get drivers acting as responsible adults by treating them like
irresponsible infants.

--
Roger Chapman
Sure as Hell
My next Computer
Won't be a Dell
.

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