Thanks to Instapundit, I came across this staggering collection of photo images of vandalised speed cameras – called “Gatsos” – on the sides of British roads.
The website I have linked to gives the impression that it is generally rather in favour of this practice, on the grounds that many such cameras are difficult to spot and hence set up as a sneaky way to catch out motorists to make money from fines, rather than actually trying to slow down speeds to cut the risk of accidents. A recent book by Christopher Booker and Richard North contends that the obsession with reducing speed limits on Britain’s roads has not reduced the amount of accidents, although it has made the driving process even more tedious than it can be already.
Frankly, I am not able to judge whether North and Booker’s analysis is correct, although they present a formidable number of facts to demonstrate their argument. Rather, what the extraordinary collection of images of vandalised speed cameras demonstrates is how far Britain has retreated from quiet deference to the rule of law. I think that society needs to have laws and certain laws need to be enforced and respected. It is a perversion of the argument for freedom to state that it implies a lack of respect for the law. Not so. But what is also clear is that in a society burdened with a rising weight of regulatory, nannying regulations, that a degree of blowback, if I can use the term, will occur. Which is a pity. Motorists who hammer along roads in streets near schools and houses are a menace.
Pay attention, Pearce! With all due respect to Glenn the Blog Father (PBUH), I have linked to that site on Samizdata many times over the years.
Sometimes when I am feeling a bit down in the dumps I go there just to see English civil society proffering the Mighty Forks to the state. I find it rather heartening.
Peanut Butter Upon Him? I like the Puppy Blender and all, but that’s one hell of a mental image for a sleepless Sunday morning.
I used to work for one of those speed-trap towns. (In the US, not the UK.) I had a very uncomfortable conversation with the boss about how traffic paper brings in money, but arresting people for beating hell out of “intimate partners” did not.
I’m sure that you’ll be shocked to hear that I don’t work there anymore.
Well it’s obvious that they will have to install CCTV cameras close by to record the people vandalising the Gatsos
I would like to refer you to a website founded by one Paul Smith (www.safespeed.org.uk) who has, for a long time, done critical analyses on the effects of speed and speed “policing”. Germany has many areas with no speed limits at all and Italians have a wide disregard for traffic regulation in general and yet their roads are safer than the UK’s. Italy doesn’t even police drunk driving much (although if you are drunk and cause and accident you are in real trouble). A town in Holland has run an experiment at a traffic circle (roundabout) where they removed all roadsigns and “right of way” indicators and the number of fatal accidents reduced significantly .
I commute about 30km a day on a bicycle and one thing I have noticed from the vulnerable perspective of a cyclist is that there is nothing as dangerous on the roads as a man who is convinced he has the right of way!
Travel on a speed limit free German Autobahn and no one stays blocking traffic in the overtaking lane convinced that they are playing “policeman” by preventing you from overtaking and going over the speed limit. Wherever speed limits are in force this appears to be a widespread practice fueling frustration and road rage, and definitely not in the overall interests of road safety.
Excessive traffic regulations — and resulting prosecutions of people who consider themselves law-abiding citizens — have been a big part of the change in attitude of people towards their police forces over the years.
Only a generation or so ago, most people saw a policeman and felt safer; now, we see a policeman and immediately wonder what regulation we are currently infringing. In some neighborhoods, you can be prosecuted for running your sprinklers at the wrong time of day (and does that time change with daylight saving?).
One of the biggest threats to the Rule of Law is a surfeit of Laws.
Perry, well I can’t remember URLs by heart, now can I?!! Anyway, I came across the site via Instapundit, so I credited him.
Seriously though, it is impressive the amount of work this guy has done in chronicling this stuff.
now there are cameras watching cameras.
since the car I drive is in my wife’s name and visa versa any photos are immediately discarded. alternative
nothing is as evil as the red light camera.
The notion that everyone should give up a “little” freedom to save a few lives is a very widely practiced mode of collectivist thought in the West. Unfortunately, the info-tainment media finds it both profitable and self vindicating to make relatively low probability occurences appear to be major societal issues by personalizing the victims. This excitation, when fed through the transfer function of the elective machinery inevidably results in a police/nanny state.
I dispare of this mental approach ever being rejected in favor of a more individualistic approach since the alternatives require the understanding of likelyhoods and probabilities. Something that appears to be a non starter in the present educational set up.
What’s depressing about this is that they weren’t until our government started its obsession with speed cameras. The UK used to have one of the best road safety records in the world; the best in Europe. (See Booker & North – although there are plenty of other references.)
Oxford saw an interesting application of official blind faith in cameras recently. Back in the summer a woman was taking her son and six of his friends (eight people in the car) on a birthday outing in her standard family car, which was equipped with five sets of seat belts, to suit its five seat capacity. She lost control and killed three of the children plus an innocent passing motorist. There is no evidence that speed was a factor in her losing control of her criminally overloaded car. Nonetheless, the accident site has now been blessed with the presence of a “safety camera” to prevent further accidents.
And of course, the absence of further accidents at that location will be used as proof that speed cameras work.
Until recently it had been ages since I’d regularly driven. The big shock to me is that nowadays – this is certainly true of the M25 and surrounding areas where I have been driving – everybody keeps to the speed limits. Away from the M25 this is a right pain in the arse. But on the M25 it seems to be a massive improvement. It’s a nicer drive and the traffic moves faster.
The widening to five lanes (in some places) may also have something to do with it.
The question I ask is what would happen if all roads were private? My guess is that although there would be less speed cameras there would still be plenty to go around.
Not that anybody wants to hear from a traffic cop about traffic safety, but…
In the US, NHTSA claimed that about half of all traffic deaths are drunk-driving-involved. DUI may or may not be the proximate cause of the death (I suspect that it usually is, but reconstructing whether the presence of alcohol actually lead to the delayed reaction that caused the driver to pass the stop sign, etc. is not an exact science, or at least not as exact as global warming anyway) but about one-half of all traffic deaths come from a collision in which at least one driver had a BAC or BrAC of .08% or higher, or other judgement-altering drugs on board.
So it’s not necessarily speed. Drunks may speed and speeders may hit someone while sober, but intoxication correlates with death at least a little better than fast-but-sober.
What stops drunks from driving? Most are smart enough to take a cab. The rest, if anything it’s the fear of getting caught.
A speed camera won’t see a car driving on the wrong side of the street while straddling two lanes with the lights out at 2:15 am. It will not see a drunk fumble for his license. It won’t evaluate standardized field sobriety maneuvers. It won’t smell the metabolites of sixteen cans of Coors Light on your breath. It won’t hear your slurred words or inability to follow a train of thought. It won’t drive you to a jail and collect a breath test or watch while the RN draws blood.
Nor will a speed camera notice that the car is stolen, or that it has a dozen DVD players in the back seat a day after an appliance store was burglarized, or that the driver has a dozen warrants for skipping court for beating his wife.
They’re not even all that great a deterrent to speeding, as Spidly notes above.
They’re great for collecting sixty bucks a pop for the city, though.
Number plate recognition is I believe an integral part of the new digital speed cameras.
Ian:
I mis-spoke. The camera will not query the plate against NCIC/PNC/whatever in real time, receive notice that the vehicle was reported jacked in southeast Westchester last night, pull the car over, question the occupants as to their possession of the stolen car, make arrests and bookings as appropriate, and arrange for the car’s return.
Human beings can do all of that stuff.