Catching someone who smashed your car, whats the chances?

ballooba

Guards are unlikely to care that you are driving unaccompanied. The matter at hand is the accident.

I was involved in a crash one day in Donnybrook and the other party asked my sister (who was driving) had she got her full licence. Before my sis had a chance to answer, the guard told the woman that it was none of her business and that regardless, she was at fault.

pontovic

shabbyroad wrote:

Sorry for your trouble pontovic but there is a reason why you shouldn't be driving on your own with a 1st provisional license - especially on the quays in the city centre.

Now hang on a second. That side swipe was in no way at all my fault, so please don't assume that because I was on a provisional licence that I may have been at fault if you were thinking that. I dont know if you know, but the driving test application system in this country is in a shambles, and people like me have had to wait ages to get their test and full licence. I waited ages to do my test, and I passed it the first time around.
I am a careful driver. On that particular day, I had no problems with driving on the quays. Just because I was on a provisional doesn't necessarily mean I was a learner driver.

Just to clarify that point.

Alun

Just because I was on a provisional doesn't necessarily mean I was a learner driver.

What else does it make you then?

kluivert

Alun

Whether a person is a learner or not depends on your level of experience.

Technically speaking your correct, provisional = learner driver, however someone on there fourth or fifth provisional license could hardly be classified as a learner in the sense, they are a provisional license holder.

Anyway that person passed first time...

Theres no developments on catching the person who hit the gf's girl over the week end. The person who done it is very very lucky to get away.

Its strange really more lads die on the roads in this country yet the ladies have more accidents or mishaps. Ill get the stats, theres a website i found with it on.

Bluehair

kluivert wrote:

Theres no developments on catching the person who hit the gf's girl over the week end. The person who done it is very very lucky to get away.

Really sorry to hear that, don't give up just yet though and keep us posted.

pontovic

Alun wrote:

What else does it make you then?

It makes me someone who has proficient experience to drive in the city center without being a situation where I wouldn't know what I am doing. It makes me someone who was ready at the time to do their test, but they had to wait because of the overly long waiting times. In fact, less than 4 weeks after that mishap, I took my test and passed it with flying colours.

bungeecork

Irish-trucker wrote:

I was on aston quay waiting on the bus one day , and a truck driven by most likely a foreigner , took the mirror off the side of a bus clean off ,and went on his way

Sorry Dude, but I can't let this one slip by. What do you have against foreign truck drivers? International driving is part of the nature of trucking, isn't it? I love spotting a truck on the continent with "O'Sheas Transport - Tralee" or similar painted on the sides.

Saying he was most likely a foreigner is like saying he was most likely a Sinn Fein supporter. Kinda silly, yeah?

bungeecork

ballooba wrote:

...the other party asked my sister (who was driving) had she got her full licence. Before my sis had a chance to answer, the guard told the woman that it was none of her business....

Excellent!!
Cops are cool again

kluivert

Cheers Bluehair

This is not going to lay down easily.

Going to keep an eye out for Red Toyota Land Cruisers in the area.

Found out last night that a neighbour of the gf's lives a half mile up the road has a wine colour Jeep, the Jeep hasnt been seen all week, I know you cant accuse people like that but imagine if it was her neighbour.

Someone living a half a mile from you in the country would be classsified as a neighbour for all you city slickers...

shabbyroad

pontovic wrote:

It makes me someone who has proficient experience to drive in the city center without being a situation where I wouldn't know what I am doing. It makes me someone who was ready at the time to do their test, but they had to wait because of the overly long waiting times. In fact, less than 4 weeks after that mishap, I took my test and passed it with flying colours.

What's "proficient experience" ? You'll have to explain that one.

Look, you were on your 1st provisional unaccompanied, you shouldn't have been there. Simple as.

Congratulations on getting your certificate of competency. I don't believe they grade it so the 'flying colours' bit I'll take with a pinch of salt

pontovic

Hey Kluivert,

I hope you catch him

Best of luck with it

pontovic

shabbyroad wrote:

What's "proficient experience" ? You'll have to explain that one.

Look, you were on your 1st provisional unaccompanied, you shouldn't have been there. Simple as.

Congratulations on getting your certificate of competency. I don't believe they grade it so the 'flying colours' bit I'll take with a pinch of salt

Proficient experience means exactly what it says. I felt perfectly comfortable driving on that day and I had plenty of driving experience. I wont get into this argument again with people who say that because someone is on a provisional licence they are assumed to be careless drivers. Would it make any difference if I was on a full licence and it happened ? After all, the test was mere weeks after I was clipped.

On the driving test, they mark you down when you make mistakes doing certain things, like observation of hazards and turning, etc. A green mark is a minor mistake whereas a red mark is a major mistake and you can fail the test automatically for it. I didnt get any marks

MrSinn

This is a good example of the kind of society that we live in kluivert,people do this kinda thing all the time and get away with it,nothing but cowards i reckon.
It has been done to me too and i know what i would like to do if i could get the baxterds

shabbyroad

Sorry Pontovic - my mistake I assumed that English was your first language ("proficient experience" doesn't mean anything - do you mean 'sufficient experience' ?)

Nobody is assuming that you are a careless driver. But as a driver on their 1st provisional license you are an inexperienced driver. Whether you like to hear it or not you shouldn't have been there. It's as simple as that. Whether you believe that being comfortable or getting your certificate of competency some weeks later has anything to do with it is neither here nor there.

You can't "pass a test with flying colours" because it's a measure of competency. You proved to the examiner that you are a competent driver. That's something to be pleased with but don't kid yourself that you are anything else.

What happened to you and the OP was wrong but as you said yourself... karma. If you had been driving within the law you would not have been in that situation. That's karma mate. sucks doesn't it ?

pontovic

fair enough shabbyroad, i may have fractured the law on that day technically, but that point can't really be argued when we have to wait up to 14 months to take our driving test. in the states, i hear you can walk into a testing center and have a test started within about half an hour of applying for it.

i needed my car to get into and out of work. if i went by public transport, then it would take so long for me it wouldnt be feasible, and no one else in here can tell me they wouldnt drive into work in my situation if they had a car even though they were on their first provisional.

looking back, i have no regrets driving in the city center on that day. i would do it again just as i did. i had as much experience as anyone else, so its not really fair to say i shouldnt have been there. fair enough, it was against the law technically, but when you look at our driving testing situation, that point gets cancelled out.

ds20prefecture

pontovic wrote:

looking back, i have no regrets driving in the city center on that day. i would do it again just as i did. i had as much experience as anyone else, so its not really fair to say i shouldnt have been there. fair enough, it was against the law technically, but when you look at our driving testing situation, that point gets cancelled out.

Hi Pontovic - The side of my Alfa was badly damaged by a truck on the north side of the quays (down beside the point) back when it was legal to park there. I was in an office and didn't see it happen, but luckily one of the shops spotted it. The truck driver was still there (he damaged the car turning into a yard). He claimed it wasn't him even though there was Alaska Grey paint all over the trailer of the truck, and the shop assistants saw him do it. When I confronted him with this and told him I was calling the gardai he just jumped in the truck and buggered off.

The gardai arrived within 10 minutes, took statements and took off after yer man (The haulier's name was in 10' letters on the trailer, and I had taken the reg). Then they nabbed him at the far end of the quays he claimed he hadn't been anywhere near them. They must have told him they would arrest him if he didn't stop bull****ting because I then got a very apologetic call from him with his insurance details (which he also had to give to the garda). Problem was sorted immediately.

What was most impressive was how the Gardai handled the case. I was given a case number, the officer's card with his direct line and mobile, and they followed up on the case 7 and 14 days later to ensure it had been closed satisfactorily.

By the way, I had a full license and the truck driver was as Irish as they come. Should I say that all full license holders are careless parkers and all Irish truckers are thick as two short planks? I don't think so - I can't believe how quick people are to generalise here.

@ Kluivert - sorry for the OT rant. I hope you find who did it. One of my brothers was very involved in putting CCTV in a small rural town and it had a big impact on casual crime rates there, particularly in the wee hours. Unfortunately that town wasn't monaghan...

kluivert

Am from Carrickmacross in Monaghan and like your brother am going to propose that CCTV camera's be introduced to the town.

I spend alot of time in Dundalk where they have them and i think they re a great idea.

ds20prefecture

PM me if you'd like to contact my brother for more info. It helps if you are actually in the town/member of the chamber of commerce that sort of thing. Basically, a bunch of the local business subscribed to a scheme which put up 3 cameras in strategic locations (hotspots for crime & max coverage). Carrickmacross should be easy enough to cover with the wide streets and so on.

The legal requirements for the recording equipment are quite strict and it isn't cheap at all. You also need absolute buy in from the Gardai, as it's useless without.

HelterSkelter

Bogger77 wrote:

No chance, to be honest.

MIBI claim would be best bet

I think you need to have the reg to claim off the MIBI

ballooba

I thought there was funding made available in the last couple of months for community CCTV projects in small towns.

[edit] there was:
http://www.google.ie/search?hl=en&q=funding+community+cctv&meta=[/edit]

HelterSkelter

Padraig Mor wrote:

Agreed; they really couldn't give a flying fuck (what exactly do Gardai do?). Similar story with my GF. Her parked car was hit while at work. Several witnesses got reg no. of jeep that hit her but the guard in question did absolutely nothing. She only got in contact when I wrote a letter of complaint to the local Superintendent; even with that though she came up with a load of cock and bull to avoid doing anything about it. GF eventually paid for repairs herself.

Same happened me,drunk driver hit my car parked outside my house. Neighbour got the reg. I got onto the MIBI, they required the car reg and name & address of the person driving. Guards would not give me that info but gave it to the MIBI who then covered the cost of repairing my car. The guard told me they were going to do her for driving with no tax & insurance.

bungeecork

pontovic wrote:

...but that point can't really be argued when we have to wait up to 14 months to take our driving test...

Look, a lot of people break the law these day. Have you ever jay-walked, downloaded copyright music, drifted over the speed limit etc. Most everyone is guilty of something.

And a lot of people justify it. Jay-walk? - sure we're miles away from the traffic lights. Copyrighted music? - Sure couldn't I tape it off the radio? Break the speed limit? - but sure the limit is way too low on this road and anyway I have ABS etc.

Now it's just plain bad luck to be side-swiped. But if you sign up for a license and agree to follow the requirements for that license, and then you go back on that contract and drive on your own - you might feel the need to justify your decision by inventing your own reasons (I'm a good driver, the queue is too long for a driving test etc.). But you're not actually justifying your decision, you're just making yourself feel better about breaking the law.

kluivert

BungeeCork

Seriously this is besides the point.... If he left out the fact that he was a provisional license holder you would be none the wise and there would be less of a rant.

Anyone who gets into a car has a responsiblility to themselves and other roadusers for the safety of everyone concerned. This includes damage to other users property where they are 18yrs or 88yrs old. Learning or Experienced. No one can be 100% perfect and the odd accident does happen.

But when it does happen its important that people live up to their responsibility and accept the consequence of doing so. A Contract is formed by written or oral expression or by action. The action of getting into the car is contract, if you want to call it that.

When that person got side swiped it was the responsibility of the person who done it to stop give his/her details over and get on with it. Whether or not the gentleman was a learner driver or not has nothing got to do with what happened.

For agruments stake ok, say there was a qualified driver in the car with him and the car still got side swiped what difference is there.

Please start another thread about this if you feel so strongly about it.

bungeecork

I don't feel strongly about it at all kluivert. As I said in an earlier post in this thread, good luck to you. May I add to that... relax!

kluivert

LOL... Sorry bungeecork...i get carried away at times

I think the problem with this country is one of attitude and not driver skill. When you see people in cars do silly things with their lives and the lives of others youquestion whats going through their head.

Been reading through the posts and its good to hear that some people have been able to catch the feckers who think they can up and run. Well done to them.

There's no sign of this lad being caught but the gf is getting the car fixed on sunday, it ll be back on the road as good as new, so its probably time to move on.

Its good to see that there's people out there who still give damn about these things, cheers.

pontovic

I don't jay walk, I cross over at a zebra crossing or signalled corssing, and I don' t download copyrighted music anymore

But as for the argument of provisional licence holders not being allowed to drive, fair enough, if I had a weeks experience and about 10 miles under my belt driving, it would have been silly to drive in the city center, but with the amount of driving I had done up to the point of that accident, I felt I had enough responsibility and experience to drive on that day. At that stage, I 'knew' how to drive in a safe manner. Its not that hard to do.
Its very easy for people to point the finger sometimes, but you must remember that you were all in the same position as I was at one stage or another. You can't tell me you didn't drive on your own on a provisional at some stage ?

bungeecork

pontovic wrote:

You can't tell me you didn't drive on your own on a provisional at some stage ?

Mea culpa. I used to swap cars around in our driveway whenever someone blocked in needed to leave, that involved reversing out onto the road. We live at the end of a cul-de-sac though, wasn't like I was reversing onto the M50. And I did feel that I had proficient/sufficient experience at the time....:D

Irish-trucker

bungeecork wrote:

Sorry Dude, but I can't let this one slip by. What do you have against foreign truck drivers? International driving is part of the nature of trucking, isn't it? I love spotting a truck on the continent with "O'Sheas Transport - Tralee" or similar painted on the sides.

Saying he was most likely a foreigner is like saying he was most likely a Sinn Fein supporter. Kinda silly, yeah?

Lads ,

Right i realise that my original post sounded as if i did'nt like foreign drivers working in ireland , which i realise was wrong ,i dont .
But generally some hauliers , employ cheap foreign drivers ,and some would not be the best of the bunch .
And that the view and quality of truck drivers in general in my opinion ,was being brought down.
I'm not saying Either that there is not a few bad apples in among irish truck drivers too .
That's all i wanted to say in my original post , which i did'nt do - sorry if offence was caused to anyone .
I like spotting foreign company's trucks from holland/france here myself .

Hope this clears things up

TempestSabre

bungeecork wrote:

But they get crap pay and are only promoted on a politicians nod so I guess we get what we deserve. I think you're lucky she wasn't a politician or other "garda connected" individual, even your garda friend would have been slow to act then.

Exactly why theres such a lack of enforcement of a whole range of crimes. If you are not willing to do your job then quit. End of. Crap pay? You don't join the guards to be a millionaire. Your a public servent. If you not happy with that then leave. But don't make excuses for not doing your job.

I wish they'd spent the money building that sinking tunnel on the guards myself. Because its a hard job. But that doesn't excuse that kinda attitude.