Banned for driving with sandals

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

seamus

It's the same deal with any kind of hazardous footwear. I drive a peugeot, and the pedals are quite close together. I also have a pair of shoes with a wide rim on them, which makes my footprint about an inch wider than my actual foot. I drove with them for about 100m before I realised that it was next to impossible to drive in them without stepping on two pedals at once. So I changed them.

Maxwell

Vegeta wrote:

I drive barefoot all the time in the summer

I do know a few people who have had difficulty wearing flip flops while driving. Where the heel gets stuck on the floor mat and your foot gets stuck on the pedal. Happened to my brother and my girlfriends best friend.

EDIT: flip flops are different from sandals

Well you are wrong driving barefoot. I would love to see your control of a car whole breaking in a sudden situation in barefoot compared to if you had shoes on.

You are putting yourself and others at risk by driving like that.

Yes, there is some comedic value to this decision by the Judge, but he is correct, there is no way that you have the same control over a car wearing flip-flops, flimsy sandals than regular shoes/runners. I think the woman deserves a caution, but not an 18 ban. I think the judge came to his decision in order for a PR stunt as it might get people to wear proper shoes while driving machinery at up to 120kmph an hour. Its basic common sense.

Squirrel

In work I drove a car (I don't remember which one) and the pedals were ridiculously close together in my boots, and had to consciously make sure my foot was only on one pedal, foot-wear has a big affect, that said, any other car in them boots and i they were grand that whole day

Vegeta

Maxwell wrote:

Well you are wrong driving barefoot. I would love to see your control of a car whole breaking in a sudden situation in barefoot compared to if you had shoes on.

You are putting yourself and others at risk by driving like that.

please go on. I'd love to hear how a barefoot is less sensitive than a shoed one.

Big Balls

I can't believe you're even trying to defend driving barefoot.

HOW are you gonna stand on the brakes if you have to without hurting yourself?

Idiot. :rolleyes:

wingnut

Now that I think about it the young girl that ran in to the back of me two weeks ago was wearing flip flops and a bikini!

saobh_ie

Gerry Ryan... nothing more needs to be said.

Probaly a case of her ploughing somebody out of it with her car, coming up with some story about how her sandals stopped her from moving her foot quickly enough, "The heel got caught on the mat and then I couldn't get over to the brake so I slammed into the back of the car at the red light."

"A likley story... careless driving, pay three grand."

comanche

Big Balls wrote:

I can't believe you're even trying to defend driving barefoot.

HOW are you gonna stand on the brakes if you have to without hurting yourself?

Idiot. :rolleyes:

Are you having a laugh?

1. There are already rubber on the pedals
2. In an emergency you will only be concerned about the pain afterwards

Stark

If you're used to being barefoot then the soles of your feet are probably hard anyway.

Mine are soft and ladylike at the moment so I won't be doing any barefoot driving

Vegeta

Big Balls wrote:

I can't believe you're even trying to defend driving barefoot.

HOW are you gonna stand on the brakes if you have to without hurting yourself?

Idiot. :rolleyes:

am with my foot, i thought that would be obvious.

yeah and racing car drivers wear big wellies do they. No they wear very tight fitting thin soled shoes.

Why would standing on a pedal hurt. I kick people quite regularly and that doesn't hurt

seamus

I'm assuming you do some form of martial arts vegeta, which has toughened the balls of your feet significantly. Many pedals are designed with a shoe in mind, and as such have large thin "blades" or small spikes on them for grip. This would hurt most people.

You may want to reconsider for your own sake however - very often in accidents people will break toes and other parts of their feet, even if it's a very small crash. This is probably due to the amount of force they are putting against the brake pedal, and their foot/leg then takes a significant shock from the impact. Any padding you can apply to this will help minimise the damage.

zilog_jones

Yeah, Vegeta - if you read the EuroNCAP reports you'll see a lot of cars (especially older ones) have pretty piss-poor protection when it comes to you lower legs/feet in a frontal collision - the pedals go all over the place in some cars for starters. At least if you're wearing shoes you'll have decent enough protection from jaggedy metal trying to go into your soles.

Vegeta

whoa, i am not contesting the fact if in an accident when driving barefoot you are more likely to damage your foot.

Just like if drviving with no top on or driving with a vest style piece of clothin you are going to get pretty bad seat belt burn.

I am saying that braking hard would not hurt me. I am saying driving in your bare feet does not make you any less in control of the car.

Yes if you crash you will pay for it. I never challenged that.

My cousin cut a hole in his shin from the pedals when he crashed a micra but he was wearing shoes

whassupp2

Ok. I only saw this thread now but its a load of rubblish.
I live in Roscommon. Last Tuesday week I awoke like every Tuesday and read my local newspaper, the "Roscommon Champion".
I saw a little section in the corner of one page entitled "news in brief".
This section contained the sandal story in question and other ridiculous stories. I then found out that the editors of the paper have started running a hoax page. It is written at the top of the page that the stories are made up but its very unclear and easily missable.
Obviously, work spread fast amongst unaware Roscommoners and that eejit Gerry Ryan found out. It was all joke.

Last Tuesday, a similar page was in the paper. This time there was a story about a pensioner who was fined for carrying too much money in public.!!!!

It spread rumours anyway but was a bit of craic all the same.

Wossack

whassupp2 wrote:

Last Tuesday, a similar page was in the paper. This time there was a story about a pensioner who was fined for carrying too much money in public.!!!!

It spread rumours anyway but was a bit of craic all the same.

Bout time to be honest, damn pensioners walkin around like they own the place. brb, gonna call Gerry Ryan, see if he agrees with me.

Nevyn

You are ment to wear proper shoes for driving I know someone who was done for driving barefoot there is a part of the rules of the road safe operation of a motorised vechile that it comes under.

Vegeta

Thaedydal wrote:

driving barefoot there is a part of the rules of the road safe operation of a motorised vechile that it comes under.

can someone please post this section if they have it as anywhere online the rules of the road are generally a mess

Hotblack Desiato

Thaedydal wrote:

You are ment to wear proper shoes for driving I know someone who was done for driving barefoot

Really? What was the charge? What did they do to get stopped in the first place?

there is a part of the rules of the road safe operation of a motorised vechile that it comes under.

Rubbish, the whole book comes under 'safe operation of a motorised vehicle' (well, except for the pedestrians, cyclists and persons in charge of animals bits )
Anyway ROTR is NOT the law, it is advice. Unless there is a specific law being broken then no offence is being committed.

I heard once that quite a few truckies drive in stocking feet, hitting the brake pedal hard enough isn't going to be a problem with BFO servo brakes.

hshortt

Guard must have been the using the new sniffilizer

AMurphy

Vegeta wrote:

there are people with no legs who drive you know.

My math lecturer in college for one. Had a joy stick beside the steering wheel for speeding up and slowing down

More a case of without the use of their legs. Ireland has plenty Polio victims driving about. Though I will admit in specially equipped cars.

Vegeta

AMurphy wrote:

More a case of without the use of their legs. Ireland has plenty Polio victims driving about. Though I will admit in specially equipped cars.

no he had no legs i believe

event

this was a hoax

Seth Brundle

mike65 wrote:

Now slippers I understand!

I often wear when driving!

Stark wrote:

Maybe she wore socks with her sandals.

hopefully not white socks!

seamus wrote:

It's the same deal with any kind of hazardous footwear. I drive a peugeot, and the pedals are quite close together. I also have a pair of shoes with a wide rim on them, which makes my footprint about an inch wider than my actual foot. I drove with them for about 100m before I realised that it was next to impossible to drive in them without stepping on two pedals at once. So I changed them.

When in my (normal) shoes I have no problem in my car. My wifes 206 has pedals that are too close and crossover has often happened

ambro25

I can't believe there are posters arguing that it's wrong/illegal to drive barefeet.

If you had proper car driving schools with proper instructors, they'd dispense these invaluable nuggets of motoring wisdom, which they do early on in the cursus in FR and DE: whenever you buy a car, inasmuchas possible you should acquaint yourself with it by driving it barefeet first, in order to get as intimate a feel for its behaviour as possible early on. Moreover, if you are going to drive uninterrupted over long distances (100 kms +), especially in summer/hot weather (or in winter with heating on max), driving barefeet lessens your risk of falling asleep + risk of cramp by improving your bloodflow.

Just guessing, that must be down to Ireland's still-relatively-new acquaintance with mass-motoring at work again :rolleyes:

And btw: if you need to press that hard on the brake pedal that it would hurt you if you were barefeet, (i) your driving/due care & attention ain't that good or (ii) your brakes are in need of a service/adjustment.

wingnut

Thats the old school way to learn. I did that in my first car.

BrianD3

ambro25 wrote:

And btw: if you need to press that hard on the brake pedal that it would hurt you if you were barefeet, (i) your driving/due care & attention ain't that good or (ii) your brakes are in need of a service/adjustment.

I agree, and the posts criticising barefoot driving in this thread have been ridiculous. The brake pedal on a modern car needs a very light push to activate the brakes fully. The human leg and foot should be able to repeatedly generate far, far more force than this without hurting or damaging anything. Unless you've got severe osteoporosis or something in your foot

andrea

BrianD3 wrote:

I agree, and the posts criticising barefoot driving in this thread have been ridiculous. The brake pedal on a modern car needs a very light push to activate the brakes fully. The human leg and foot should be able to repeatedly generate far, far more force than this without hurting or damaging anything. Unless you've got severe osteoporosis or something in your foot

Or unless you're being thrown forward by an impact as you try to brake. For example.

ambro25

wingnut wrote:

Thats the old school way to learn.

I did not know there were old ways and new ways to learn how to drive My understanding, insofar as the Republic is concerned, is that there currently is no way to learn as such. And it shows. By such uneducated posts as those criticising barefoot driving.

andrea wrote:

Or unless you're being thrown forward by an impact as you try to brake. For example.

:rolleyes:

No point braking during or after an impact

> see item (i) in my post above

ambro25

Wrong button. I drive better than I interweb