Do we need Fixed Speed Cameras in Sligo?

andyr

I think we need to see some fixed roadside speed cameras installed on some of the N-Roads around here in Sligo.

I travel the N-17 Galway road and the N4 Collooney to Sligo road on a daily basis and have done for many years and have witnessed loads of accidents and near misses due to what i think is speed related yet a very limited time have I seen Garda cars out with their speed cameras on these roads. most of the time its a free for all with some people driving as fast as they like with no-one to catch them.

I understand that a lot of people think they are only installed for extra revenue but I do personally believe they act as a deterrent to motorists and even dummy speed cameras can be effective in a lot of places to help people slow down and stick to the limit.

I see a lot of them up in Dublin but I haven't seen any at all down this neck of the woods.

Do people think that there should be more fixed cameras nationwide across the whole of Ireland?

muffler

There was talk at a time that the whole area of speed cameras was to be privatised. If its still in the pipeline it should be brought in as a matter of urgency or as some would say - as a matter of life and death

Paddy20

muffler wrote:

There was talk at a time that the whole area of speed cameras was to be privatised. If its still in the pipeline it should be brought in as a matter of urgency or as some would say - as a matter of life and death

Good heavens, I agree with muffler 'for once' :eek: This subject is serious and we can not have Garda patrols everywhere. Until our Government wakes up to the carnage, slow down for god's sake .

P. :cool:

magnumlady

muffler wrote:

There was talk at a time that the whole area of speed cameras was to be privatised. If its still in the pipeline it should be brought in as a matter of urgency or as some would say - as a matter of life and death

Hope that it does come in soon but I am not too sure whether privatise would be a good thing or not. I think i would like to see it a Garda owned operation I think if anything.

MrShadow

its not speed as such is the problem its dangerous driving. and speed cameras dont tell you dick about that unless they are put on dangerous bends and such like.

Alot of stupid things that I have seen on the road are more to do with dangerous overtakes (no proper line of sight).Pulling out infront of a side road infront of oncoming traffic.

Big improvement would be if you had the same rule as some of the states have were if you had 5 cars or more behind you then you had to pull over and let them by. Would cut down on the frustration and agro on the road.

andyr

MrShadow wrote:

its not speed as such is the problem its dangerous driving. and speed cameras dont tell you dick about that unless they are put on dangerous bends and such like.

Alot of stupid things that I have seen on the road are more to do with dangerous overtakes (no proper line of sight).Pulling out infront of a side road infront of oncoming traffic.

Big improvement would be if you had the same rule as some of the states have were if you had 5 cars or more behind you then you had to pull over and let them by. Would cut down on the frustration and agro on the road.

I believe that people who speed and break the speed limit on a regular basis are the same ones that cause dangerous overtakes as well - in other words if someone drives sensibly and under the speed limit then they are less likely to be the drivers who overtake dangerously and on bends.

As for pulling out of side roads I think a lot of side roads onto main roads should have roundabouts or traffic lights on the main roads. there is a dangerous side road that is used regularly near where I live and it goes out onto a busy N17 Galway road and I have seen loads of accidents there and at least one person I know of died pulling out there a few years back but still no roundabout has been put there. Maybe with the roundabout it would force cars to slow down and then cars can then exit safely onto the N17.

I know you cannot put roundabouts on every side turnings but on busy ones that lead to other towns I cant see why they couldn't.

sligobhoy67

andyr wrote:

I believe that people who speed and break the speed limit on a regular basis are the same ones that cause dangerous overtakes as well - in other words if someone drives sensibly and under the speed limit then they are less likely to be the drivers who overtake dangerously and on bends.

As for pulling out of side roads I think a lot of side roads onto main roads should have roundabouts or traffic lights on the main roads. there is a dangerous side road that is used regularly near where I live and it goes out onto a busy N17 Galway road and I have seen loads of accidents there and at least one person I know of died pulling out there a few years back but still no roundabout has been put there. Maybe with the roundabout it would force cars to slow down and then cars can then exit safely onto the N17.

I know you cannot put roundabouts on every side turnings but on busy ones that lead to other towns I cant see why they couldn't.

its poor education, drink driving and poor road infrastructure that is the main problem as causes the deaths on Irish road - not speeding on N roads - people just get wise to where the cameras are and slow down a that spot and speed up two seconds later

MrShadow

It all boils down to the fact the government doesnt want to tackle the problem cause all the solutions cost either money or votes.

More enforcement, better training, better roads and better sinage all cost money. (which can be better spent on horse tracks and voting machines)

Real crack down on drink driving (costs votes until more of the ff voters stop doing it) Why do you think it took so long for random breath testing?

So why the emphisis on speed? cheap to enforce and makes money! Also the idiots in the press have been pushing it that its the answer to the problem. Tis amazing all the progress over the last 10 years on going after speeders and the only things that made a difference were penelty points and randon breath testing. And what does this tell you... the speeders they have been catching arent the problem but it makes them money and keep the press happy and the public when they show how much they are trying to do to tackle speed

andyr

MrShadow wrote:

It all boils down to the fact the government doesnt want to tackle the problem cause all the solutions cost either money or votes.

More enforcement, better training, better roads and better sinage all cost money. (which can be better spent on horse tracks and voting machines)

Real crack down on drink driving (costs votes until more of the ff voters stop doing it) Why do you think it took so long for random breath testing?

So why the emphisis on speed? cheap to enforce and makes money! Also the idiots in the press have been pushing it that its the answer to the problem. Tis amazing all the progress over the last 10 years on going after speeders and the only things that made a difference were penelty points and randon breath testing. And what does this tell you... the speeders they have been catching arent the problem but it makes them money and keep the press happy and the public when they show how much they are trying to do to tackle speed

I think maybe it might be better to tackle this huge problem of deaths on the roads in stages rather than try and fix the whole lot in one go. If speeding motorists are cut out of the equation or is heavily cut down this will go a hell of a long way to helping making the roads safer.

But even with adverts, slots on the news, risk of being caught and penalty points on the licence people a hell of a lot of people (majority not minority) are still speeding on a daily basis and also not adjusting their speed to road and weather conditions and the view ahead. - I t makes me think in another 5 years time will there ever be a solution to finally stop these drivers doing it or will it just continue to go on and on?

You can bet that if we were talking about the Wifes, Children, Friends, Relations of Government members being killed regularly on the roads then soon we would see something drastic done pretty soon.

andyr

sligobhoy67 wrote:

- people just get wise to where the cameras are and slow down a that spot and speed up two seconds later

There is that I suppose. - I see in the UK to try and overcome this problem they sometimes put another set of cameras a bit of a distance up from the last ones to catch people out who do this!

muffler

MrShadow wrote:

the government doesnt want to tackle the problem cause all the solutions cost either money or votes.................. the speeders they have been catching arent the problem but it makes them money

I dont think you can have it both ways. Its either making money or not and they are either spending it or not.

The sad facts are that speeding is probably responsible for 70% of fatal accidents. If anyone ever takes the time to read the reports about the inquests into these fatal accidents then it makes very poor reading to see the evidence that the deceased was doing 70, 80, or 90 MPH at the time of the accident.

How many times have we seen and read the number of single car accidents that have ended in tragedy. Again we can read the inquest report where one of the survivors stated that the driver lost control. You dont loose control of a car thats going at 40 or 50 MPH unless its icey roads.

We can try to educate all the silly buggers we want but it wont make one iota of a difference as long as you have these 17 and 18 year old boys running about town in Daddys car doing doughnuts and racing each other along the back roads without any care for themselves or others.

il gatto

Alot of the problem is the emphasis on main roads. Guards can spend an afternoon on aroad like the dual carriage way south of Sligo or the Curlew bypass and catch any amount of people doing 70mph. It brings up their numbers and makes alot of money. Thing is, in good weather with no traffic, thats a pretty safe speed. What irks me is that I am likely to be driving at that speed on those roads, and I am at risk of being caught. When I'm coming home on back roads at night, I meet souped up Civics and Celicas doing similar speeds, across the white line and with no chance of stopping should the need arise. It's scary at times. Problem is, the only times I've ever encountered Guards on these roads at night, they were looking for drink drivers, which in itself is good. However, outside of weekend nights, it's a free for all for every tosser in a grannys shopping car with alloys and a big exhaust.
By prosecuting civic minded people, driving at mildly excessive speeds on good open roads, while ignoring people who put themselves, their passengers and other road users at risk with their total disregard for others, the Guards are breeding resentment amongst many motorists, who, fairly legitimately feel the speed traps they usually encounter are a money making racket.

andyr

il gatto wrote:

Alot of the problem is the emphasis on main roads. Guards can spend an afternoon on aroad like the dual carriage way south of Sligo or the Curlew bypass and catch any amount of people doing 70mph. It brings up their numbers and makes alot of money. Thing is, in good weather with no traffic, thats a pretty safe speed. What irks me is that I am likely to be driving at that speed on those roads, and I am at risk of being caught. When I'm coming home on back roads at night, I meet souped up Civics and Celicas doing similar speeds, across the white line and with no chance of stopping should the need arise. It's scary at times. Problem is, the only times I've ever encountered Guards on these roads at night, they were looking for drink drivers, which in itself is good. However, outside of weekend nights, it's a free for all for every tosser in a grannys shopping car with alloys and a big exhaust.
By prosecuting civic minded people, driving at mildly excessive speeds on good open roads, while ignoring people who put themselves, their passengers and other road users at risk with their total disregard for others, the Guards are breeding resentment amongst many motorists, who, fairly legitimately feel the speed traps they usually encounter are a money making racket.

I see what you are saying and its not fair that yer ones get away with driving like maniacs in the nights but with fixed speed cameras in 24 hour operation it might cut it down a bit , but then as you say you are travelling on back roads and they wouldn't be putting any fixed cameras on those roads anyway.

On another point I am amazed some mornings i have travelled on the N-17 or N-4 into Sligo that I see round circle tyre marks on the roads were racers must have been burning rubber as they call it and doing handbrake turns in the night. I am glad I don't meet up with them at that time and its becoming quite frequent now. The lesser of all evil even though its not an ideal situation, is that I would rather them do in some shopping centre car park rather than on the main dual carriageway!

The way how you (Gardai) could cut down on these boy (and girl) racers I think is to catch them in the daytime (and they can be just as bad in the day time) and immediately seize their cars and impound them for something like 28 days somewhere. Treat them like children and if children are bad you confiscate their toys until they learn to behave themselves!

andyr

I cant see the effect working deterrent of a Garda pulling over a car on the road for speeding and giving an on the spot fine and then letting the car drive off again to go off and speed again. - far better to (in excessive speeding cases maybe) immediately impound the car and make the driver find his or her own way home or destination.

sligobhoy67

andyr wrote:

There is that I suppose. - I see in the UK to try and overcome this problem they sometimes put another set of cameras a bit of a distance up from the last ones to catch people out who do this!

again, people just get wise to it - and even if you dont know the area and know that they are there you can see the lines on the road. Also the are programmed into many sat nav/tom toms so they know where the cameras are

andyr

sligobhoy67 wrote:

again, people just get wise to it - and even if you dont know the area and know that they are there you can see the lines on the road. Also the are programmed into many sat nav/tom toms so they know where the cameras are

Agreed they are not infallible but I still think its better to have them than not. When I hire a car in the UK and drive around to a similar road to N-roads (A Roads over there) they are busy but you don't seem to get as many people speeding and overtaking dangerously as you do in Ireland (that is unless someone has nicked a car of course).

Loads of Fixed speed Cameras where I was in the UK and I didn't see people slowing down for them and then speeding right up again afterwards.

ddea

People who speed will always slow down for fixed cameras and speed up after. I have driven tens of thousands of miles in the UK and it definitely is the case there. The biggest problem I find there with cameras are actually slower drivers, driving below the limit, who brake as soon as they see a camera, just to be on the safe side I suppose!!

Random speed checks will be much more effective and I understand that these will be introduced by private means.

I don't agree with people who say it's safe to break the speed limit on this or that road and the Gardai should be concentrating on other roads. Anybody caught speeding will try to use this excuse but it's nonsense. From my experience Gardai who do speed checks will exercise common sense and will not pursue motorists who are very slightly over the limit but concentrate on those who are driving at dangerous speeds.

il gatto

I have driven many tens of thousands of miles also. I have driven for a living. I ride a motorbike as well. It's far from nonsense to suppose that 70mph on an excellant road is safer than 55mph on a bad road. It's logic. You can see farther ahead. The surface is better. The road is wider. New roads have less intersections. They have better road markings. Good roads have hard shoulders.
To suppose that the Gardai will use common sense is wishful thinking. Pursuit rarely happens. More likely they catch up with you as they're on patrol. Random speed checks usually just involves taking a reading on the gun and stepping out in front of you. Most people I know who've been caught speeding have been marginally over the limit on a good road where they posed no additional threat to anyone.

andyr

il gatto wrote:

I have driven many tens of thousands of miles also. I have driven for a living. I ride a motorbike as well. It's far from nonsense to suppose that 70mph on an excellant road is safer than 55mph on a bad road. It's logic. You can see farther ahead. The surface is better. The road is wider. New roads have less intersections. They have better road markings. Good roads have hard shoulders.
To suppose that the Gardai will use common sense is wishful thinking. Pursuit rarely happens. More likely they catch up with you as they're on patrol. Random speed checks usually just involves taking a reading on the gun and stepping out in front of you. Most people I know who've been caught speeding have been marginally over the limit on a good road where they posed no additional threat to anyone.

i might have a lesser issue if people who were gonna take a large open excellent road at 70 if i could be sure that if they had to brake in an emergency that they could do so in a safe and correct manner but I bet you most wouldn't have the experience to stop as safe as possible.

Most would chose to slam on the footbrake and skid, or overturn the car, will not keep it in a straight line and veer onto other oncoming traffic.

considering you can have a blowout on a tyre or hit a patch of ice or wet road at any time even on a straight open road doing 70 that can be a very hairy experience, better if you are trained to handle the car in that kind of emergency to bring the car to a safe halt but looking at it honestly how many drivers on the road could do it in those situations?

However I maintain that at a lower speed if something untoward should happen then surely you will have more chance to try and stop safely and maybe avoid a worse accident.

il gatto

andyr wrote:

i might have a lesser issue if people who were gonna take a large open excellent road at 70 if i could be sure that if they had to brake in an emergency that they could do so in a safe and correct manner but I bet you most wouldn't have the experience to stop as safe as possible.

Most would chose to slam on the footbrake and skid, or overturn the car, will not keep it in a straight line and veer onto other oncoming traffic.

considering you can have a blowout on a tyre or hit a patch of ice or wet road at any time even on a straight open road doing 70 that can be a very hairy experience, better if you are trained to handle the car in that kind of emergency to bring the car to a safe halt but looking at it honestly how many drivers on the road could do it in those situations?

However I maintain that at a lower speed if something untoward should happen then surely you will have more chance to try and stop safely and maybe avoid a worse accident.

Unfortunately most people have no expirience hitting the Irish roads. I had the benefit of growing up in a rural area with fields and private lanes to expiriment and learn on. Most people don't get to do this.
Most fatal accidents happen as a result of bad driving. It can be exacerbated by speed, but more often the cause is passing when you don't have the time, passing on bends, or going too fast on bends when grip can vanish in an instant.
My point is that the Gardai are frequently on roads such as the dual carriage way south of Sligo town, where, in the decade it's been open, there has been few, if any fatalities. It's not because they're there, as people still speed on it. It's because it's a safe road to travel on. They ignore the places where most fatalities happen in the north west (second and third class roads) as it's not as productive or lucrative to be there. They could sit all night and catch one person as opposed to an hour on a primary route and catch a dozen. The thing is, if the problem is on the bad roads, their strike rate of speeding fines shouldn't come into it. Speed traps are supposed to be there to enhance safety on our roads, and if takes all night to catch one boy racer "rallying" on a quiet road at night, then that's what they should do. Just ask the poor people of the Inishowen Peninsula who've been so unfortunate these past couple of years. I'm sure they'd much rather their kids to be paying a fine or serving a driving ban than what happened.

As an aside, I was on Teeling Street in Sligo tonight at 11 o'clock, and a lorry (white tractor unit pulling a blue curtain sider trailor) went up the street at certainly 35mph plus. As you can imagine, at that time, there dozens of drunken students on the street. If the lorry went out of control, or someone had staggered or fell in front of it, it would have been horrific. If I hadn't got such a fright, I would have taken it's number and reported it. As they passed the nightclub, they lay on the horn and the "helper" let a yell at those qeueing outside. It's people like that who should be < SNIP >.

Edit by muffler: Advocating violence is not acceptable here. I understand your annoyance at that incident and if I met you privately I would probably tell you that I would do as you suggested but unfortunately that type of suggestion is out of bounds on boards.ie.

Some good posts from you so keep up the good work