A 30 KPH limit for Dublin

Seth Brundle

Chris_Heilong wrote: »

We dont need cars travelling at the same speed that a bicycle can reach, better infrastructure saves lives not forcing people to move at an unnaturally slow speed and since the public have said the same this should just not be a thing.

1. I don't think the plan is to make cars travel at the same speed as fast bicycles but to reduce vehicle speeds which in turn will reduce the number and severity of collisions.
2. Whilst better infrastructure saves lives, this has been opposed in so many places because of the loss of road space and other similar reasons (think BusConnects for similar examples). In addition, our council's tend to believe that they can design their own view of best practice whilst ignoring the vast experience built up by the Dutch. Unfortunately, out councils are usually wrong with their views. Loads of money spent on inadequate and unsafe infrastructure.
Also proper infrastructure takes years to put in place.
3. You're against cars driving at an "unnatural speed". Do you want to think that through fully or do you need someone to explain it to you, maybe with some pictures?
4. Should the public be allowed to decide on which safety measures are in the public interest and which are not? Or should we make public safety decisions based on fact based science?

SeanW

Seth Brundle wrote: »

4. Should the public be allowed to decide on which safety measures are in the public interest and which are not? Or should we make public safety decisions based on fact based science?

"The public" are the ones who have to live with this nonsense, so yes, they should have a say on "safety measures" especially when they are utterly disproportionate. And it would not just be private drivers affected but also all bus passengers. You want to talk about facts, well here are some facts. (Facts that you wouldn't find on any of the DCC "consultation" documents but are nevertheless true).

• There are more 300,000,000 vehicle kilometres between fatalities (of any cause) in Ireland. https://etsc.eu/14th-annual-road-safety-performance-index-pin-report/
• Of the less than 150 people approximately who die on our roads each year, only a small number of those are not in a vehicle. The numbers vary, but last year it was 32 pedestrians and 10 cyclists, in a country with a population of 5,000,000.
  https://www.rsa.ie/RSA/Road-Safety/RSA-Statistics/Deaths-injuries-on-Irish-roads/
• And in many of those cases, the actions of the motorist were not the cause.
• 30kph as a default speed limit is out of line with European practice with 50kph being most common for main routes. Usual practice is to apply 30kph (or 20MPH in the case of the United Kingdom) limits to specific zones, on a case-by-case basis.
• By far the vast, vast supermajority of Irish motorists will never be involved in a fatal incident. Doing some rough calculations based on the number of Irish license holders, the number of fatalities each year and assuming each motorist is on the road for a certain number of years (e.g. 40 or 50) you get a number well under 0.5% of drivers who will ever be involved in a fatal incident, and many of those will not have been the cause of it.

Given these facts, it is reasonable for drivers, bus passengers etc to expect that any future "safety measures" will be proportionate and not needlessly punitive. The same can only be determined by looking at all of the facts, not a biased selection facts, exaggerations and worse like we've seen on this thread. Nonsense such as claims that Ireland has polluted air (we don't), poor public health (we have the 18th highest life expectancy in the world), dangerous drivers (incredibly rare) among others.

What's worse, you will have seen repeatedly the following falsehood:

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

Motorists continue to kill 2 or 3 people each week on Irish roads.

Which is intended to imply that all 2,820,528+ drivers are collectively guilty and fully responsible for all fatalities that occur on the roads. Now I don't remember being asked for permission by this clown: https://fermanaghherald.com/2021/04/man-sentenced-to-five-years-for-donegal-crash/ to drive drunk, like a maniac, on a suspended license, with a car overloaded with people. Nor indeed for every other dumb things individuals sometimes do.

And I regard this as the intellectual foundation of ideas like "30kph as the default speed limit." Ignoring facts that contradict the narrative (like DCC did), exaggerations and outright falsehoods (like we've seen in this thread).

CramCycle

No wonder the RSA is so useless when they can't even report dodgy claims correctly, their researchers seem to like picking the lower numbers to appear to have better coverage, and aren't chasing up further data if it isn't easy to get. Getting a doctorate seems to be as easy as passing a PLC course years ago.

They claim to have 85% coverage in regards culpability but they ignore those incidents they didn't track down the reports, their coverage is actually is actually 56.9% of cases they have determined culpability.

The only thing I find in the report of use overall is their acceptance that their are limitations to analysing the small group they did find.

In 56.9% of these case they found that 70% of pedestrians were at fault for their deaths, partially or completely.

They appear to claim that not wearing Hi Vis puts the culpability of death on them, with no digging on the data of other factors, but they haven't separated that data out into the Urban (well lit)/Rural divide, nor do they investigate data to assess was this a causative factor, they also mention this info is not always recorded and so this data could be misleading in the extreme without the actual % of cases reported.

A third of pedestrians were crossing the road, and 1 in 5 had failed to observe. - another one they don't say in how many cases this was recorded, was it Urban/Rural and who gives this report.

It goes both ways, half of culpable drivers failed to observe before the fatal pedestrian collision but again not reported how this was recorded. Even more I would love to know in these cases was it caught on dash Cam CCTV or when the pedestrian was run over, did the driver just tell the Garda they didn't look, and if so, how was the driver going so fast they couldn't stop?

Same with speeding, they didn't even have the data for apparently most of the cases, nor did they look, but in the few they bothered to recover, 25% were speeding. Considering the car speed detection calculations are known to be flawed in Ireland using a system that is discounted by most other European police forces, and (this is a favourite), even when a driver dmits they were speeding in a fatal RTC, the gardai dismiss it as their technique calculated it at half the reported speed. Look up speed from skid marks, and the numerous accepted flaws with this useful but basic calculation which does into take into account simple things like yaw angles, differential in drag coefficient, even road condition.

I will happily withdraw any statement I have made if I can get my hands on an actual report with appendices to the actual data used, but that powerpoint that I wouldn't accept from an undergrad student is beyond useless, it is more worryingly, misleading.

AndrewJRenko

crooked cockney villain wrote: »

I used to live beside a Dart station for about two years. I would only use it when going into town for a drink, as driving most places was far cheaper than a return Dart trip. Not to mention

Great point about the chronic underfunding of public transport and chronic subsidising of private car usage, resulting in individual journeys being much cheaper by car. Maybe we could get to the stage where motorists actually pay their way?

Chris_Heilong wrote: »

We dont need cars travelling at the same speed that a bicycle can reach, better infrastructure saves lives not forcing people to move at an unnaturally slow speed and since the public have said the same this should just not be a thing.

We already have cars travelling and much lower speeds than a bicycle can reach.

https://www.rte.ie/news/dublin/2019/0213/1029375-dublin-traffic-survey/

SeanW wrote: »

[*]And in many of those cases, the actions of the motorist were not the cause.

You know well that the RSA have never published any actual paper to back up that research slide deck. You know well that that you don't know what is the definition of culpability. You use that mysterious figure like a drunk uses a lamppost, more for support than illumination.

SeanW wrote: »

[*]By far the vast, vast supermajority of Irish motorists will never be involved in a fatal incident. Doing some rough calculations based on the number of Irish license holders, the number of fatalities each year and assuming each motorist is on the road for a certain number of years (e.g. 40 or 50) you get a number well under 0.5% of drivers who will ever be involved in a fatal incident, and many of those will not have been the cause of it.
[/LIST]

Aw gee, thanks for not killing more of us. I must pass on your stats to the families of those killed by speeding, texting motorists, I'm sure it will make all the differece.

SeanW wrote: »

Nonsense such as claims that Ireland has polluted air (we don't), poor public health (we have the 18th highest life expectancy in the world), dangerous drivers (incredibly rare) among others.

The families of the 1500 people who dies prematurely last year due to poor quality will be delighted to know that we don't have any problems in that area.

SeanW wrote: »

What's worse, you will have seen repeatedly the following falsehood:
Which is intended to imply that all 2,820,528+ drivers are collectively guilty and fully responsible for all fatalities that occur on the roads. Now I don't remember being asked for permission by this clown: https://fermanaghherald.com/2021/04/man-sentenced-to-five-years-for-donegal-crash/ to drive drunk, like a maniac, on a suspended license, with a car overloaded with people. Nor indeed for every other dumb things individuals sometimes do.

No-one mentioned collective responsibility but you. It's pure strawmanning. There is no collective responsibility. That doesn't change the facts that drivers kill 2 or 3 people each week on the roads.

SeanW

CramCycle wrote: »

No wonder the RSA is so useless when they can't even report dodgy claims correctly, their researchers seem to like picking the lower numbers to appear to have better coverage, and aren't chasing up further data if it isn't easy to get. Getting a doctorate seems to be as easy as passing a PLC course years ago.

They did accept that there were some limitations in their data, and one of the sources they listed were Garda and/or coroners files. I took that to mean that in some cases, culpability was assigned not by the RSA but by the coroners investigation, death certificates, the Garda investigation etc. But even if one rejects that the figure is as high as 70% pedestrian culpability, one thing is clear. Simplistic narratives like "motorists kill people" is a bit of an oversimplification (at best) and that "drivers" (whether individually or collectively) are sometimes simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Anecdotally, my experience as a pedestrian is that genuinely threatening behaviour by individuals driving is extremely rare, so I'm inclined to believe that the number of culpable drivers is at the lower end.

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

Great point about the chronic underfunding of public transport and chronic subsidising of private car usage, resulting in individual journeys being much cheaper by car. Maybe we could get to the stage where motorists actually pay their way?

Yes, motorists should "pay their fair share"

• Road tax (i.e. Motor Tax)
• Insurance
• Levies on insurance to pay for failed insurers, uninsured drivers etc.
• Vehicle Registration Tax
• Fuel duties
• Carbon taxes
• NCT fees
• motorway and bridge tolls
• VAT on most of the above
• Plus all the other taxes that people pay for common services like income tax, VAT, various consumption taxes.

Yeah, motorists are really being "subsidised" :pac:

We already have cars travelling and much lower speeds than a bicycle can reach.

Not by choice.

The families of the 1500 people who dies prematurely last year due to poor quality will be delighted to know that we don't have any problems in that area.

Your claim that Ireland has "poor public health outcomes" is a provable falsehood. As to your claim that 1500 people die every year due to poor air quality, that requires some explanation in a country where air quality is generally good. At best, I suspect that your figure comes from some theoretical model, and that's being generous. It's even more bizarre considering that the few countries that have higher life-expectancies than Ireland often have much worse air quality (like Japan, which has a longer LE despite generally having moderate air quality). One thing is clear - your "poor public health outcomes" and "polluted air" claims are overwrought at best.

Not that it matters in any case, as our government has signaled a phase out of Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) cars in favour of electric cars, and those cause zero air pollution. So the "air quality" argument, weak though it is in a country with good air quality and very high life expectancies, will be completely irrelevant within a decade or so.

No-one mentioned collective responsibility but you. It's pure strawmanning. There is no collective responsibility. That doesn't change the facts that drivers kill 2 or 3 people each week on the roads.

The bolded statements are self-contradicting. :eek:
But however intended, your claim is false. Your use of such loaded terminology is clearly intended to place the blame squarely on a collective, homogenous group of "motorists" or "drivers", furthermore "kill" is usually read as "cause the death of."

To be fair, your misleading statement could be read in one of two ways, both of them false.

1. That all 2,820,528+ motorists/drivers collectively kill or 2 or 3 people every week on our roads.
2. That individual drivers - not connected in any way with any other driver or drivers - kill 2 or 3 people every week.

The first is a lie because 2,820,528+ "motorists" are not a giant collective hive mind killing some macabre quota of "people" every week. Any implication that "motorists" as a whole are killing people is just a straight up lie. The second is false because in many cases the so-called killer was not responsible, or the circumstances were such that it would be very strange (e.g. single occupant, single vehicle collisions) to say "members of that group killed that person"

More broadly though, there are two possibilities. Either "motorists" as a collective are "killing people" (i.e. never involved in collisions they didn't cause, or single occupant/vehicle collisions) or there's a little more to road safety than your false soundbites.

Hamsterchops

Wow, there's some long and winding posts on here, so I'll be brief

40km/h (just 24.8 MPH) should have been tabled from the off, a very slow speed that everybody would have bought into and agreed upon. The 30km/h limit is too draconian and divisive for many people to get their heads around, don't get me wrong, 30 (18 mph) is ideal for housing estates and around schools, but otherwise 40 (just 24.8 MPH) is very slow anyway.

The End.

_Kaiser_

Hamsterchops wrote: »

Wow, there's some long and winding posts on here, so I'll be brief

40km/h (just 24.8 MPH) should have been tabled from the off, a very slow speed that everybody would have bought into and agreed upon. The 30km/h limit is too draconian and divisive for many people to get their heads around, don't get me wrong, 30 (18 mph) is ideal for housing estates and around schools, but otherwise 40 (just 24.8 MPH) is very slow anyway.

The End.

Nope. 50 is perfectly acceptable for urban areas and has been so for decades, during with cars have gotten ever more reliable and safe as the injury/fatality stats show.

What's changed in that time is the notion that people should be protected from the reality that sometimes bad things happen, and that nothing is ever their fault.

Hence we have ideas like this based on hysteria fuelled by soundbites, selective "evidence" on social media, and ideological crusading more than anything else with no real consideration of the wider impact of the suggestions or that it's not all about them.

It's not restricted to this topic but it's an ongoing trend in recent years. Helen Lovejoy's "think of the children!" mantra used to be satire and a caricature, but as with so much else it's seeping into the real world nowadays.

magicbastarder

SeanW wrote: »

Anecdotally, my experience as a pedestrian is that genuinely threatening behaviour by individuals driving is extremely rare, so I'm inclined to believe that the number of culpable drivers is at the lower end.

twice, just this morning, i have been on a pedestrian crossing where a car breezed through, the motorist clearly not looking. granted, i was prepared for such an eventuality because i know there's a significant minority of irish drivers who simply don't know what function zebra crossings serve.
worth noting that this was in the car park at decathlon in ballymun, and busy car parks, where motorists are paying more attention looking for free spaces than they are to fleshbags like me, are endemic for this behaviour.

magicbastarder

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

Nope. 50 is perfectly acceptable for urban areas and has been so for decades, during with cars have gotten ever more reliable and safe as the injury/fatality stats show.

What's changed in that time is the notion that people should be protected from the reality that sometimes bad things happen, and that nothing is ever their fault.

what has also changed over the last three decades is the sheer volume of traffic on the roads. and i will go back again to the point that when the amount of traffic eased off significantly during the first lockdown, pedestrian fatalities went *up*.
i'm not one to always 100% agree with the gardai/RSA on cause and effect in these cases, but there is probably merit in the assumption they made that the reason was lighter traffic meant faster moving cars.

and it's kinda a pity that this debate has become solely about the safety aspect of the speed limits (though the authorities/council are also largely responsible for this, it's been the main thrust of the campaigns). it's also about liveable cities.
there are plenty of urban roads where motorists can/will claim 'it's safe for me to drive 50km/h on this road' but i suspect i'd counter with 'yes, but you gain *very* little by doing so, whereas those who live on the road have to put up with greater road noise, greater pollution, and yes, increased danger as a pedestrian'.

mr potato head

SeanW wrote: »

Yeah, motorists are really being "subsidised" :pac:

But we are:

As this research indicates, automobility is heavily subsidized in the European Union, at an estimated €500 billion per year, while active transportation represents a benefit to society currently worth an annual €24 billion (cycling) and €66 billion (walking). Specifically, in cities, the long-standing focus on automobility as the favoured transport mode should consequently change.
The Social Cost of Automobility, Cycling and Walking in the European Union. Gössling et al, 2019

The 30km/h speed limits aren't just about safety, they are about a livable city space, discouraging people from making unnecessary car trips, reducing noise, reallocating space to pedestrians and cyclists, reducing energy usage and lots more.

cnocbui

Taxation of motorists amounts to 10% of Irish government revenues. Motorists are not susidised, quite the reverse.

Last year the different taxes on drivers amounted to €4.3bn. This is out of a total of €37.8bn in all forms of taxes generated last year.

https://www.independent.ie/life/motoring/clobbered-drivers-pay-10pc-of-total-tax-take-30321308.html

Ireland has the second highest costs for owning and operating a motor vehicle in the EU.

AndrewJRenko

cnocbui wrote: »

Taxation of motorists amounts to 10% of Irish government revenues. Motorists are not susidised, quite the reverse.

https://www.independent.ie/life/motoring/clobbered-drivers-pay-10pc-of-total-tax-take-30321308.html

Ireland has the second highest costs for owning and operating a motor vehicle in the EU.

The Indo (heavily supported by motoring advertisers) and you seem to have forgotten the cost side of the equation. You can't conclude that motorists aren't subsidised until you check both the costs and the expenditure.

When are motorists going to start paying for the vast amounts of Garda resources and Courts resources that they consume? When are they going to start paying for the vast amounts of public space used for free storage of their private property, particularly on suburban roads? When are motorists going to start paying for their share of the 1500 premature deaths each year?

mr potato head

The literature says otherwise:

"Based on the assumptions described in this study, the cars used within the EU-27 externalize about 373 billion € per year (high estimate) on to other people, other regions and other generations (low estimate: 258 billion €). This is a considerable sum, and it leads to a level of car use that is inefficient from the perspective of society. Because “others” pay for large parts of the costs of transport, Europeans travel by car too much to enable an efficient situation. This in part also explains why there is a high level of congestion in parts of the EU."



Source: Becker, Becker & Gerlach, The True Costs of Automobility: External Costs of Cars Overview on existing estimates in EU-27, TU Dresden

cnocbui

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

The Indo (heavily supported by motoring advertisers) and you seem to have forgotten the cost side of the equation. You can't conclude that motorists aren't subsidised until you check both the costs and the expenditure.

When are motorists going to start paying for the vast amounts of Garda resources and Courts resources that they consume? When are they going to start paying for the vast amounts of public space used for free storage of their private property, particularly on suburban roads? When are motorists going to start paying for their share of the 1500 premature deaths each year?

Are you claiming that the figures for revenue collected from motorists are false? It doesn't matter what the Indo is or who you claim it's supporters are if what is being reported is objectively true.

As for the rest of your anti-motorist diatribe, I am not interested in engaging with that facile nonsense.

AndrewJRenko

cnocbui wrote: »

Are you claiming that the figures for revenue collected from motorists are false?

I'm claiming what I said above - that you seem to have forgotten the cost side of the equation. You can't conclude that motorists aren't subsidised until you check both the costs and the expenditure.

cnocbui

mr potato head wrote: »

The literature says otherwise:

"Based on the assumptions described in this study, the cars used within the EU-27 externalize about 373 billion € per year (high estimate) on to other people, other regions and other generations (low estimate: 258 billion €). This is a considerable sum, and it leads to a level of car use that is inefficient from the perspective of society. Because “others” pay for large parts of the costs of transport, Europeans travel by car too much to enable an efficient situation. This in part also explains why there is a high level of congestion in parts of the EU."



Source: Becker, Becker & Gerlach, The True Costs of Automobility: External Costs of Cars Overview on existing estimates in EU-27, TU Dresden

I propse a simple experiment. Ban every single car from moving on a road anywhere in Europe for a month and see what happens. Morons going on about costs without addressing benefits: must be cyclists.

AndrewJRenko

cnocbui wrote: »

Morons going on about costs without addressing benefits: must be cyclists.

From the person who concluded that motorists definitely weren't subsidised without looking at any of the costs arising, it's hard to take this seriously.

When are drivers going to start paying for these costs?

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1401578458329853954

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1400858887738335236

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1400833538417627137

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1401649250451312646

mr potato head

cnocbui wrote: »

I propose a simple experiment. Ban every single car from moving on a road anywhere in Europe for a month and see what happens. Morons going on about costs without addressing benefits: must be cyclists.

Why did you jump straight to that? I never suggested banning all cars, I simply countered the claim that, as individual drivers, we fully cover the costs of driving.

Driving makes complete sense for much of rural life, and for longer distances, transporting goods etc... but the reality is that there are situations where the negative impact of an activity warrants changes to how we live as it's unsustainable.

Private car use in cities is one of these situations, it has a massive negative impact on society, the cityscape and the economy. There will be people who need to use cars due to move around and should be supported, but a large proportion of our trips are by car are because we choose to because of convienence.

I've posted two studies that present data that our private car use is subsidised by others, but your response is "but cyclists"
It's not an us vs them, it's about a livable, sustainable and efficient city. A 30km/h speed limit is just one of the tools we can use to achieve that.

cnocbui

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

From the person who concluded that motorists definitely weren't subsidised without looking at any of the costs arising, it's hard to take this seriously.

When are drivers going to start paying for these costs?

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1401578458329853954

Oh, brilliant example.

Fire Service Charges & Fees
A guide to Wicklow County Fire Service fees and charges.

The following charges apply for services provided by Wicklow County Fire Service.

The Fire Service charges for the services it provides. Fire charges are an important element in financing the Fire Service as they help fund the cost of providing the service.
Fire Brigade attendance at: Charge:
1. Chimney Fire €250
2. Road Traffic Accident Wage cost + 1/3 Overheads
3. House Fires Wage cost + 1/3 Overheads
4. Business / Factory Fires Wage cost + 1/3 Overheads

https://www.wicklow.ie/Living/Services/Environment/Fire-Services/Fire-Service-Charges-Fees

Motorists pay enormous sums for insurance. When their insurance pays for the associated costs of an accident - that's motorists paying their way and not inflicting a ficticous cost burden that some hard pressed cyclist somehow pics up the tab for.

magicbastarder

an aside, but i was talking to someone about this yesterday - who once had someone refuse to call an ambulance for them because they were afraid they'd be charged for the callout.
i don't know if it's standard across ireland, but DFB will never bill the person calling and will only usually bill the insurance company of the person for whom the call was made (but all bets are off it's a malicious call or for a fire started deliberately, etc.)
they're *not* in the business of chasing people down for money; it'd be a disaster if people hesitated to ring in genuine calls.

cnocbui

magicbastarder wrote: »

an aside, but i was talking to someone about this yesterday - who once had someone refuse to call an ambulance for them because they were afraid they'd be charged for the callout.
i don't know if it's standard across ireland, but DFB will never bill the person calling and will only usually bill the insurance company of the person for whom the call was made (but all bets are off it's a malicious call or for a fire started deliberately, etc.)
they're *not* in the business of chasing people down for money; it'd be a disaster if people hesitated to ring in genuine calls.

I'd believe it. Someone I know would contact the Guards about a grass fire lit by a local arsonist and sort of suggest could they report it to the fire brigade. Had he reported it to the FB himself, he'd be up for a bill for each callout necessitated by this **nker of €900 a time or more. With the Guards reporting it and requesting it be dealt with, there was no massive bill. As there were many such fires lit by this person over many years, the cost to the land owners affected would have been huge.

AndrewJRenko

cnocbui wrote: »

Oh, brilliant example.

https://www.wicklow.ie/Living/Services/Environment/Fire-Services/Fire-Service-Charges-Fees

Motorists pay enormous sums for insurance. When their insurance pays for the associated costs of an accident - that's motorists paying their way and not inflicting a ficticous cost burden that some hard pressed cyclist somehow pics up the tab for.

Oh Wicklow isn't in Dublin.

Do you think the Dublin charge of €500 per hour comes anywhere near covering the actual costs of accidents incidents like those pictured?

AndrewJRenko

SeanW wrote: »

They did accept that there were some limitations in their data, and one of the sources they listed were Garda and/or coroners files. I took that to mean that in some cases, culpability was assigned not by the RSA but by the coroners investigation, death certificates, the Garda investigation etc. But even if one rejects that the figure is as high as 70% pedestrian culpability, one thing is clear. Simplistic narratives like "motorists kill people" is a bit of an oversimplification (at best) and that "drivers" (whether individually or collectively) are sometimes simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Coroners don’t attribute blame and death certificates don’t attribute blame. So we’re left with one option – Gardai. If that’s what is going on here, I’d expect to see clear Garda guidelines on the decision to attribute blame, not just the ticking of one box by the one Garda who happens to be dealing with the paperwork. Given the car-centric principles and active hostility to active travel clearly demonstrated by Garda, as recently as last week, I’d be highly dubious about the reliability of opinions on culpability of individual Gardai, which seems to be what’s going on here.
Could you give any examples of cases where the motorist was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time please?

SeanW wrote: »

Anecdotally, my experience as a pedestrian is that genuinely threatening behaviour by individuals driving is extremely rare, so I'm inclined to believe that the number of culpable drivers is at the lower end.

The number of incidents clearly visible on Twitter and YouTube, and the number of additional anecdotes on Twitter would lead me to believe that the number of culpable drivers more clearly matches factual data, like the 98% of drivers we see breaching speed limits.

SeanW wrote: »

Yes, motorists should "pay their fair share"

• Road tax (i.e. Motor Tax)
• Insurance
• Levies on insurance to pay for failed insurers, uninsured drivers etc.
• Vehicle Registration Tax
• Fuel duties
• Carbon taxes
• NCT fees
• motorway and bridge tolls
• VAT on most of the above
• Plus all the other taxes that people pay for common services like income tax, VAT, various consumption taxes.

Yeah, motorists are really being "subsidised" :pac:

Expenses like insurance and tolls aren’t contributions for the greater good. They are simply costs of motoring. If you’re going to choose a vehicle that is capable of doing tens or hundreds of thousands of euro of damage to a person or a property with relative ease, then you’re going to have accept some degree of insurance to ensure that damage caused is paid for.
As for the broader issue, see
https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=117365540&postcount=1303

SeanW wrote: »

Not by choice.

Actually, it really is by choice. Motorists choose to drive, frequently for short journeys that are easily walked or cycled. They then manage through extreme cognitive dissonance to disassociate that decision with heavy traffic levels, as if traffic is caused by other people, not by their own decision to drive around with four empty seats for that 1km school run or 2km run to the shops.

SeanW wrote: »

Your claim that Ireland has "poor public health outcomes" is a provable falsehood. As to your claim that 1500 people die every year due to poor air quality, that requires some explanation in a country where air quality is generally good. At best, I suspect that your figure comes from some theoretical model, and that's being generous. It's even more bizarre considering that the few countries that have higher life-expectancies than Ireland often have much worse air quality (like Japan, which has a longer LE despite generally having moderate air quality). One thing is clear - your "poor public health outcomes" and "polluted air" claims are overwrought at best.

Seriously?
Poor air quality cases more premature deaths that drivers.
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/public-consultation-on-new-air-quality-regime-ends-friday-1.4464703#:~:text=Air%20pollution%20was%20linked%20to,toll%20on%20the%20Republic's%20roads.

We’re well on our way to having the highest obesity rates in Europe. https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/ireland-set-to-be-most-obese-country-in-europe-who-says-1.2201731
We have the fifth highest cancer rates in Europe.
https://www.ncri.ie/news/article/cancer-incidence-ireland-and-recent-eu-survey
We have among the highest rates of Type 1 diabetes in Europe
https://www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-news/health-news/ireland-one-highest-rates-type-13664438
We have some of the highest rates of hypertension in the world;
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/irish-blood-pressure-problem-revealed-in-international-study-1.4013974
We’ve tripled the number of cars on our roads over a generation, so we’re not walking, and we’re not cycling. We’re setting up our kids for a lifetime of obesity, probably the first generation to have worse health than their parents.
And each and every one of your hostile posts about ‘menacing cyclists’ make it just a little bit harder for people to choose active travel.

SeanW wrote: »

Not that it matters in any case, as our government has signaled a phase out of Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) cars in favour of electric cars, and those cause zero air pollution. So the "air quality" argument, weak though it is in a country with good air quality and very high life expectancies, will be completely irrelevant within a decade or so.

Zero air pollution from EVs? If only.
https://www.me.ucr.edu/news/2020/10/05/brake-and-tire-wear-particles-emerging-source-air-pollution

SeanW wrote: »

The bolded statements are self-contradicting. :eek:
But however intended, your claim is false. Your use of such loaded terminology is clearly intended to place the blame squarely on a collective, homogenous group of "motorists" or "drivers", furthermore "kill" is usually read as "cause the death of."

To be fair, your misleading statement could be read in one of two ways, both of them false.

1. That all 2,820,528+ motorists/drivers collectively kill or 2 or 3 people every week on our roads.
2. That individual drivers - not connected in any way with any other driver or drivers - kill 2 or 3 people every week.

The first is a lie because 2,820,528+ "motorists" are not a giant collective hive mind killing some macabre quota of "people" every week. Any implication that "motorists" as a whole are killing people is just a straight up lie. The second is false because in many cases the so-called killer was not responsible, or the circumstances were such that it would be very strange (e.g. single occupant, single vehicle collisions) to say "members of that group killed that person"
More broadly though, there are two possibilities. Either "motorists" as a collective are "killing people" (i.e. never involved in collisions they didn't cause, or single occupant/vehicle collisions) or there's a little more to road safety than your false soundbites.

There is no contradiction. There is no claim of collective responsibility – just another strawman. There is no claim of murderous intent. That doesn’t change the facts that 2 or 3 people are killed here just about every week as a result of car crashes.


Pop Quiz: How many times last week did Irish Rail announce delays to services because some idiot driver hit one of their bridges or level crossings?

Beta Ray Bill

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

From the person who concluded that motorists definitely weren't subsidised without looking at any of the costs arising, it's hard to take this seriously.

When are drivers going to start paying for these costs?

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1401578458329853954

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1400858887738335236

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1400833538417627137

https://twitter.com/DubFireBrigade/status/1401649250451312646

How many of these cars were stolen and being driven by criminals?
I'll give you a hint... it's more than one.
Driver of the first one in Swords was only out of prison 2 weeks. :mad:

As for the M50....
It's hard to believe people crash on it, everyone moving in the same direction and there are still collisions, I don't get it.

Seth Brundle

Beta Ray Bill wrote: »

How many of these cars were stolen and being driven by criminals?
I'll give you a hint... it's more than one.
Driver of the first one in Swords was only out of prison 2 weeks. :mad:

I take it for granted that you've no evidence to back this up.
However, rolls such as these are not uncommon and it would be unfair to say that it is all down to criminal elements. Most can be attributed to nothing other than driving at an inappropriate speed and not paying enough attention.

Beta Ray Bill wrote: »

As for the M50....
It's hard to believe people crash on it, everyone moving in the same direction and there are still collisions, I don't get it.

Tailgaiting. Phone use. Drivers changing lanes repeatedly.
Like the above, a combination of inappropriate speed and inattention.

Beta Ray Bill

Seth Brundle wrote: »

I take it for granted that you've no evidence to back this up.
However, rolls such as these are not uncommon and it would be unfair to say that it is all down to criminal elements. Most can be attributed to nothing other than driving at an inappropriate speed and not paying enough attention.

I know a few Garda
The Swords lad was trying to overtake and, hit a speed bump, lost control and then hit the kerb that divides that road and the cycle lane and then flipped it.

Seth Brundle wrote: »

Tailgaiting. Phone use. Drivers changing lanes repeatedly.
Like the above, a combination of inappropriate speed and inattention.

I think the word you're looking for is "stupidity"
I've often wondered what happens to people that cause serious incidents on motorways. Aside for the danger to the other drivers directly involved, the inconvenience that's put upon others is awful.

I'd be in favor of a Motorway ban if you were found to be the person that caused a collision. (minimum 5 year ban)

AndrewJRenko

Beta Ray Bill wrote: »

How many of these cars were stolen and being driven by criminals?
I'll give you a hint... it's more than one.
Driver of the first one in Swords was only out of prison 2 weeks. :mad:
:

Given that we have 98% of drivers breaking speed limits, I'd say most cars are driven by criminals.

But regardless, so what? Why do we allow these vehicles on our streets without appropriate controls, including speed limiters?

Phil.x

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

Given that we have 98% of drivers breaking speed limits, I'd say most cars are driven by criminals.

But regardless, so what? Why do we allow these vehicles on our streets without appropriate controls, including speed limiters?

Given 100% of cyclists smash through every red light, I'd say completely ban or tax them to obliteration.

CramCycle

Beta Ray Bill wrote: »

As for the M50....
It's hard to believe people crash on it, everyone moving in the same direction and there are still collisions, I don't get it.

As someone who drives the M50 regularly for work, I am surprised there are so little accidents, tailgating, swerving into braking space, phone usage, inability of drivers to look past the car in front and late reacting. It is actually a testament to many drivers who make up for this poor behaviour as it is the only explanation for so few accidents. A road designed with wider lanes to account for drift and you still have a few people drift over unintentionally. Indicators seem to only come on as they move.
This is the problem with generalisations though, most drivers are very good but enough are bad enough to warrant stricter rules and laws. most cyclists are very good as well, and while rules and laws are there so that they cannot plead ignorance when they are stupid, it is again only a minority who really take the piss and put themselves in any danger.

CramCycle

Phil.x wrote: »

Given 100% of cyclists smash through every red light, I'd say completely ban or tax them to obliteration.

Your mileage may vary, but my experiences along the N11 are that numbers wise, more cars run red lights than cyclists. Which is unfair to say as there are more cars, so doing it as an observed % of users with the ability to run red lights, cyclists are between 0% and 50%, cars are between 0% and on one occasion 87.5%, although typically closer to 50% as well. Maybe it is just a case of a percentage of people run red lights and their mode of transport is irrelevant.