Metrication - the final steps?

Zaph

I've no problem with the switch, but I do think that if the government wanted to do it they should have put in place some mechanism, a subsidy perhaps, for people to have their speedos changed over to kph at minimal expense. There'll be a major glut of people clocking up penalty points in the first couple of months until they get used to looking at the inner scale on their speedo. I know on my car it's not particularly easy to read. Even more worrying is that there may be an increase in accidents as people drive at inappropriate speeds. I sincerely hope I'm wrong about that.

lomb

price rises above inflation. gross house price rises due to low interest rates which cannot be increased due to a defective continental economy. and all this when our main trade partner isnt a member of it even.

Stephen

Keep on fighting the power there lomb. Why do we Irish always have to be dragged kicking and screaming into the modern world?

lomb

do you really think the french and german are in the modern world? i can assure u they arent.

as i said the proof of the pudding is they have dragged poor economys into their own and screwed there own economies up? for what? they cant look after themselves how can u trust these children to look after anyone here?

the only reason they persue these policies is they do what they are paid to do- they are diplomats. they enjoy fine dinners, wining and dining in fine surroundings having converstions about grandiose things.

i wouldnt trust the bastards with a fiver of my money. they havent got a clue.

simu

lomb wrote:

do you really think the french and german are in the modern world? i can assure u they arent.

as i said the proof of the pudding is they have dragged poor economys into their own and screwed there own economies up? for what? they cant look after themselves how can u trust these children to look after anyone here?

the only reason they persue these policies is they do what they are paid to do- they are diplomats. they enjoy fine dinners, wining and dining in fine surroundings having converstions about grandiose things.

i wouldnt trust the bastards with a fiver of my money. they havent got a clue.

Start your own anti-EU party then! You know you want to!

Johnny Storm

Does anyone know who actually decided on our behalf that Ireland would change to the metric system for roads/speeds? Was it a minister ? An unCivil servant?

I'd be interested to know how much this will cost and what the supposed benefits are.

What basis did they make this decision on ?

lomb

that is the million dollar or should i say euro question johnny storm.

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

mike65

Why is it the "innocent" looking threads that degenerate into barbarism?!

lomb this is a motoring forum, if you want to re-run old politcal arguments we have a forum for that sort of thing here.

As for the changover, who knows maybe one or two will be killed but it'll only be cos they're stupid. Not beacuse the signs say "80 km/h" rather than 50.

Anyways it a fait accomplis (whoops!).

Mike.

OfflerCrocGod

mike65

Play nice!

Mike.

Johnny Storm

daveirl wrote:

This post has been deleted.

Thanks Daveirl. I think everyone would agree that its a very good idea to have speed limits in harmony with distance signs.
What I'm asking is "Is it worth the cost?" and "Who decided we were going to do this?"
IMHO the cost will include the actual cost of replacing existing signs, the cost of updating speedos in existing cars and the intangible cost of introducing confusion and danger to the roads plus the costs of adverts notifying people about the change etc


Let me share my perosnal experience with the board. My wife's car has its speedo in KPH only. I have a post-it pad with KPH to MPH figures on teh dashboard. I am a conscientous and safe driver so most of the time I am just keeping up with other traffic so no problem. For me anyway the problem does arrise when I see a potential radar cop in the doistance. The "thought" (using the word loosly)-process goes as follows:
1) What is the spped limit on this road in MPH?
2) Look at KPH speedo.
3) Look at post-it pad
4) Try to calculate current speed in MPH
@in' clue. Jam on brakes.
It may sound stupid but it is hard to do while driving and very definately distracts you from what you are supposed to be doing.
This is the same situat6ion that everyone with an MPH speedo will find thmselves in when we go metric

viking

Johnny Storm wrote:

My wife's car has its speedo in KPH only. I have a post-it pad with KPH to MPH figures on teh dashboard.....It may sound stupid but it is hard to do while driving and very definately distracts you from what you are supposed to be doing.
This is the same situat6ion that everyone with an MPH speedo will find thmselves in when we go metric

I too have a small sticker with KPH-MPH figures on the dial and for me its second nature now to automatically do the conversion in my head.

48Kph = 30Mph
64Kph = 40Mph
80Kph = 50Mph
96Kph = 60Mph
112Kph = 70Mph

In fact I can't even remember the last time I looked down at the sticker. People will get used to this quicker than they think, its the old "Holy God, my life will change completely" mentality thats blowing this out of proportion.

lomb

of course people will adapt.
but it is a costly and utterly pointless adaption.
why is it in the uk mph will live on into the 22 century and we are selling out?
the reality is the politicians here arent fit to command a kids party. what qualifies these idiots to hold office? any fool can become a politician. what qualifications that show any intelligence do they have?
the distances when in km were a minor and also needless annoyance compared to the costly and dangerous mistake thats going to occur now.

halkar

At last we know when to arrive to our destinations. It was pain trying to estimate looking at km with 60mph. Galyway 189km, doing 60mph, wtf

Change is good

lomb

it would have been cheaper to change the very few km distance signs back to mph than change the millions of speed signs to kph.

the confusion could raise the death toll by 5 or 6% conceivably. the cost could be 20+million euros. the confusion this creates will be unquantifiable but sure its something to talk 'bout..........

Zaph

Originally posted by lomb

the confusion could raise the death toll by 5 or 6% conceivably. the cost could be 20+million euros

And you're getting your figures from where exactly?

Originally posted by lomb

the reality is the politicians here arent fit to command a kids party. what qualifies these idiots to hold office? any fool can become a politician. what qualifications that show any intelligence do they have?

What qualifies any politician to hold office? Politicians in this country have demonstrated far more imaginative ways of proving they're unfit than simply changing the speed limits. I hardly think this is an issue that would disbar them from office and your reaction to the chageover is completely out of proportion.

halkar

lomb wrote:

it would have been cheaper to change the very few km distance signs back to mph than change the millions of speed signs to kph.

It probably cost more to change those signs back to mph, considering the labour involved where as they can just take the small old mph signs down and replace with the new ones.

Maybe we should change all the signs to digital in case someone decide to change again

Stark

lomb wrote:

the confusion could raise the death toll by 5 or 6% conceivably.

Darwinism at its best. Maybe you should stay off the roads yourself and give people a chance.

lomb

quote: the cost could be 20+million euros
accorting to irishtrucker website 58000 speed signs. minister says need to remove old ones and dig foundations for new ones. cost of this approx 350 euro minimum per sign= 20+mill

quote: death toll could increase 5 or 6% conceivably
this is conceivable. the speed limits are actually going to be raised by 5% hence death toll could increase. limit on crap irish national roads will be 100km/h.
motorways will be 120km/h.

also the death rate may increase due to confusion ie. some old codger thinks the speed limit is 100 mph........

lomb

http://www.irishtrucker.com/news/2004/december/1612041.asp

mike65

Stop discusing this like anythings going to change! Its not, its done. If you are so offended write to the minister for transport here - info@transport.ie or martin.cullen@oireachtas.irlgov.ie

Mike.

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

flyz

lomb wrote:

quote: death toll could increase 5 or 6% conceivably
this is conceivable. the speed limits are actually going to be raised by 5% hence death toll could increase. limit on crap irish national roads will be 100km/h.
motorways will be 120km/h.
also the death rate may increase due to confusion ie. some old codger thinks the speed limit is 100 mph........

(I haven't read all the postings on this thread yet)

Pardon me if I'm wrong, but I thought one of the advantages of changing the speed limits to KM was so that they could review some of the idiotic speedlimits on some roads.
And they are idiotic at the moment. For those Cork people I'll give the road between Tower and Blarney as one example, and the Commons Road / North Ring road as another. No one keeps to the 30m/h anyway, hopefully they'll be more realistic.

Some of the crap irish roads will only be 80km/h, as far as I know not all Irish roads will be 100km/h.

flyz

An extract/footnote from a book called Good Omens (Pratchett / Gaiman) :

"The British resisted decimalisation for so long because they thought it was too complicated." .. Penny = £1/240 = 1/12s = 1d Threepence = 3 pence Sixpence = £1/40 = 1/2s = 6 pence Five New Pence = £1/20 = 1s = 12d Ten New Pence = £1/10 = 2s =24d Ten shillings = £1/2 = 10s Pound = 20s Five pounds = £5 = 100s ..

Heathen

im chuffed!! my car is kph only

at leats now i'll be certain im doing the legal limit coming up to radars etc..

later
Macker

Tommy Vercetti

Macker Eire wrote:

im chuffed!! my car is kph only

at leats now i'll be certain im doing the legal limit coming up to radars etc..

I'm sure there was never a doubt!
Mine's KPH only too, I survived long enough so I'm sure everyone except Lomb will be ok with it. He should go back to a horse and cart.

Victor

Tommy Vercetti wrote:

He should go back to a horse and cart.

but the wheels might remind him ...

http://collections.ic.gc.ca/ghost/images/photo.cartwheel.vm.full.jpg

http://www.campertour.com/Maspeesa.jpg

... them new-fangled circle things ...

BrianD

it would have been cheaper to change the very few km distance signs back to mph than change the millions of speed signs to kph.

As someone said earlier all distance signs in the RoI are in Km's. You might find an old fingerpost up a mountain somewhere in miles but that's about it.

the confusion could raise the death toll by 5 or 6% conceivably. the cost could be 20+million euros. the confusion this creates will be unquantifiable but sure its something to talk 'bout..........

I habe never read so much rubbish in all my life. Would you care to back up this assumption with some hard facts from elsewhere in the world? The bottom line is that any plonker that thinks that the speed limit in a built up area is 50MPH or 110MPH should have car and licence confiscated on the grounds of plain stupidity.

The good news is that an additional 23,000 speed limit signs are being erected along with the existing signs that are being replaced. The only concern I would have is that there does not seem a strategy on how these signs should be positioned on roads.

I believe that some car marques will not have an MPH clock within the KPH clock at all.

lomb

BrianD wrote:

As someone said earlier all distance signs in the RoI are in Km's. You might find an old fingerpost up a mountain somewhere in miles but that's about it.



I habe never read so much rubbish in all my life. Would you care to back up this assumption with some hard facts from elsewhere in the world? The bottom line is that any plonker that thinks that the speed limit in a built up area is 50MPH or 110MPH should have car and licence confiscated on the grounds of plain stupidity.

The good news is that an additional 23,000 speed limit signs are being erected along with the existing signs that are being replaced. The only concern I would have is that there does not seem a strategy on how these signs should be positioned on roads.

I believe that some car marques will not have an MPH clock within the KPH clock at all.

speed limits will increase 5 to 6% hence deats may increase by that.