Do we have an excess of road policing in New Zealand?

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#1408023 16-Oct-2015 18:45

MikeB4:

Why is a 10% power reduction so dangerous ? The vehicle will maintain speed and the driver has been warned prior. You can have greater effect by a headwind on the Wellington urban motorway.
You seem to have the notion that when the power drops 10% the vehicle will suddenly stop or reduce speed rapidly it won't. The 10% Wil feel like a headwind or going up a small gradient.

'The amount of power the engine puts out is something any driver adapts to. It guides how heavy you accelerate, how heavy you brake, and basically how you drive. Once again, spontaneously changing the power output is going to result in the driver basically driving an unfamiliar vehicle. And you talk about 10kW drops - to my vehicle, that's actually a 30kW drop. To some vehicles it will be even more drastic.

The reality is, your idea will make people no safer. It will in fact make people less safer. And you still don't even bother to answer half the concerns, simply repeating the same answer.

Fatigue is nowhere near the problem you make it out to be. For how small a problem it is, the solution is education, enforcement, and people taking responsibility for their own actions. Simple. And it frustrates me no end when people advocate just "make a technical solution" when social change is the clear winner.

JimmyH

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#1408805 18-Oct-2015 20:28

MikeB4:
Jase2985:
MikeB4:
JimmyH:
MikeB4: My car will bring up a message on the driver management display telling me it's time for a rest which is good and I always stop for a rest. What would be better is all vehicles fitted with a device that will reduce the power output of the vehicle if the rest brake is not taken
and progressively reduces the power until complied with.

Providing that the vehicles are heavily advertised as such, so I can make sure I never buy one.

Life is full of annoyances, without having my car nag me as well.

I don't tend to drive long distances, and when I do it's for a reason. The last thing I want is to be miles from anywhere, in deteriorating weather, possibly rushing someone to hospital, and have my car decide to shut itself down because some software engineer thinks they know better than me.

It should be mandatory on all vehicles.

explain why, instead of just saying it should be

Driver fatigue is a factor in road accidents, it can be as imparring as alcohol/drugs. A device that enforces rest breaks is a step to reduce our appalling accident and death rates.

So, for instance, I go on a trip with my GF, after six hours I get tired so she takes over. After having driven for an hour the car shuts down because it thinks the driver must be fatigued after driving for seven hours (when she has driven for one)?

Or it's late at night. I can't get a bed in a small town in bad weather. But while I can get a booking in the next one I can't drive there and am stranded because my car decides in its wisdom I should have to spend the night in the snow?

Or I'm urgently driving someone to hospital with an serious appendicitis (I have actually had to do this!) and half way there the car decides to turn itself off?

Why should any of this be mandatory? And who would actually buy a car with that "feature"? The first thing I would do is disable it. I am the best judge of whether I'm safe to drive, and judge the circumstances - and I'm actually pretty cautious about that.

JimmyH

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#1408812 18-Oct-2015 20:37

MikeB4:

I was not suggesting shutting I was suggesting gradually reducing the power output until a rest break is taken. E.G 10% drop every 5 minutes until a minimum of 20% is reached.

On our network we had a programme that forced rest beaks, the computer forced micro pauses and after x number of pauses a minutes rest break was forced. Now from memory those computers did not kill anyone yet we had this in place for safety.

I wouldn't like to be stuck in alpine conditions on a mountain road, with only 20% power!

And Ah yes, I think you are describing Workpace on computers. Loathsome software. Utterly annoying and horrible.

My last employer installed it and wouldn't remove it. We all kill it (control-shift-escape, end process) when we log in. It's roundly disliked. At the end I had a batch file, which waited for 9 seconds, then ran "taskkill /f workpace.exe" automatically every time the machine restarted. Those micro pauses and irritating rest videos made us feel like we were back in primary school.

One of the control freaks who pedaled this junk piously told us this sort of thing was logged, and if we disabled Workpace we would be detected and reported to our manager. I replied saying "I disabled it every morning and wasn't going to stop, my manager is XXX and here is their email and phone extension, knock yourself out". Three years later, nothing had happened.

MikeB4

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#1408851 18-Oct-2015 20:59

JimmyH:
MikeB4:

I was not suggesting shutting I was suggesting gradually reducing the power output until a rest break is taken. E.G 10% drop every 5 minutes until a minimum of 20% is reached.

On our network we had a programme that forced rest beaks, the computer forced micro pauses and after x number of pauses a minutes rest break was forced. Now from memory those computers did not kill anyone yet we had this in place for safety.

I wouldn't like to be stuck in alpine conditions on a mountain road, with only 20% power!

And Ah yes, I think you are describing Workpace on computers. Loathsome software. Utterly annoying and horrible.

My last employer installed it and wouldn't remove it. We all kill it (control-shift-escape, end process) when we log in. It's roundly disliked. At the end I had a batch file, which waited for 9 seconds, then ran "taskkill /f workpace.exe" automatically every time the machine restarted. Those micro pauses and irritating rest videos made us feel like we were back in primary school.

One of the control freaks who pedaled this junk piously told us this sort of thing was logged, and if we disabled Workpace we would be detected and reported to our manager. I replied saying "I disabled it every morning and wasn't going to stop, my manager is XXX and here is their email and phone extension, knock yourself out". Three years later, nothing had happened.

Have a ten minute rest and you have 100%

MikeB4

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#1408852 18-Oct-2015 20:59

JimmyH:
MikeB4:
Jase2985:
MikeB4:
JimmyH:
MikeB4: My car will bring up a message on the driver management display telling me it's time for a rest which is good and I always stop for a rest. What would be better is all vehicles fitted with a device that will reduce the power output of the vehicle if the rest brake is not taken
and progressively reduces the power until complied with.

Providing that the vehicles are heavily advertised as such, so I can make sure I never buy one.

Life is full of annoyances, without having my car nag me as well.

I don't tend to drive long distances, and when I do it's for a reason. The last thing I want is to be miles from anywhere, in deteriorating weather, possibly rushing someone to hospital, and have my car decide to shut itself down because some software engineer thinks they know better than me.

It should be mandatory on all vehicles.

explain why, instead of just saying it should be

Driver fatigue is a factor in road accidents, it can be as imparring as alcohol/drugs. A device that enforces rest breaks is a step to reduce our appalling accident and death rates.

So, for instance, I go on a trip with my GF, after six hours I get tired so she takes over. After having driven for an hour the car shuts down because it thinks the driver must be fatigued after driving for seven hours (when she has driven for one)?

Or it's late at night. I can't get a bed in a small town in bad weather. But while I can get a booking in the next one I can't drive there and am stranded because my car decides in its wisdom I should have to spend the night in the snow?

Or I'm urgently driving someone to hospital with an serious appendicitis (I have actually had to do this!) and half way there the car decides to turn itself off?

Why should any of this be mandatory? And who would actually buy a car with that "feature"? The first thing I would do is disable it. I am the best judge of whether I'm safe to drive, and judge the circumstances - and I'm actually pretty cautious about that.

Have a ten minute rest and you have 100%

TonyR1973

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#1408922 18-Oct-2015 23:14

MikeB4:
TonyR1973:
MikeB4: I believe insurance should be mandatory in order to drive, that does not imply compulsion as driving cars is not compulsory.

The question is how would it affect you if it was compulsory to have motor vehicle insurance as opposed to the current situation? Aside, of course, from the obvious premium fleecing you'd be getting.

Compulsion to do something is still compulsion regardless of whether the underlying reason for that compulsion is optional. It's not compulsory to have an income, but if you choose to it's compulsory to account for it and to pay tax according to the rules.

MikeB4: I also believe it should be mandatory that any work done on vehicles concerning safety and structural integrity etc should be carried out only by appropriately certified personnel and the work certified and those certifications carried with the vehicle at all times.

That's nice. Having experts deciding what's good and what's not certainly helped prevent the leaky homes which had occurred many times previously when amateurs were allowed to build their own homes. Oh, wait...

I equate positions such as yours with turkeys voting for an early Thanksgiving.

So we need certified plumbers to do certain work ...... not a lot of plumbing related deaths in NZ
We need certified electricians to do certain electrical work.... what is the death rate in NZ from electrical work.?

Yet we allow any back yard self claimed expert to tamper with the brakes etc on cars and they do have a high death rate in NZ

How many deaths or even injuries from brake failures attributable to these back yard self-claimed experts? I can't recall any.

I do recall non-self claimed experts being found responsible for a death from a truck wheel coming adrift on the southern motorway a few years ago and crashing through a bus though.

ScuL: Relevant to what's been suggested above.. here's a direction conversion of all traffic violations & mechanical faults that will result in a fine in The Netherlands; converted to NZD:

If they started enforcing those laws here rather than their current blinkered "speed kills" approach to road safety perhaps we'd actually see an improvement in driving standards. I read the other day that we're currently up 35 deaths on the same time last year for the road toll.

jarledb: The argument that the premiums would be higher seems strange to me. Its not like this is not a cost that has to be handled by the insurance companies in NZ today. If anything, everyone being required to have insurance should get the costs down, because some of the losses they are making from having to cover uninsured drivers that can't pay for themselves would be covered by the premiums.

Please explain the logic behind higher premiums and feel free to give me a link that shows that has been the case anywhere else?

The NZ Insurance Council warned using this point in their submissions the last time it was debated.

Jase2985: you are wanting to turn this country into a nanny state. most of the things you have mentioned is issues that people can deal with themselves. instead of cuddling or what your suggesting why not just make people more aware of it.

It sure seems that way to me too.

Jase2985: your example in the car, people can just ignore it, it changes nothing.

Especially easy to ignore when the power has been reduced making the trip even more monotonous and you've nodded off from boredom! ;-) It's an utterly stupid idea.

Kyanar

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#1408936 18-Oct-2015 23:43

MikeB4:
Have a ten minute rest and you have 100%

This is absolutely not an acceptable answer. All of these are valid reasons why this is a silly idea, and you just brush it off with what equates to "I know better than you". This is why people are getting annoyed with you here.

You need to understand that for a start, an element of risk is one of the prices we pay for a free society. This is why alcohol interlocks are not standard on cars, and are only required when someone proves that society cannot trust them. And why governors are outright no longer fitted on cars. Remember governors? Yeah. Dumb idea then, and remain so now.

Second, people do not like being dictated to, and you are basically advocating yet more government dictating. No thanks.

Third, you cannot simply brush off valid arguments against the idea (or simply refuse to answer anyone who disagrees with you with a rebuttal you have no answer for).

Tradepub

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nzkiwiman

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#1409233 19-Oct-2015 14:16

Geektastic:
ScuL: Don't get me started on that. I'm used to driving 130km/h on a daily basis and have been doing so for the last 15 years (which is the recommended maximum speed limit in nearly all of the EU).
115km/h is perfectly safe on a dual carriageway with road conditions like that. Sometimes I have to nudge myself not to fall asleep with the low limits in this country, but I manage because I am a strong believer in sticking to road laws. It's just taking a while for NZ to upgrade parts of its key infrastructure to 2x2 120km/h standards. The cars are more than capable of doing so, it's just about filling the gaps in the infrastructure before policy can change. I suspect (and hope) that once the Waikato Expressway is complete past Hamilton we will see an increase to 110km/h if not 120km/h on that road.

Taking a while?!

The main routes on the NI SH1 and SH2 still have sections that qualify as "Goat Track Grade 1" just about!

If we were serious about improving road safety and reducing the time wasted moving things around by road, a new dual carriageway between Wellington and Auckland and Picton and Christchurch would be half done by now.

They could never do it though (even if they had the cash) because they have foolishly let everyone believe that their personal views on such projects actually matter and can stop/divert/delay such things more or less indefinitely.

I haven't travelled Picton to Christchurch in a while, but around Kaikoura you wouldn't be able to make a dual carriageway.
Pretty sure you could do a dual carriageway from Christchurch down to Timaru without too much effort, maybe even to Oamaru
Between Oamaru and Dunedin it would be tricker but from Dunedin through to Invercargill I can't see too many issues.

Speaking of speeding - travelling up to Christchurch on Friday I saw my first marked speed camera van - had something like Police Safety Vehicle written on the side.
Saw the unmarked vans a couple of times as well travelling back to Dunedin. Thankfully passing all three I was either under the speed limit or had cruise control (set for 103km) so I do not expect any tickets in the mail.

Of course, its not a nice long drive without some inappropriate driving - managed to do my fastest speed (170km) on a passing lane outside of Ashburton in order to pass a large truck (passed one, then saw the other and went for it). Thankfully I had a very clear view of the road and there was nothing coming and nothing hidden on the side of the road to stop my journey.

mdooher

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#1409259 19-Oct-2015 14:40

nzkiwiman:

Of course, its not a nice long drive without some inappropriate driving - managed to do my fastest speed (170km) on a passing lane outside of Ashburton.

OMG and you are still alive? How is this possible? Didn't you come close to losing control? Didn't the other motorists freak out? I don't believe its even possible to reach these speeds on New Zealand roads.

Matthew

TonyR1973

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#1409540 20-Oct-2015 01:09

mdooher:
nzkiwiman:

Of course, its not a nice long drive without some inappropriate driving - managed to do my fastest speed (170km) on a passing lane outside of Ashburton.

OMG and you are still alive? How is this possible? Didn't you come close to losing control? Didn't the other motorists freak out? I don't believe its even possible to reach these speeds on New Zealand roads.

Of course, this didn't happen. He would have instantly died. I know this because the gubbermint tells me so.

RUKI

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#1409676 20-Oct-2015 10:20

mdooher:
nzkiwiman:

Of course, its not a nice long drive without some inappropriate driving - managed to do my fastest speed (170km) on a passing lane outside of Ashburton.

OMG and you are still alive? How is this possible? Didn't you come close to losing control? Didn't the other motorists freak out? I don't believe its even possible to reach these speeds on New Zealand roads.

What I like about NZ Roads is a speed limit. It is reasonable. No rush. Few seconds of early arrival will not make any difference in your life.
If you wish adrenalin to pump in - there are courses for mad horses - go and crash your car over there, not on the public road.
And please, before you push pedal to the metal, be conscious about those who wish you back home in one piece....

If you are rushing because of the business - I am making a statement for you: "If you important – they will wait".
During last 12 years here without speeding - I have only being late once – for the job interview. Stuck in a traffic jam. They waited for me 30 minutes…. Speeding to get their earlier – would not make any difference…
At the end of the day, it is good to know "what day is it today" in New Zealand. "-ish hour" is a wide spread accepted habbit. Why people are still speeding?

nzkiwiman

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#1409752 20-Oct-2015 11:54

mdooher:
nzkiwiman:

Of course, its not a nice long drive without some inappropriate driving - managed to do my fastest speed (170km) on a passing lane outside of Ashburton.

OMG and you are still alive? How is this possible? Didn't you come close to losing control? Didn't the other motorists freak out? I don't believe its even possible to reach these speeds on New Zealand roads.

Clearly I am still alive
No hint of stabilisation issues with the car at that speed - unlike my old car which at 145km (or higher) started to twitch.

MikeB4

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#1409755 20-Oct-2015 12:02

nzkiwiman:
mdooher:
nzkiwiman:

Of course, its not a nice long drive without some inappropriate driving - managed to do my fastest speed (170km) on a passing lane outside of Ashburton.

OMG and you are still alive? How is this possible? Didn't you come close to losing control? Didn't the other motorists freak out? I don't believe its even possible to reach these speeds on New Zealand roads.

Clearly I am still alive
No hint of stabilisation issues with the car at that speed - unlike my old car which at 145km (or higher) started to twitch.

If you are genuinely bragging of driving on public roads at 170km/h or 145km/h there are bigger issues here, however I believe you are simply trolling

DizzyD

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#1409759 20-Oct-2015 12:14

nzkiwiman:
mdooher:
nzkiwiman:

Of course, its not a nice long drive without some inappropriate driving - managed to do my fastest speed (170km) on a passing lane outside of Ashburton.

OMG and you are still alive? How is this possible? Didn't you come close to losing control? Didn't the other motorists freak out? I don't believe its even possible to reach these speeds on New Zealand roads.

Clearly I am still alive
No hint of stabilisation issues with the car at that speed - unlike my old car which at 145km (or higher) started to twitch.

170km/h is really fast for NZ roads. Bad roads/Really bad other drivers with the "I was here first/don't overtake me" mentality. IMO thats what causes most of our crashes.

230km/h though on Germany's Autobahn is like a Sundays drive. Been there done that, bought the TShirt and mug!

I blame our bad roads for the high amount of deaths in NZ, Per Capita 7.4 people out of every 100k. Germany has just 4.3. In other words you far safer driving in Germany on the Autoban where in most places no speed limit is enforced. Speed does not kill and sometimes I think that here in NZ we are just waisting our time with all the enforcements, and extra road policing. That money could be better spent on better roads, which will do a far better job at reducing our very high road death toll.

scuwp

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#1409765 20-Oct-2015 12:26

DizzyD:
nzkiwiman:
mdooher:
nzkiwiman:

Of course, its not a nice long drive without some inappropriate driving - managed to do my fastest speed (170km) on a passing lane outside of Ashburton.

OMG and you are still alive? How is this possible? Didn't you come close to losing control? Didn't the other motorists freak out? I don't believe its even possible to reach these speeds on New Zealand roads.

Clearly I am still alive
No hint of stabilisation issues with the car at that speed - unlike my old car which at 145km (or higher) started to twitch.

170km/h is really fast for NZ roads. Bad roads/Really bad other drivers with the "I was here first/don't overtake me" mentality. IMO thats what causes most of our crashes.

230km/h though on Germany's Autobahn is like a Sundays drive. Been there done that, bought the TShirt and mug!

I blame our bad roads for the high amount of deaths in NZ, Per Capita 7.4 people out of every 100k. Germany has just 4.3. In other words you far safer driving in Germany on the Autoban where in most places no speed limit is enforced. Speed does not kill and sometimes I think that here in NZ we are just waisting our time with all the enforcements, and extra road policing. That money could be better spent on better roads, which will do a far better job at reducing our very high road death toll.

Perfect roads are expensive to build and maintain. If we had a 5 star highway all over NZ the country would be broke.

Road safety is joint responsibility, there is no silver bullet. We need good drivers, operating good cars, on good roads. Education & enforcement is needed for the first one, vehicle safety standards are always developing (although NZ's average car fleet at about 13 years from memory doesn't help that much), and better highways are being built all the time with safety design standards upgrading on many existing roads.

Lazy is such an ugly word, I prefer to call it selective participation

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