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Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

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Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#61

Post by hombre_fatal »

quotemstr wrote: post #48
ticmasta wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

heaven for bid we impact "driving efficiency" for something as low-priority as public safety...

Why is "safety" the most important consideration? A world that values safety above everything else is a pretty dismal world --- and it's a world without cars at all.

A single distracted person in a vehicle can inflict an incredible amount of death and damage upon those around them. This isn't just the government making you wear a straitjacket to protect you from yourself.

Also, I'm on board with a world that minimizes ape-driven cars. I can't even imagine how much more amazing my city would be in that utopia.

I don't understand why pulling over before fiddling with your gadgets is so much to ask of you, though.

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#62

Post by hombre_fatal »

quotemstr wrote: post #29
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #21

Kinda funny how HN is normally anti-surveillance and against automated law enforcement unless you frame it as something pro-social. At the end of the day this is still a camera network capable of being repurposed for more sinister means of revenue generation at the whim of the government. If you really want to stop this behavior post a cop on the corner. His presence will prevent people from all sorts of other minor…

It's simpler than that: a lot of HN posters are just anti-car, and anything that makes driving less convenient is a good thing in their eyes.

That doesn't fly, because you could dismiss your posts in this comments section the same way: you're pro-car and anything that makes driving less convenient is a bad thing no matter what.

It's not very productive discourse to make these claims about others.

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#63

Post by AcerbicZero »

jbarberu wrote: post #59
AcerbicZero wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The root of the problem is bad driving. You can be stone sober, fully rested and have your phone locked in the trunk of your car, but none of that matters if you lack the skills needed to operate a vehicle at speed. Drivers education is woefully inadequate and the only driving laws I see enforced are the ones which have a clear easy to obtain financial incentive attached for the police.

I think the lack of decent public transport in many places contribute to this. When I've lived in cities with good public transport I would usually take the bus, especially if I wasn't feeling in a good mental state to drive (tired, stressed, other). In Orlando that's not an option, here I can chose to stay home or drive.

That is a very valid point. Even the best city I've lived in as far as public transit goes had issues such as stopping service around midnight, even on weekends. If the goal was to reduce drinking driving and/or driving tired you'd think they'd keep those going, but instead they just bring out the DUI checkpoints.

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#64

Post by jjulius »

quotemstr wrote: post #53
jjulius wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I drive 2+ hours round-trip for work every weekday, and my work often has me visiting client sites during the week. I find nothing difficult about setting my destination via GPS before I begin my drive, and I find that my attention to what's going on around me is significantly diminished should I attempt to modify my route while driving. An inconvenience of, say, 5-10 minutes to find a place to pull over and input ne…

> absolutely worth it Can you demonstrate, using numbers, that the tradeoff is positive? > I cannot believe people are arguing for "efficiency" over traffic safety. People prioritize efficiency over safety all the time. It's a good thing. So do you, if you support non-zero speed limits. The current animus against cell phone use while driving is the result of a moral panic, not a rational cost-benefit tradeoff. > If I…

Gonna respond with this separate post, since OP edited their post to respond to mine.

>Untrue. The act of pulling is itself is a complex maneuver that practically invites accidents. Most accidents occur at low speed, and often, when you pull over, you pull over into an area where pedestrians are active. It might be the case that pulling over instead of using a phone at a red light results in more people being injured or killed.

As I've said before, driving is always an inherently dangerous act, and I'm not disputing that point. It seems to me as though you don't believe risks should be mitigated; that you're saying, "Well, pulling over could be pretty dangerous, so I think you should still be allowed to distract yourself with your phone while driving". Is that correct?

Driving in an area with a lot of pedestrians is certainly dangerous, but to my point, it's far more dangerous if the driver is staring at their phone rather than consciously looking for people walking around in an effort to avoid them.

>Anecdotal personal misfortune is not an argument for society-wide policy.

Again - how is not getting into an accident "not a rational cost-benefit tradeoff"? Can you provide any sort of valid argument in support of taking your eyes off of the road? Do you have any kind of data that shows that not looking at the road is safer, or for that matter safe at all?

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#65

Post by javagram »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #15
homonculus1 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't need police-connected camera networks running machine learning in any US city.

Especially when a officer on the street corner will do the job (and prevent a ton of other petty law violations) just as well without being Orwellian about it. Edit : Do the down-voters care to explain how a networked camera system is somehow better or less orwellian than a human cop?

This problem is so widespread you would need a lot of cops.

Frankly I’d rather have things like automatic cameras than police posted at every intersection.

Look at how stuff like speeding works. Putting cops on the highways just makes people alert each other on waze to slow down in one specific area.

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#66

Post by yjftsjthsd-h »

blacksmith_tb wrote: post #43
yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you would need a very high resolution image with litle blur to determine that they were 'texting' Bigger reason: This amounts to "set up cameras that record exactly what's on the screen of every phone that goes by", which is an utter nightmare in terms of privacy.

Hmm, if you're in a jurisdiction where it's illegal to be using your phone, I'm not sure how upset we should be about the police invading your privacy to prove you're breaking the law? I suppose you could argue that such a camera would also potentially capture the screens of passengers, though.

> I suppose you could argue that such a camera would also potentially capture the screens of passengers, though.

That is exactly the main argument that I would make:) It also amounts to a permanent warrantless recording of a space that most people would expect to be semi-private, which is worrying even if you assume that it will only affect the guilty.

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#67

Post by alxmdev »

quotemstr wrote: post #53
jjulius wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I drive 2+ hours round-trip for work every weekday, and my work often has me visiting client sites during the week. I find nothing difficult about setting my destination via GPS before I begin my drive, and I find that my attention to what's going on around me is significantly diminished should I attempt to modify my route while driving. An inconvenience of, say, 5-10 minutes to find a place to pull over and input ne…

> absolutely worth it Can you demonstrate, using numbers, that the tradeoff is positive? > I cannot believe people are arguing for "efficiency" over traffic safety. People prioritize efficiency over safety all the time. It's a good thing. So do you, if you support non-zero speed limits. The current animus against cell phone use while driving is the result of a moral panic, not a rational cost-benefit tradeoff. > If I…

> The current animus against cell phone use while driving is the result of a moral panic

Spend some more time walking then, it'll feel a lot more personal when you have daily close calls with multi-ton monsters doing rolling stops with their eyes glued to a screen.

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#68

Post by jbarberu »

AcerbicZero wrote: post #63
jbarberu wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the lack of decent public transport in many places contribute to this. When I've lived in cities with good public transport I would usually take the bus, especially if I wasn't feeling in a good mental state to drive (tired, stressed, other). In Orlando that's not an option, here I can chose to stay home or drive.

That is a very valid point. Even the best city I've lived in as far as public transit goes had issues such as stopping service around midnight, even on weekends. If the goal was to reduce drinking driving and/or driving tired you'd think they'd keep those going, but instead they just bring out the DUI checkpoints.

Where I grew up the last bus would leave downtown around 4am and the trams stopped for an hour between 6-7am on Sat-Sun (after basically all the bars and clubs had closed). That aspect was pretty good. Most other aspects of Swedish drinking culture is not great...

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#69

Post by megablast »

y4mi wrote: post #3

So they're ramping up the detection of people using their phones while waiting for the traffic light to turn green? Doesn't really sound like this is actually about safety. I doubt these cameras can capture the photo do a decent quality on that angle for anything but standing or very slow moving cars But I guess we can hope it will stop some people, even if there will be a lot of people caught that weren't really end…

> Doesn't really sound like this is actually about safety.

Wow, what an ignorant statement. I get a lot of people like to drive without following the rules and think there should be no consequences. Even though driving a car is usually the most dangerous thing you will do today.

Re: Australia uses new technology to catch drivers on phones

#70

Post by megablast »

homonculus1 wrote: post #11
javagram wrote: post #6

Great. We need this in every US city ASAP. Walk around in a downtown area and it’s blatantly visible how many drivers use their phones while driving , often performing illegal maneuvers due to their distraction.

We don't need police-connected camera networks running machine learning in any US city.

Yes, we do. Every single car should be tracked. 40,000 people are killed every year due to car drivers, we should start taking this seriously.
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