New UK police speed gun can read license plates from half a mile away at night

Post by bb123 » Sun, Dec 13, 2020, 10:41 AM UTC

fergie wrote: post #163

bArray wrote: post #77

> To the inevitable dismay of U.K. street racers who > primarily partake in their favorite illegal motorsport > after hours, the TruCam II also features night mode > whereas the first TruCam, which has already reportedly > been in use for the past six years, only worked during the > daytime. I think this really comes down to the letter of the law vs the spirit of it. To the spirit of the law, i.e. saving third-party…

"as I understand it, persons living in Scotland can drive back home drunk in rural areas as the only person they are ever likely to hurt its themselves." As a person who grew up in the Scottish countryside I can assure you that is absolutely not the case, and drunk driving is _extremely_ frowned upon. In fact Scotland has generally had tougher drink driving regulations than England. ( https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scot…

Post by bloodorange » Sun, Dec 13, 2020, 10:45 AM UTC

barrkel wrote: post #215

NLips wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ignoring whether it’s “human nature” to vary by that much, the remedy is simple: in a 60mph limit (the clue is in the name), target 54. +/-10% is now 48.6-59.4, instead of 54-66. It’s within the speed limit, and a smaller absolute speed differential between lowest and highest speed. Similar arguments have been made against average speed cameras on UK motorways - “I’ll have to be entirely focused on the speedo the who…

Interestingly, you'll fail your UK motorcycle test if you don't largely treat the speed limit as a target. If you stick at 40mph or thereabouts going into a 50mph zone, the examiner may think you haven't seen the speed limit change. More importantly, if you don't keep up a good pace on a clear country road with good visibility where the speed limit is 60mph, they won't have confidence in your riding at higher speeds,…

Post by 7952 » Sun, Dec 13, 2020, 10:48 AM UTC

iso947 wrote: post #271

spoonjim wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"un-sporting"? It's not a game. It's about reducing the most common cause of preventable death. The harms to privacy or "freedom" or whatnot are more defensible here than pretty much anywhere else.

In the U.K. excess speed is the 10th most common cause of accidents, way below “driver didn’t look properly”, which was 9 times as common. As far as deaths go, the most common contributory causes are loss of control and failure to look properly. Exceeding speed limit was a cause in just 16% of deaths. https://www.regtransfers.co.uk/content/common-causes-for-roa... https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/u…

Post by Denvercoder9 » Sun, Dec 13, 2020, 10:49 AM UTC

lordnacho wrote: post #198

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> very car should have a chip. Once you are in a speed limit - your car can't go faster. This is actually dangerous because people need the ability to use discretion. Suppose you're transporting a part to repair a machine which is causing a fatality every five seconds as long as it's offline. Getting there 20 seconds faster saves four lives. Do you still want a chip that prevents you from exceeding the speed limit? >…

Is that Homo Economicus driving the delivery truck? You'd expect a machine that saves a life every 5 seconds to have some kind of investment in redundancy. Either is spread over more machines or the wonder device has spare parts that are kept stocked. And if not, I'm sure parliament could pass a law to clear the streets for the day.

Post by DecoPerson » Sun, Dec 13, 2020, 10:56 AM UTC

01100011 wrote: post #138

viraptor wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speed limiters and cruise control are pretty common in modern cars. You can set your mental intended speed lower and won't drift as much. This is from experience of switching to a car with speed notification beeper (very low tech) - it took maybe 2 weeks to stop drifting over almost completely without paying extra attention. We ended up treating it as a game with gf - shortest time for a 300km drive with no beeps.

You set your cruise control when driving on city streets? Sure, I use it on the freeway, but only on long drives. I've never seen anyone use it in the city.