I hope this is a wind up!
My wife read out something this morning from the Daily Mail website which I hope is one big joke! Chief Constable Anthony Bangham of the West Mercier force has suggested that the ‘margins’ for speeding allowance be removed completely and that even 1mph over the speed limit would end in a £100 fine. What a cash cow! He must have taken the blue pill (no pun intended) and joined the automatons who can’t think past the initial suggestion. To be fair, it is only a suggestion. Comments please.
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I can see both sides of the argument but surely 30mph means 30mph so why turm a blind eye to exceeding it?
The site speed limit of 5mph means just that and we complain about people exceeding it so where’s the difference?
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The margins were put in place to allow for calibration errors on Speedometers. -------- IMO those margins should remain. Sounds like good quality investigative reporting is still present on the quality newspapers, bringing proposals like this to the discerning public's attention.
K
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Mmm, a bit like you and VW in a way, K.
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I told you I could see both sides of the argument but there’s no way I’m going to condone lawbreaking, Merve.
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New car speedo's are not accurate which is why new police cars have to them calibrated, fact. My own car under reads by about 3 mph at 30 to more than 6 mph at 70 when compared with roadside warning signs and GPS.
Just a another case of a Chief Plod talking rubbish In my opinion.
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He has definitely said it at a recent conference that he thinks the 10% margin over the speed limit should be scraped. Obviously no one would condone breaking the speed limit but I would want reassurance that any equipment used to measure the speed of a vehicle was 100% accurate but could anyone actually give that guarantee? If not it can't be done. I assume the reason for the 10% margin is because accuracy cannot be guaranteed? There would have to be some proof that being within that 10% margin was actually responsible for more accidents which I somehow doubt.
David
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"The Motor Vehicles (Approval) Regulations 2001 permits single vehicles to be approved. As with the UNECE regulation and the EC Directives, the speedometer must never show an indicated speed less than the actual speed."
So yes, remove the margin.👍
A modern speedo is manufactured to only overead, if it undereads then its broke.
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Some margin is necessary. I generally rely on satnav as speedo neither well placed or easy to read at an angle near middle of dash in the X-Trail. When driving the Yaris it has a digital speedo and in either case you do not know you are exceeding 30 until it actually shows 31.
No cruise control on Yaris and so if trying to maintain 30mph it is easy to vary between 28 and 30 or so and 32 say, particularly with gradient changes, unless watching speedo instead of road.
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I understand the monitoring equipment has to be calibrated, David, and I read of a case being thrown out of court when the police couldn’t produce evidence of calibration.
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I quite agree that a 1mph allowance did you read the bit that you can do 79 mph on the motorway without getting fined this is not on, either we have speed limits which are there to protect everyone or we don't. How many times have I read on the club site caravan and motor home owner complain about supposedly speading HGV 's
I live on a main road which has a 30mph limit which most do not do, so I am in favour of any measure to reduce speed. And you satnav will give you a better idea of your speed
Paul
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Have I asked you to condone lawbreaking??? I can also see both sides and in an ideal world it would work. Unfortunately it’s not an ideal world. Odometers would have to be spot on to make this work. When I was a police officer we had to go to a chosen ‘mile’ and check the odometer each time we put a name in the book for speeding. Now, it’s just a photo so I say again, because of the innacuracies of speedos, we will have to travel at 2or 3 miles below the speed limit to be sure of staying within the law.
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Hey, no need to get spiky, Merve. I didn’t say you asked me to condone law breaking. It was merely a statement.
Saying I could see both sides of the argument meant I accepted all the points you make, even if technology has negated some of it, but I still say the law is the law and we should not expect it to be OK to break it.
Why do you call the Chief Constable a "cash cow"? I think that's rather a hasty assumption.
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As tyres wear and the diameter reduces then a speedo will over-read so less chance of breaking the limit.
Just don't go above the indicated speedo reading and due to the manufacturers overead calibration everyone will be happy. Its people that want to push their luck by one or two extra MPH that are worrying about the loss of margin.
Speedo's cannot be GPS powered until our reliance on the USA military satellite is kicked into touch, its accuracy varies daily. Also atmospheric conditions, buildings, trees etc.
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I can only go by my own experiences. Locally we have had lots of those signs showing your speed for several years now. In that time we have had 6 cars. All at 30 mph on the speedo have registered at 27 mph on the signs.
Assuming that others cars are similar, if you are clocked at 31mph your speedo would be showing 34 mph. If currently you are allowed 10% your speedo would be showing 36/37mph. Personally I don't consider that acceptable. You don have to monitor it that closely to see it is over half way to 40.
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Yes, that’s what I thought about Metheven's posts.👍🏻
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Putting my Tin Hat on.
When it comes to speed on public roads, does anyone really obey every single speed limit for every bit of road they drive on. Come folks, be honest with yourself. I not saying its right or wrong and if you get caught then you only have yourself to blame.
Incidentally, every non major road where I live is now a 20 mph limit and nobody appears observes it although it has slowed some drivers down a little. but even the police cars and ambulance still exceed the 20 limit when just driving through.
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I obey 20mph and 30mph limits. In many built up residential and town street 30mph areas I am often doing 20mph anyway.
I will increase speed when overtaking on a motorway to two or three mph over the limit on occasion if a vehicle is doing perhaps 67 mph in order to speed up the passing process. There are times leaving a built up area and into open country when I have sped not realising that the limit has not changed.
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It’s not really about whether or not we break the speed limit but whether there should be any legitimate leeway.
I can’t claim never to have exceeded the limit - who can? It’s very easy to let our attention wander and creep a few mph over the top but, if I do that, I know I’ve only myself to blame and I don’t expect to be let off for 'only' doing 33mph when I should have ensured I didn’t exceed 30. In that scenario I’ve broken the law and deserve whatever is thrown at me.
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The 10% leeway is a myth. Different police forces implement different tolerances. Some are very low indeed. Best not get caught out. Some will fine at 1 mph over. You need money to take them to court and fight your case. So easy to make a mistake on journeys in unknown areas.
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"It’s not really about whether or not we break the speed limit but whether there should be any legitimate leeway."
Is it though. As you say its a honest mistake.
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I think that ridiculous though and have known it happen allegedly. If I am driving at 30 mph I wont know that I have exceeded the speed limit until speedo or satnav shows 31mph which \i suppose could mean that my actual speed could be 31.5
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I totally agree ET, that is information from someone who runs those driver speed training courses you can do rather than pay a fine and get the points! They rely on folks not questioning a ticket!
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My speedos fit perfectly.
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