Dangerous Safety Devices

[Guest High Plains Drifter]

Not aviation as such, but interesting all the same -

 

Courier Mail Newspaper, 9/12/07

 

Accident levels have almost halved in a London street where "safety" equipment such as guard rails, signs, white lines and signposts were taken out. Seems once the council took out all the devices, motorists could concentrate on actually looking at the road.

 

HPD

 

 

[Yenn]

I can relate to that. Between my home and the nearest town there are hundreds of safety signs. A level crossing has so many they have to stack them vertically. At night all the luminous arrows on the corners nearly blind you and some of the signs are just ridiculous. At least they havn't been able to put signs in the sky yet.

 

 

[Guest Fred Bear]

My great uncle came out from Germany here and said he has never seen so many roundabouts/speedhumps/signs in his whole life and he has traveled the world over. On a different note, I found the roads overseas crapped on ours. Well, NSW is supposed to have the worst of all. Ian, remember when I took you for that drive along Parramatta Rd? I guarantee Baghdad is better. ACT had the best roads. Wonder why that may be???? ;)

 

 

[Deskpilot]

Can't remember if it was Holland or Belgium but one town decided to turn off all traffic lights. Accident rate dropped sharply as drivers were force to take more care. Not sure if this was a trial or permanent.

 

 

[Guest David C]

I reckon those illuminated signs we have on the freeways are a positive danger . There is usually 3 lines of text to read and sometimes the message is spread over two screen refreshes . By the time you have read the message , the person in front may have stopped and WAM !! , you suddenly find yourself embedded is his rear end , well you know what I mean ... It is interesting in Europe where I have driven on the "wrong side " of the road , that there are very few accidents between left and right hand drive vehicles . I put it down to the fact that you have to be so vigilant , that your driving actually improves . Just my two bobs worth anyway ;)

 

Dave C

 

 

[planedriver]

Could it simply be a case of the authorities trying to cover their arses if somthing goes wrong. They can at least say "well don't blame us, you were warned", while we all go boss-eyed reading all the signs. To say nothing about the revenue it helps to raise for those that do not comply with speed-reading the signs.

 

Alan

 

 

[Mick]

Let the Darwin Theory run it's course......

 

All of this is just part of dumbing down the world.

 

Too many people are no longer willing to take responsibility for their own actions. Hence the government and authorities are forced to cater to the lowest common denominator.

 

One unfortunate side effect of this is that idiots are no longer killing themselves, thus living long enough to breed and multiply. :confused:

 

I say let the Darwin process do it's work. ;)

 

Some may feel this is a bit harsh, but it is my take on what is happening to this world.

 

Another effect of this is that those of us willing to take responsibility for ourselves continue to loose the freedom to make our own choices.

 

Cheers

 

Mick

 

 

[Guest mudjeep]

I don't know how the accident rate compares between North America and here but I must say that we have much better road markings. Whereas we have a stop line in conjunction with stop signs and traffic lights it's not always the case over there. I sailed through more than one stop sign, not seeing them until too late, because I was looking for the line on the road not the sign itself, and if you think about it this is usually the first visual indicater that you have to give way. I got pulled over by the mounties in Newfoundland for doing that at a T-intersection, where the terminating road had right-of-way. The red and white reflectors on each side of the road are also something I no longer take for granted after times spent driving through Canadian and American forests at night. I got used to it all after 20,000 miles.

 

Whilst signage overload can definitely be a problem, one which is regularly revisited and occasionally results in rationalisation, I don't think removing all devices is the answer. It's about doing things smarter, not knee-jerk reactions. If lines or reflectors or whatever help us stay on the road, this can only reduce the workload to help us watch out for the unexpected, like the odd moose/roo/seneca darting across the road.

 

 

[Guest High Plains Drifter]

Yes, I think your right Mudjeep, finding just the right level of safety devices, guidance, what-ever, and not totaly stopping what it is you are trying to make safer - or through good intentions making it less safe, that is the sixty million dollar question.

 

HPD