Beware of a Poole Speed Camera

[Trundlebug]

I have to say, empty lanes alongside jammed lanes doesn't sound like good road engineering or well thought out traffic management to me. It's certainly not making the most of the road space available, and is therefore increasing congestion. From descriptions above it doesn't seem very intuitive either, regardless of the conspicuity of the millions of signs , they just becaome another road hazard to be avoided and looked around..

 

[Robin]

I think I have probably said all I can on this subject and am quite happy to leave it to the conspiracy theorists.

Tom

I don't condone speeding but I'm not a believer of everything either regardless of source. The Chilcott enquiry should prove that just because they SAY it is true don't mean it is!

Just been out locally and past a known camera. This particular camera is on a steep downhill and just round a bend (note 25yds past the bend not 25yds before the bend) and out of sight. The warning sign for it is 10yds (no that is not a typo) before the camera and actually hides the camera, then the overhanging tree makes absolutely sure it is hidden as does another road sign and all of these hideaways are within yards of the camera. In order to go past at 30mph you have the brakes on all the way. Yes there have been accidents here - 150 yds farther on at the traffic lights. Oh and the camera works only on the downhill side of the road not the uphill.

Don't believe all you see.

 

[motayotty]

This is a really long thread and if I have not allowed it to sink in properly I apologise and stand to be corrected.

All these cameras as far as I am aware mark where several people have died and or been seriously injured in road accidents , although I dont think that is the fashionable term for it..

I believe that is the criteria.

If you look at it as a big cross or whatever your choice of embelm to remember the dead and suffering might be maybe you would see it slightly differently.

I dont agree with revenue earners and dont like the way that various authorities operate with such zeal.

But the simple fact is you are driving over the point where someone innocently or not has driven and lost their lives , or their friends lives due to a mistake.

How much of a rush do we need to be in to arrive 30 seconds earlier at our destination.

Just another point of view. It wont be just the camera watching you being innatentive but those who have lost a great deal more than cash or points.

But hey we can get a smart brief to sort that out cant we?

 

[Tranona]

I find that comment very hard to understand bearing in mind the same people probably came up with the stop go never flow system at Fleets roundabout! Then again the same people put a set of pedestrian crossing lights offset past a junction by 25 yds instead of on the junction itself so that cars could get out onto Ashley Road without having to bully their way into the stream. May even be the same people that allowed Castlepoint shops to be built where it is and then wondered how the traffic flow at busy times stops dead to the point you cannot even get out of the car park, oh and that is the car park that is 50% closed because it is falling apart from poor construction methods. Then again there is the traffic flow (or not mostly) on the A338 whilst yet more roadworks are in progress. I have a sneaking feeling that traffic planning in the area is deliberately designed to STOP free flow of traffic because smart it is not. Still it all adds to the CO2 to keep us warm.

Could not agree more with the examples you quote - although Castle Point has improved with the new junction coming from the north.

However, I make an issue of the Hanger Hill junction because I think this is one case where they have got it as right as they can. As I say, I have used it for 30 years and considering the complexity and increased volume from the new developments, think the current system works well. Mind you have not seen how they propose to incorporate the access to the new bridge, although with the massive reduction of traffic from the reduction in ferry sailings who knows what will work out.

 

[kcrane]

Mobile safety camera sites are located where at least one person has been killed or seriously injured in a speed-related crash/es, over a 5km stretch of road, in the three years prior to installation....

Goodness that is a wide clause.

It would explain why, on Wednesday of this week, they could justify a mobile camera parked in a lay-by on the A419 from Cheltenham to Cirencester. For those who don't know it, it is a recently built, wide, open, sweeping dual carriageway. It was around lunchtime, the road was very quiet, the weather was dry and calm, visibility was good.

I must be slipping into seeing conspiracies too, cos it was the circumstances where some of the posters to this thread would have decided that this was exactly when it was perfectly safe to drive at 80mph, and lo, they would have contributed to the "safety committee" coffers.

Maybe there was a day, a couple of years ago, when in fog and snow, someone took a chance and pulled out from a rural road into the faster moving traffic and caused an accident, thus giving the excuse for the van to sit there this Wednesday.

"£65, £130, £195.. pass the rich tea biscuits John, we could be here a while..."

...and no, I wasn't speeding, but it did annoy me.

 

[timbartlett]

Fixed safety camera sites are located where three or more people have been killed or seriously injured... Cameras are not placed on roads where they will make the most money....

Just like Father Chrismas delivers presents in person to every child
and The Earth is flat
They must be true 'cos it says so on a website.

 

[[2068]]

Goodness that is a wide clause.

It would explain why, on Wednesday of this week, they could justify a mobile camera parked in a lay-by on the A419 from Cheltenham to Cirencester. For those who don't know it, it is a recently built, wide, open, sweeping dual carriageway. It was around lunchtime, the road was very quiet, the weather was dry and calm, visibility was good.

If enough fatalities or serious injuries are caused by people braking heavily when they see the mobile camera, then that would provide a justification for installing a permanent one.

 

[kcrane]

If enough fatalities or serious injuries are caused by people braking heavily when they see the mobile camera, then that would provide a justification for installing a permanent one.

Good point, and you remind me I did indeed automatically brake when I saw the van, only to look down and see I was now doing 60mph. I guess I should have been sufficiently aware of my speed not to do that, but the auto-response kicked in.

 

[Nautibusiness]

Poole and Bournemouth have out done themselves again.

The A338 from the Liverpool Victoria roundabout has now been reduced from 50 to 40.
The first stretch was fine at 50. It was (usually) good, free flowing, wide single carriageway. Now everyone is stamping on the anchors as soon as they straighten up from the first bend as they find themselves breaking the speed limit as they change to third or fourth gear.

The second stretch should always have been 60 or National Limit anyway, let alone 50.
It is wide, free flowing dual carriageway with good barriers and a single junction leaving / joining it in the 1 mile or so stretch. This junction never causes any real issues. In fact the only thing that caused any issue was drivers braking hard for the camera when they realised the dual carriageway was actually only a 50 and they had (wrongly) assumed they could go 70.
Now drivers are braking harder still. To try and slow down to the 40 that some crack pot has decided to make it.
Just my own opinion and I don't condone speeding. Just common sense please.

Tom

 

[Robin]

Nobody will drive through at 40 either. Most will do an indicated 37/38mph (heads down looking) just to be safe and if you have a satnav the real speed will be seen to be around 35mph. Pretty good for a by-pass dual carriageway with central crash barriers designed for the national speed limit. The intention too is for the existing cameras (4 in just 3 miles) to be removed and replaced with ANPR Average Speed Cameras as the locals now know where the others are and revenue has no doubt fallen. So pretty soon even more visitors will be welcomed with a £60 fine and £15 donatiion to victins of crime.

 

[Nautibusiness]

This thread has run it's natural course and whilst being completely off topic for a MOBO thread it was interesting to see opinion.

So whilst it should now be consigned to the recycle bin I thought I'd bring it to an amusing (I thought so) conclusion.

Just dropped my daughter off at school this morning and I was driving through Poole towards the Shah of Persia pub.
A few hundred yards before the pub is a pedestrian crossing, the lights on which turned amber as I approached and so I stopped and waited at the front of the queue.

On the other side of the road I watched as a "DORSET SAFETY sCAMERA" mobile unit drove straight through the just changing to red lights at slightly too high a speed for the rush hour traffic.
Both driver and passenger (adorned in their luminescent jackets) were gauping with jaws dropped to the pavement on my side of the road. Both oblivious to having just sailed through the crossing on red.

I looked over to see a rather attractive young lady, the obvious cause of their distraction.

Not sure what the conclusion is here apart from it made me chuckle, but was also lucky that nobody was actually crossing as the lights changed.

Tom

 

[Giblets]

I don't condone speeding but I do despise stealth tax!

But it is the only voluntary tax!