Statistically, most accidents happen in shopping centre carparks and nobody is hurt. Losing a loved one to any cause is painful and tends to make opinions rather polarised towards the cause. Its everyones right to drive below the speed limit, sure. But really its not your business if some driver chooses to go faster. Yes, I know, it puts you in great danger and being the chosen one sent to strike the unroadworthy- its your divine duty to slow these infidels down. Thing is, you'd be in less danger if the offending vehicle was in front of you, surely.
Of course we're all experts at driving and its the rest of the world thats too fast/slow. As an amusing thought, I'm proud to be a bad driver. Why? because look at what groups consider themselves most competent...taxi drivers, spotty youths, urban commuters and housewives in 4wd's.
But back to the thread. If speed cameras are such an effective agent of achieving their stated aims (reducing speed), why is it an offense to flash other drivers as a warning? Why is it viable to have a patrol car patrolling a camera site catching flashers?
My rhetoric will be lost on some (there are none so blind as those that will not see), so to simplify, you see a camera- you slow down for a bit. You see someone flashing- you know theres a camera, but you dont know where, so you slow down for a longer period of time. I do wonder what taxes would go up if they knocked revenue cameras on the head. Would it be petrol or rego? Perhaps selling a government utility would ease the pain of lost revenue.
And who knows, in my next little rant I may even quote the Koran.
We'll see you on the road like we saw the night rider.
We remember the night rider and we know who you are!
(Kennedy/Miller, 1979)

Kenny,

unfortunately you are missing a rather BIG point.

The cameras are NOT always accurate. I was recently booked for doing 88 in an 80 zone (Melbourne) even though BOTH my speedo AND my GPS navigation system were showing that I was doing 80 (speedo registered 83 which is actually 80).

I am now faced with copping the fine or paying $1000's to defend the case in court. AND I AM ONLY ONE OF THOUSANDS who have been incorrectly fined.

Where is the fairness in that?

The SAFEST drivers on our roads are those that drive at a speed appropriate for the conditions, REMAIN alert, concentrate on their driving and avoid distractions.

Constantly watching the speedo and/or the side of the road for cameras is completely counter to driving safely yet I am now forced to do exactly that so that I can slow down to at least 10kph UNDER the limit to be certain of avoinding a fine!

ALL cameras should be scrapped and 1000's more police should be patrolling our roads looking for people driving dangerously or carelessly - and that is NOT determined simply by the speed they are travelling at.

Omnipotent voice,

I didn’t think you could indicate even more strongly that you don’t deserve to have a drivers licence!

You had a semi chronically tailgating you for 30km….. and you just put up with it! You made no attempt to signal your discontent, you did not pull off and let him pass and you did not slow right down so that he had to pass in one of the several overtaking lanes!

What sort of a driver are you?

You were submitting yourself to an ongoing heightened risk imposed by this tailgater, and imposed by yourself by letting the situation continue. Were there other people in the car? Were you grossly shirking your responsibility as the driver to not place your passengers under unnecessary risk?

What would have happened if you had needed to hit the brakes, for a roo on the road for instance? Or even if you had needed to slow down gently, unexpectedly, for a patch of pot-holed road for example? You would have worn the truck!

My mind boggles!

How can you call speed cameras a distraction? Are you suggesting that there shouldn’t be any and that drivers should be able to speed at will, in the same way that you seem to believe that tailgaters should be allowed to drive recklessly at will?

Roads should be well-maintained, but huge expense on road upgrades is a waste of money. This money should instead be spent on two things – comprehensive driver-training and a vastly improved policing regime.

“…people should smile and wave like simpletons. This solution actually works, believe me.”

Now it is very tempting to point out what you have just implied…. but I won’t.

OF COURSE people should strive to fix things that they feel are wrong, especially when their personal safety margins are threatened

The issue of speeding versus exceeding the speed limit is one which many motorists become quite heated about.

Speed limits are set by various authorities around Australia and once these limits are set people have a choice. That is to drive at or above those limits. If you drive above the limits then governments will certainly take advantage and use that as a tax collection method.

If we think the limits are too low we should focus on changing the limits, not screaming when we get fined for not complying with what society apparently has agreed is a sensible and safe limit.

If any of you have tried driving at the speed limit you will find angry queues behind you, or if on a dual lane road you will find yourself regularly the lone vehicle as the packs whizz past, until the next pack catches up.

It is hypocritical to exceed the set speed limit and then whinge about being fined. What other laws would you consider not complying with?

As to speed not killing, stupid statement. It does, regularly but clearly isn't the only cause of road deaths.

With so many calls for fairness, reasonableness, justice and so on in this thread, you would think we were talking about something that was susceptible to the application of logic.

But it is a tax, people. A means by which a government can raise revenue from the population while giving the impression of "doing the right thing".

Driving fast can be dangerous. So tax it. You know it makes sense.

There needs to be no rhyme or reason behind the speed itself. If there were, none of us would be allowed to drive at all.

If there are fewer accidents at 50kph than 60, and fewer again at 40, and so on down to zero accidents at zero kph, then it can be argued that any speed limit over zero kph is recklessly endangering the population.

Therefore we are always going to be talking about compromises, whichever number we pick.

So forget about relative speed levels, relative skills of drivers, relative dangers inherent in the time of day, time of year, climatic conditions, whether school is out or in. It is a tax designed to bring in a certain level of revenue.

If revenue levels decline for whatever reason, you may be sure that i) the limits will be lowered and ii) more cameras will be installed, until the revenue level once again rises to the desired level.

How will they justify this? Because (ah!) the previous "driver education plan" that produced the last "speed management system" was so clearly successful. QED.

You know it makes sense.

Pericles,

I am in total agreement with your sentiments and your post distilled one of my issues very well.

IMO most accidents are mainly caused through driver distraction / inattention.

If speed limits are set too low, drivers do not have enough stimulation to maintain concentration on the task at hand. This was not a very big problem until speed limits started being set by politicians / revenue raisers instead of scientists. The rule for setting a speed limit used to be the 85th %tile. ie the speed at which 85% of traffic would normally travel if no speed limit was in place. The rule now seems to be, "What speed limit do we need to apply to return a set amount of revenue" or "Someone has died and we need to be seen to be doing something so let's reduce the speed limit"

So many speed limits are now ridiculously low and this can actually lead to an increase in crashes as drivers become distracted more easily due to the low amount of concentration required to assess the situation.

For example, when I travel on the Hume in good weather and traffic is light I find myself getting drowsy very quickly. This is because at 110kph there is no need to concentrate because nothing changes. (Before someone says take a break, this could be 5 minutes into a trip first thing in the morning after a full nights sleep)

I feel much more comfortable travelling at speeds of around 140kph in these conditions. At that speed I find my concentration levels are much higher and my focus is on the road ahead, not which radio station / CD I would like to listen to. Obviously, if there is other traffic about I do NOT travel at that sort of speed, only when the road is clear and all other conditions are good.