Monday, May 22, 2006

Bad Driving Kills Not Speed

I have just traveled an eighteen mile stretch of the M5 in Somerset and during this short trip I witnessed six near misses where lorries with their "get outa my way I am bigger than you" attitude pulled out in front of cars causing them to swerve into the outside lane. Not only that, it also caused a concertina effect where other cars in the overtaking lane had to slam on their anchors and cut their speed immediately. None of the cars in question were speeding but they were forced through the lorry drivers bad driving to risk their safety in order to avoid a possible collision. I found the whole thing very scary and it made me wonder what the statistics are vis a vis the percentage of motorway accidents which involve a lorry against the total number. From what I just witnessed I guessed it was pretty high but according to the FTA (Freight Transport Association) in October last year the Government and Police stated that it's all o.k. cause lorries only have 48 accidents per 100 million km's and cars have 80 accidents per 100 million km's. Do we actually believe this ? The truth is clear and that is bad driving causes accidents not speed but of course, silly me, to admit this would not justify the use of speed scameras with their revenue earning potential would it !!!

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home