h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'm reminded of those emails that used to circulate the interweb in the late 90's, detailing laws in different countries that we find hilarious.

One of these was of some clearly backward, ignorant African country's (I forget which one, there are so many to choose from) law, which made it illegal to have sex with a *female* goat. The comment from the oh-so-knowing circulator of the email was that this was a big enough problem for them to legislate against it?

The point I'm making in my roundabout kind of way is that the local authority involved felt it necessary to do something more than just send out fines to offenders, as this was clearly not working...as demonstrated by the three victims in the clip.

So yes...ha ha! you poor Serves you bloody well right! Learn to read!

RF

" no violent scallies"
That's probably cos scallies are from liverpool...

And Central Station's 'Scally Nights'.

Well, I didn't find the video even slightly amusing. It's not fair to smash people's cars up just because they are stupid - there are too many stupid people out there and we are supposed to be looking after them, not punishing them for it.

I wonder what sort of warning signs and lights there were - did the cars have to run a red light to smash into the bollards?

Agree entirely, Gnomon. I posted it for this debate.

The warning signs are displayed at the very beginning of the video.

Look at it this way - check the speed those guys were going as they tried to beat the bollards.

Now, think about this scenario - Mother and small child are standing at the side of the road waiting to cross, bus goes past, the only thing they see behind it, they look down the road, remembering they're in a pedestrian/bus only area, don't notice the 'parked' car with its engine running as they're looking for buses, cross the road behind the bus and the bollards _don't_ rise in time to stop the idiots accelerating towards them at high speed.

Now think about that mother and small child being your wife and child (or sister, or mother)

When you say it's not fair to smash someone's car up because they're stupid.

It's not exactly fair to kill someone by being stupid either.

Those bollards are there for a reason, there are ruddy great no entry signs and warnings clearly visible- they're obviously triggered to rise as quickly as possible to _stop_ idiots ignoring the signs and deliberately going through into a pedestrian only zone (my guess is that however slow they were set they'd still catch idiots).
You set them at a five second delay - there'd still be an idiot try to go across them at 4.9 seconds - and in addition, there'd be all the morons who'd already managed to get through them within that time limit.

Look at the number of people who attempt to run level crossings... look at the number of people who attempt to run traffic lights at amber.

Should we set traffic lights so they're timed to be red in all directions for five seconds between cycles to cater to idiots?

These huge signs in the city centre clearly state to all and sundry that there is no entry except for authorised vehicles and then only one authorised vehicle may pass through at any one time. Not only that but isn't it also an offence to ignore a No Entry sign, punishable by a £60 fine and three penalty points?

I think they could be engineered better to discourage this kind of speed-tailgating. Considering that authorised vehicles have to stop before they proceed, why not put some sort of hump/chicane there as well?

I'm with Whisky and a few others on that one.

People that stupid, in charge of a fast moving lump of metal, are quite likely to kill someone else eventually.

This might be the only way to make them think a bit. Even then they'll just blame it on the Council, of course...

sprout

Of course, the motorists could just read the bloody signs, get out of their cars and stop being so bleedin' stoopid.

If ever there was an invention where I've thought "I wish I'd invented that", those bollards are it.

By definition, they punish only the arrogant, the wilfully ignorant and the dangerously stupid. By definition they punish only people intelligent enough to drive a car, but gittishly moronic enough to ignore brightly lit NO ENTRY signs. (Observe the beginning of the video - those signs are IMPOSSIBLE to miss, unless you're driving with your eyes closed, in which case...)

And the punishment they give is instant, obvious, unarguable, publicly humiliating (bonus!), and very expensive to the perpetrator without requiring any paperwork for the enforcing authority.

The one and only tiny, tiny downside I can think of is the potential injury to the passengers of people who deliberately drive over these things. But quite honestly, if you get into a car with someone like that, or allow your child to get into a car with someone like that, that's your own lookout. Any injury you or your child suffer is THEIR responsibility and nobody else's. I would hope that anyone bringing a personal injury claim against the council that fitted the bollards would be given short shrift and told to sue the driver.

I agree that in a more litigious society there may be some danger that some shyster lawyer might be able to argue that in some way a driver ought to be allowed to do this sort of thing and not suffer the consequences. I hope the UK never goes that way and that these bollards proliferate.

Definitely my fave video of the week.

SoRB

Is there a park and ride scheme in Manchester? Mind you, if the people in those cars can't read 'No Entry' it's unlikely they'd be able to read a bus timetable.

If the authorised vehicle was required to drive forward and stop, wait the three seconds it takes for the bollards to rise, and then drive on, the idiots would be prevented from causing injury to anybody.

There is. The two buses in the video are free city centre shuttle buses.
http://www.gmpte.com/content.cfm?subcategory_id=370432

The vehicles vary in length, though. How would you get them to stop in the right place? Maybe two sets of bollards in a zone would do the trick?

Bus drivers are capable of driving until the back of their bus is past the bollards, then stopping.

Oh, by the way, I also feel that the drivers of those cars which smashed into the bollards should be banned from driving for, say, a year.

1) Apologies for the godawful construction of my last post... I tried to re-write it half way through and it ended up as a combination of two different phrases

2) Gnomon - I presume what you're talking about would be some kind of 'airlock' system with two sets of bollards? - It'd work, but it'd be a) twice as expensive and b) it'd take up a _lot_ of space (remember - it'd have to be long enough to accept buses and delivery trucks). Oh, and you'd probably still get the idiots trying to squeeze into the 'airlock' behind an authorised vehicle - so in addition to damaging their own vehicle there'd be the added risk of them running up the back of another car _and_ flattening pedestrians between the two vehicles.

Personally, I think the fact the bollards lift into place quickly has probably saved more accidents than it's caused.

If you look at the different timings:

0.5 second delay before the bollards start to lift and another 0.5 seconds before they're fully visible and in their raised position means that drivers passing that spot within a 1 second period are at risk - anyone arriving after that time will see the bollards and stop.

2.0 second delay before the bollards start to lift and another 2.0 seconds before they're fully visible in their raised position means that any driver within a full 4-second period is at risk of having the bottom of their vehicle ripped out.

Wouldn't it be lovely if the No Entry signs were enough and no bollards were needed?

Whisky, I didn't suggest a second set of bollards. It was Icy who suggested that. I suggested the bus driver stopping for 2 seconds after having passed the bollards.