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

Yes, it's true folks! All i hav to do is give the Cornwall and devon safety camera partnership £60 and my drivers licience and they'll give me a whole three points!

I wouldn't be so affronted, but they had positioned their camera van at the end of a lengthy dual carriageway, where it closes down to three lanes, mine being the dual side and nicked me for 72mph in a 60mph zone. Fair play, I am guilty and as a reasonable and law abiding citizen who is not in the habit of tearing up the peace of the streets at 80mph as the taxi drivers do around my rural part of England, I will cough up and you caufght me bang to rights Guv.

What I do question is the road safety aspect of the camera's position, or perhaps was it more to do with a private company, loosely affiliated to positioning them selves on a piece of road where there has been no recorded accidents in a deliberate attempt to catch the unwary in order to generate maximum revenue.

I shall be writing to my MP, harumphhh! (Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells)

Yeah, I know guilty and pay up tight wad At least the money pit is amused, just 17 and zero points on her full licience We'll see as the years and zealots take their toll

I'd write to them, for sure. imo if it was a safety thing you'd have warning sign that lights up when you're over, and the camera would be another couple of hundred yards down the road from there

Poor you.

That'll larn ya though! Hee hee hee!!!

No sympathy if you were speeding, *but* if the van was parked illegally judges tend to throw it out - you do have to go to court though afaik.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZn67GkV58I

go along there again at a reasonable speed and take a good look!!! see where the signs are in relation to the speed etc.

dual carrige speed is a default 70 unless specifically sign posted

+- 5% is 3.5 mph you might find they were in the wrong and you were in the right

OR Norti decided to slow down *from* the slower speed sign and not *for* it in which case, strictly speaking, he will have been speeding, even if he was reducing his speed.

The speed limit changes where the sign is, not 100yds down the road...

Which is why I'd prefer it if there was a light-up 'slow down' sign there and the men with cameras were a bit further along to catch the deliberate speeders not the people who are just coasting down to the speed limit....

Quite correct Robyn. That why I was a little affronted, I don't habitually speed

What I question was the, apparently to me, cynical positioning of the camera at the end of a dual carraigeway to where the raod goes to three lanes in my favour. I had just passed large lorry (safely) when pinged by a private company loosely affiliated with the

I do wonder if the positioning of the camera had a 'Road Safety' element, or the deliberate entrapment of the unwary to boost company profits?

Had I been driving an unregistered, unlicienced, untaxed etc. vehical I would have got away free.

The local taxi drivers, on the urban streets near where I live, frequently drive at lunatic speeds, scaring me and the , but we never see the Safety Camera Partnership there, not enough traffic to generate revenue me thinks

Those slow down signs, when I am doing a perfectly legal speed, make me not slow down because they're accusing me of speeding when I'm not.

Wait till you have the MX5 gunned up It'll be welcome to the club

early start??

Beat the traffic, and the cameras

were you overtaking something when you got caught??

It was a dual carraigeway going down to a three lane road, in my favour, a large lorry in front, so I maintained my speed to nip in front. Then I saw the camera , legally and on strictest principle a 60mph limit, morally I would argue I was doing 72 mph exiting the dual carraigeway.
On principle of law I am guilty, hardly a speeding maniac, but a useful source of easy income for a private company

Having admitted it was me that done it, Guv, just slap the bracelets on I have been invited to take part in a 'Road Safety and Speed Awareness Course" £69.00 + £2.50 for paying online, pretty much works out at £1.00/mile an hour but NO points!

I still feel I was done and stiched up like a kipper, though I have to adnmit my drivers licience is still green and on paper My driving test was a 10 minute drive around the block and a couple of questions. Perhaps it is time to re-evaluate my over confidence in my driving ability, and make a suitable contribution to the coffers of a private company

I think that if the government held a driving amnesty and offered a free driving test to all drivers with an offer of ten hours free driving lessons if you fail, it would be interesting to see how many people would stand a chance.

I'd do it. It'd scare me, but I'd do it. I'd rather be safe than proud.

Darling daughter, aka the monetpit, is an unsufferably smug 17y/o full licience holder, zero points. "Your driving is appalling Daddy. If you weren't such a tight wad, I could go on your insurance and show you how to drive properly and with modern courtesy. You are such a freak".

... I blame the parents.

I'm sure Mrs Norti will be delighted

My sympathies, here in north Wales I've been the lucky winner of
a speeding ticket twice now. The first time was the result of a sneaky
one lurking at the exit of a sharpish bend. 30mph limit and I was doing
about 40 so fair cop guv and I paid up, 3 points and of course the insurance premiums went up which I think is just profiteering.
The second time I was just over the limit by about 5 mph soI was
offered the Speed Awareness course.
A day of my life where I felt the will to live slowly ebbing away.
Mind you it has made me a more carefull driver as far as speeding is
concerned.

I have to admit I did spend, an entirely unexpectedly, interesting 3 1/2 hours on a speed awareness course courtesy of Devon CC
Far more productive and contructive than being hit with 3 points and a fine, though it did cost me £69 paid to Devon CC, not the Cahancellor and a private company.

Yes the course was populated by middle class, middle aged, crims like myself, who wantonly flout the laws of the land by driving too fast Which is the point, the course wasn't an ear bashing It was well and reasonably presented, a simple illustration of the difference a few miles an hour over the speed limit makes coupled with a reminder that none of us had bothered to update our knowledge of the highway code since passing our driving tests 40 odd years ago