governors to limit motor vehicles speeds to speed limits

[mrjemm]

It was more than cruise control.
The cars I've driven with it were quite different to what I drove in Florida.

One thing you could do, was sitting at the lights, as they went to green, you selected "resume" and off you went. No pressing the accelerator at all. Foot on the brake pedal still in "drive", lift off the brake and hit "resume".

I drove the car from Cape Canaveral down to West Palm Beach and back, so I had plenty time to play with it.

To my mind, it would be a small step to fit a computer to that system that read the speed limits and kept you below them.

Most modern cruise controls have a resume function, but I believe they usually only work on 5th (or 6th...), and maybe 4th gear. Maybe that's only on manuals though, and perhaps autos are more flexible like that (bar being rubbish otherwise, sorry fans). Was also driving some rentals in US lately and used cruise, but not that aspect. I found though, that even more than in the UK, even on the 'freeways' CC can be a PITBum, often down to road users that don't have it varying speed all the time.

A lot of modern cars have speed warning systems already- often hire cars have it set at 70, and the sharp 'bing' is annoying. Likewise, satnavs have speed limit awareness and I suppose alarms... Which brings me to a bad aspect of that; the speeder friendly camera alarm that's built in to most of them, if not all.

[Mick F]

I've just remembered a story a mate told me a year or so ago.

He works for the Queen's Harbour Master down in Devonport, and had to attend a meeting with some of his work colleagues. They took a pool car from the dockyard and four of them piled in and off they went - somewhere up country, Midlands? The MOD pool cars have "black boxes" fitted that record where they are and do a full set of data logging.

Anyway, my mate had arranged the car and it was in his name, but he never drove but remained on the back seat all the way there and back reading.

A few days later, he got a letter through the internal mail telling him he was banned from driving pool cars because he'd exceeded the speed limit on a few occasions on the journey. They didn't want to accept that it wasn't him driving!
It was "his" car, so he was responsible. Dunno what happened in the end, I should ask him when I see him next.

[CJ]

If you were to limit cars in particular I fear they would all drive along at the limit, tailgating each other, drivers' brains switched off whatever the appropriate speed and be a sort of pile-up-in-waiting.

Which is different to what we have already... ... by about 10% - and in a good way!

For right now they all drive along at the speed at which one may hope to get away with exceeding the limit!

There is of course the entire argument of whether speed contributes to accidents, it may make them worse when they happen but does it create more? It is inappropriate speed which is the problem I think.

Sure, and over the limit is always inappropriate. It is a limit remember, not a target. In some countries they have big roadsigns reminding the careless, selfish numbskulls about that.

Whenever some external factor, such as the 1970s oil crisis, or a sudden hike in the price of fuel, causes a general reduction in driving speeds either by legislation to save fuel or through general pain in the pocket, there is a coresponding dip in road crashes and casualties.

I lived in Kuwait for 3 years and my car had a chiming bell when I went over the speed limit. So did every other car in Kuwait but they didn't stop Kuwait having one of the worst accident rates for cars in the World so I think we can kick advisory systems into touch. By the way, the solution to the chiming bell was just to turn the radio up a notch or two.

Proves nothing. Would probably have been even worse without, which is probably why they enacted this measure. Newly rich and rapidly motorising countries always have horrendous road crash rates, as each society struggles to adapt traditional patterns of behaviour to a new tool which offers intoxicating speed and freedom of action in combination with sudden and unexpected death. Its like swapping spears for firearms all over again: utter carnage until new social limits are imposed on who is permitted to use this new tool and how.

In Britain we've come a long way in civilising car use, but still have some way to go before 3rd party traffic injuries become as rare as shootings.

[[XAP]Bob]

In Britain we've come a long way in civilising car use, but still have some way to go before 3rd party traffic injuries become as rare as shootings.

No - we've normalised car use - it's a long way from civilised.

[Tonyf33]

Sure, and over the limit is always inappropriate. It is a limit remember, not a target. In some countries they have big roadsigns reminding the careless, selfish numbskulls about that.

Whenever some external factor, such as the 1970s oil crisis, or a sudden hike in the price of fuel, causes a general reduction in driving speeds either by legislation to save fuel or through general pain in the pocket, there is a coresponding dip in road crashes and casualties..

Sorry but I disagree with that blanket statement, in fact i disagree with the whole restricting speed of motor vehicles to the speed limit set on that bit of highway. Far and away it isn't the speed that is the problem that was hinted at upthread, it is the attitude, plus mental/physical ability to observe/rationalise and act and thus control the vehicle that has by far the largest influence on incidents..speed is way down on the list.
I accept that speed over a limit can make an incident worse but excessive speed could be 10mph in some situations, & not being able to exceeed the limit even if by a few mph for a short period of time in situations that I expect 99.9% of motorists have experienced could leave you a sitting duck & unable to avoid scenarios like that that happen. Not everyone is able to be decisive, no-one has the ability to read a scenario 100% correctly 100% of the time, by taking away that control and supposedly 'dumbing it down' is a mistake IMO.

You see incidents happening at & well below the speed limits all the time, introducing a maximum limit for any given piece of road is massively the wrong thing to be addressing, would make people switch off from thinking about their speed and adds its own set of problems that are pretty obvious

[Bicycler]

If we could trust drivers to drive at a safe speed for the conditions we wouldn't need speed limits. Indeed, we wouldn't notice any reduction in pedestrian casualties when speed limits of 30mph are reduced to 20mph. The reality is we see a huge difference.

I'm not sure I believe in the get out of an emergency by exceeding the speed limit thing either. I can once recall speeding up because I was unsure of something was going to stop coming onto the roundabout I was on but I wasn't near the speed limit. Either way, that wouldn't be an argument against the continuous audible alarm that was being suggested when the speed limit was exceeded. Are we all in favour of that?

Is there any evidence that commercial vehicles with fitted limiters are more prone to collisions than those without? Surely there are enough of them about now that we would be able to see the predicted spike in RTAs? What about cruise control? If a limiter is a problem then cruise control would be more so.

[snibgo]

I'm in favour of drivers obeying speed limits but I'm not convinced by any ideas on this thread, for a number of reasons.

1. The big numbers on round signs encourage drivers to actually look around from time to time.

2. To obey a speed limit, driver must slow down before the limits starts. I suppose an alarm system etc would only kick in where the new limits starts. This would encourage the myth that a "slowing down" distance is allowed after the limits starts.

3. How reliable would a GPS system be, and how reliable do we want it to be? I suggest that a 1% error rate would be difficult to achieve, and hopelessly bad, creating too many false negatives as well as false positives.

[rfryer]

I'm in favour of drivers obeying speed limits but I'm not convinced by any ideas on this thread, for a number of reasons.

1. The big numbers on round signs encourage drivers to actually look around from time to time.

Or, maybe, they encourage drivers to stare at their speedometers rather than watching the road?

2. To obey a speed limit, driver must slow down before the limits starts. I suppose an alarm system etc would only kick in where the new limits starts. This would encourage the myth that a "slowing down" distance is allowed after the limits starts.

Alternatively, a system could intelligently reduce the limit approaching the low speed zone.

3. How reliable would a GPS system be, and how reliable do we want it to be? I suggest that a 1% error rate would be difficult to achieve, and hopelessly bad, creating too many false negatives as well as false positives.

I'd think that's pessimistic. And the typical failure modes would be that a driver is able to speed (like they are now), or that the speed is unnecessarily restricted. Neither of those cause me much loss of sleep. The only dangerous case might be if a motorway driver was suddenly restricted to 20mph due to confusion with a road close by - but I'm sure problems like this are readily solvable.

A lot of my thinking on speed limits comes from my time using a car with a decent speed limiter, where I found that I was freed up from monitoring the speedometer, and that left me more time to watch the road. This led me to think that I would be safer with either no speed limit, or an automatically limited one. In this day and age, it seems ridiculous that people in control of dangerous machinery are tested once in their lives, and are required to continually look away from the road to ensure that they are complying with an arbitrary limit (arbitrary because it doesn't take into account the driver, the car, or the road conditions).

[reohn2]

2. To obey a speed limit, driver must slow down before the limits starts. I suppose an alarm system etc would only kick in where the new limits starts. This would encourage the myth that a "slowing down" distance is allowed after the limits starts.

Alternatively, a system could intelligently reduce the limit approaching the low speed zone.

Or the signs could be moved forward a bit so the limit starts before it needs to be but don't tell the motorists

[Bicycler]

Yes, but that would require orders to be made for all changes of speed limits on roads. I'm sure it would keep local council legal departments in work for a year or so at great expense. It would be simpler just to extend the speed limit zones on the underlying gps maps. More advanced gps limiter systems could recognise this as a deceleration zone and conduct a controlled and efficient deceleration (an easing off the gas) in the distance prior to the start of the speed limit proper. With the audible alarm solution we could have beeps in the couple of hundred yards to indicate an approaching speed limit reduction

[[XAP]Bob]

Yes, but that would require orders to be made for all changes of speed limits on roads. I'm sure it would keep local council legal departments in work for a year or so at great expense. It would be simpler just to extend the speed limit zones on the underlying gps maps. More advanced gps limiter systems could recognise this as a deceleration zone and conduct a controlled and efficient deceleration (an easing off the gas) in the distance prior to the start of the speed limit proper. With the audible alarm solution we could have beeps in the couple of hundred yards to indicate an approaching speed limit reduction

You don't even need to do this as an extension on the map - the damned thing knows where you are going anyway, so it adjusts itself a few hundred yards early.

Adding radar controlled "car following" systems would be useful as well...

[Bicycler]

You don't even need to do this as an extension on the map - the damned thing knows where you are going anyway, so it adjusts itself a few hundred yards early.

Wouldn't that mean setting a destination every time you leave the house or following the exact route the satnav suggests? Satnavs are a last resort means of navigation for me I'm afraid

[CJ]

Far and away it isn't the speed that is the problem that was hinted at upthread, it is the attitude, plus mental/physical ability to observe/rationalise and act and thus control the vehicle that has by far the largest influence on incidents..speed is way down on the list.

I am prepared to accept that is very likely to be true. Someone with the skill, reactions and training of a fighter pilot, combined with the social conscience of a charity worker, could very well be trusted to drive at whatever speed they think fit for the conditions.

Do you have a suggestion for what psychological and physiological tests should be added to the driving test (to be re-taken at what intervals?) and any estimate of how few might yet be permitted to drive under such an exemplary regime? Personally I would welcome such a thinning out of the ranks of those permitted to drive, leaving only those sufficiently skillful, alert and socially responsible to regulate themselves. I reckon that would take at least half the drivers off the road and cut the volume of traffic to 1950s levels!

Those who cannot be trusted to drive without limits are unfortunately NOT so stupid as to vote for their own loss of freedom to drive at all, which is why that's never going to happen - or not so long as fuel remains cheap enough for private motoring to a remain a reasonable aspiration for most UK adults, which is probably the rest of my lifetime and yours.

I think it' s more likely that the equipment of cars with artificial intelligence will instead be used to offset the manifest lack of intelligence on the part of so many of those presently permitted to operate such dangerous machines in a public place. Limits will nevertheless continue to be necessary, to regulate those driving older vehicles, who would not seem likely on the balance of probabilities to be especially skilfull or conscienscous. And if a simple device can be added to such vehicles to ensure compliance, what's not to like?

[SleepyJoe]

I have recently got a new TomTom Satnav and it came with a default setting which sounded an alarm if I exceeded the speed limit.
Great I thought, this should make it less likely if I inadvertently speed (this has happened in the past when I was navigating around an unknown area with lots of 30 & 40 mph limits which kept on changing & I thought I was in a 40 limit....)
Anyway, all went well until I got on the motorway and the SatNav started to warn me every 30 seconds when I was exceeding a non-existent 50mph limit. There must have been temporary roadworks when the map was last updated and subsequently removed.
It was annoying - I ended up turning the stupid thing off!
An automated speed limiter or audio warning will only work IF it has up to date information.
In addition, it can't take account of traffic or weather conditions and will encourage drivers to drive at the limit regardless.

Mark

[Adam S]

In addition, it can't take account of traffic or weather conditions and will encourage drivers to drive at the limit regardless.

A few people have said this. But why?