The government did something right…
I stopped to let that sink in…
I’m having trouble believing it too.
The government usually has an unhealthy obsession with motorists speeding; it usually uses speed cameras as semi-voluntary tax collectors; it usually places adverts on the TV about how you’re more likely to kill someone if you speed than if you were to drive with your head turned to the passenger chatting (well maybe not the last one). But today they had an advert telling pedestrians not to be so damn stupid. The advert depicted a group of teenagers playing with a video mobile and ends with the strapline “55 teenagers a week wish they’d given the road their full attention” (Click here for an online copy)
Given the cost of fatal accidents (about £1m per accident), this is a good use of public money and focuses in a more balanced way the attention of other road users to be aware of the clear risk that cars pose when they hit things and people.
The Solution
On the other hand, drivers who flout speed laws and assume pedestrians should not be in the road to be run over, should stop and think how hard it must be to cross a road if you are unable to walk briskly. Councils should place zebra crossings at more locations and drivers should be educated more deliberately about the danger of parking on the areas approaching zebra crossings. The solution is vehemently not to place speed cameras on roads such as the Falmer Road in Woodingdean as the following cartoon excellently illustrates:
Speed is a cause of some car accidents, and it does make the results more serious. But the alternative to letting cars drive at a safe speed for the conditions (as 90% of drivers do, regardless of the limit) is to impose arbitrary limits on drivers, as now, or to stop cars moving at all - as then they’d surely be safe. The victimisation of drivers by the socialists is despite the fact that there is no viable alternative infrastructure for many non-town locations and I doubt there ever will be.
The government should be making every immediate effort to provide an alternative to fossil fuelled cars, but it mustn’t stop people from being independent of state provided or so-called ‘public’ transport.
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