Average Speed Cameras Set to Become UK's Average Speed Cameras

Robert Farago
by Robert Farago

I’m not quite sure why I continue to cover the UK’s anti-speeding jihad. These posts never get much attention on this side of the pond, even though The Land of Hope and Glory’s obsession with speeding (and speeding revenue) is either a hateful harbinger of what’s to come in The Land of the Free, or a simple, stark warning: DON’T GO THERE. Either way, Pistonheads reports that “yellow vultures”– so-called SPECS cameras which average speed between point A and Point B– are set to replace radar or induction loop-based speed cameras. While safety campaigners and government accountants welcome any system where speeding motorists can’t “cheat” (slow down at the camera site and then speed up again), it’s the next step in Big Brother surveillance. And I happen to agree with the Association of British Drivers, who claim that fixating on your speed, rather than maintaining overall situational awareness, leads to more accidents, not fewer. Not to mention disrupting the “natural” traffic flow, creating accidents when motorists trying to overtake slower vehicles intent on obeying the letter of the law.

Robert Farago
Robert Farago

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  • 50merc 50merc on Sep 15, 2008

    menno: "I think “fascism” as seen by the Nazis was just a variant on “communism”. Besides, some people of the extreme right wing are so radical with their beliefs that they virtually “wrap around” and become like the extreme left wing. It’s simply a matter of the powerful “always” wanting to run things “their way”. Right. Both are statist, in that they subject the individual to intrusive, extensive and severe governmental control for the sake of whatever is declared to be beneficial to the state in general. I suppose the next step will be installing radio-controlled speed governors in cars to insure vehicles can't exceed the posted limit for a particular stretch of road.

  • Psarhjinian Psarhjinian on Sep 15, 2008
    Interestingly the dictionary indicates “fasicsm” is “extreme right wing politics” but I think “fascism” as seen by the Nazis was just a variant on “communism”. Heh. I've said the same thing, though usually the other way around. Right or left, what needs to be maintained is accountable government. Statist, anarchist, socialist or capitalist, as soon as accountability is lost (and you can lose it just as easily under any system!) that's when people start to get trampled. I don't mind speed cameras, but I want a measure of accountability to go with them. The rubberstamp traffic court system is not that.
  • VerbalKint VerbalKint on Sep 16, 2008

    Re: menno-- In John Toland's bio "Adolph Hitler" (excellent read BTW) someone quoted AH as saying "The best Nazis were ex-Communists." Let's hope Atlas Shrugs over there (and here!) before it's too late.

  • 2ronnies1cup 2ronnies1cup on Jun 13, 2011

    Aaaargh! - that stupid 'Hitler was a Socialist' internet meme rears its ugly head again. Where did that come from anyway? I don't recall seeing it until around five or six years ago, and now it's all over the place. Please, without taking political sides, without wishing to start an argument, just for the sake of truth, do some basic reading about socialism and about the Nazi Party and see if you still believe it. Seriously, there's more of a case to be made that Reagan was a Socialist than that Hitler was.

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