Merge in turn....a rant

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Each day I drive down the A629 Calderdale Way from the M62 towards Halifax. It's a fine clear dual carriageway (somewhat inevitably ruined by speed cameras enforcing a ridiculous 50 mph limit) that becomes a single lane as you approach Halifax.

As you drive along the dual carriageway towards the point at which two lanes become one there are a series of signs. The first says:

"Use both lanes"

Pretty straightforward - yet day after day there's a mile-long queue in the inside lane and a quarter-mile long queue in the outside lane. I, of course, use the outside lane (but more of this later).

The second sign says:

"Merge in Turn 200m"

Again pretty clear - the sign advises us to be prepared to merge in turn.

The third sign - just shy of the final dying of the second lane - says:

"Merge in Turn Now"

Pretty clear again.

So tell me why it is that, more often than not one of the following things happens:

1. A car (or more commonly a van) that has waited in the inside lane - presumably because they don't understand what "use both lanes" means - 'drifts' into the outside lane, straddling the centre line with the intention of preventing people in the outside lane passing

2. Rather than merging in turn, a vehicle (usually a car) in the inside lane squeezes right up to the car in front so as to make the instructions "merge in turn" impossible. Last week I witnessed a woman so eager to prevent this merging in turn that she ran into the car in front.

What is it with people that they cannot understand simple advice set out in simple English? If these drivers did what the signs said - used both lanes and merged in turn - the traffic would flow much more smoothly and everyone would get home safely and cheerily.

It seems that those of us who enter the lane with the least traffic and seek to follow the advice so kindly set out for us by Calderdale's highways engineers are not appreciated by the drivers who ignore that advice (I assume they aren't illiterate or blind). To the extent that these people deliberately drive badly.

What exactly is it about the concept of "merge in turn" that these drivers don't get?

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Bradford's parking fines and the economic downturn...

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In the latest (Q1 2012/13) Bradford Council financial monitor there's a bit on why the Directorate of Environment & Sport is predicting an overspend. Amongst other things it says:

Revenue generated from Car Parking Services is currently declining; this is primarily as a consequence of the economic downturn and a reduction in income from parking fines. Our analysis raises questions about the trade-off between less income than planned and the positive outcome of more law-abiding parking.

Implicit in this statement is that the 'economic downturn' is responsible for a predicted reduction in income from fines. No-one was able to provide any substantiation for this a today's meeting. Probably because the real evidence suggests the opposite:

Traffic tickets go up significantly when local government revenue falls, they found. Their study showed for the first time evidence of how "local governments behave, in part, as though traffic tickets are a revenue tool to help offset periods of fiscal distress." ...

Controlling for other factors, a 1 percentage point drop in local government revenue leads to a roughly .32 percentage point increase in the number of traffic tickets in the following year, a statistically significant connection.

My feeling is that this reflects more enforcement rather than more bad driving - perhaps (although I'm pretty sure most Bradfordians would giggle at this suggestion) the City's drivers are behaving better?

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Do we think we'll get away with it?

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There's been a deal of mournful, celebratory and serious reporting on the resignation of Chris Huhne following him being charged with perverting the course of justice.

Chris Huhne has quit as energy secretary after learning he will be charged with perverting the course of justice over a 2003 speeding case. His ex-wife Vicky Pryce will face the same charge in relation to claims she accepted his penalty points.

The question I have in all this is; "why?" Why did Mr Huhne - a clever and successful man - allegedly decide that it made any sense at all to ask his wife to take the rap for some penalty points on a driving licence. And for that matter, why did Vicky Pryce, his wife - another clever and successful person - think that this was anything like a good idea?

It may of course turn out that nothing of the sort took place, it is all a confusion or a misunderstanding. But nevertheless I really would like to know what is so massively important about not having a driving ban for a few months compared to the possibility of a career-ending prison sentence for perverting the course of justice?

I can understand when a spur of the moment action gets someone into trouble. But the actions of Mr Huhne - if true - were considered not impulsive. It seems to me utterly barking mad to run this risk when nobody is going to get too hot under the collar over a driving ban for accumulated speeding points. In some circles it might even get some street cred.

It has to be that too many people - especially in positions of power - think they'll get away with it.

Crazy!

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Speed cameras don't cut accidents...probably

The words "I told you" spring to mind at this morning's news on speed cameras - or "safety cameras" as their advocates like to dub them:

Ministers fear that thousands of cameras have served only to raise millions from motorists, rather than improve safety.

The findings, from an initial sample of 75 local authorities, will prompt the Government to call on every council to publish detailed information on each speed camera site, including accident rates and how much has been raised in fines.

Ministers hope that local authorities will succumb to pressure to remove the controversial devices if the information does not demonstrate that accidents have been cut. 

Oh dear! It seems that the people who advocate putting cameras on every street corner were wrong and that folk like me who said that driver training is more important that on street management were right.

I'm sure we've not heard the last of this - just as with CCTV (where the Home Office knows it doesn't reduce crime), the enthusiasts for lucrative speed cameras will be out there shroud waving. And ignoring the evidence.

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Nothing is that straightforward, Johann - the case of speed cameras

As ever with reporting on research we can be easily lulled into accepting the headline figures and the results that appear always to substantiate the view of authority. So it is with speed cameras. Here’s the oft wrong, Johann Hari on the subject:

We have the independent academic studies. We have reams of them. They all say the same. To cite the most detailed: a four year on-the-ground scientific study by University College London* found that when you set up a speed camera, the number of people killed in that place falls by 17 percent, over and above the general decline in road accidents that is happening everywhere because of improving technologies like airbags. That’s 100 people saved from death every year nationwide, the equivalent of stopping two 7/7s, or six Dunblaine (sic) massacres. Oh, and over 4000 people saved from serious injury.

Case closed says our friendly left-wing journalist. You lot – you speeding, middle-class drivers, you budding Clarksons – you are in the wrong. Speed cameras are saving the lives of countless kiddies and grannies across the length and breadth of England. Or is this actually the case?

Well maybe not.

There are many possible reasons which may contribute to the recent large reductions in fatalities. The economic downturn and falling traffic levels for the last two years have played a part. Similar large falls in fatalities were seen in the recession in the early 1990s.

We should also note that there has been no observable change in the long-term trend of reducing pedestrian casualties. If speed cameras were so effective then we would expect to have seen an accelerating rate of decline. Especially given that many cameras are installed with the express intention of reducing pedestrian casualty risk.

The big contribution to the decline in casualty rates is in the numbers of 16-25 year olds killed:

The number of fatalities in accidents involving young car drivers fell by 11 per cent from 635 in 2008 to 564 in 2009 – a reduction of 71 deaths, out of a total fall of 316 road deaths between 2008 and 2009. This follows a 22 per cent fall between 2007 and 2008 – a reduction of 182 deaths.

All this comes from Department of Transport figures and studies – the same studies that report every year how the main contributor to road casualties is sloppy behaviour:

The contributory factor category driver/rider error or reaction was the most frequently reported category, involved in 69 per cent of all accidents reported to the police. It was the most frequently reported category for each severity of accident

And for pedestrians:

Pedestrian failed to look properly was reported in 58 per cent of accidents in which a pedestrian was injured or killed, and pedestrian careless, reckless or in a hurry was reported in 23 per cent. Eighteen per cent of pedestrian casualties had both of these factors reported.

It may be that speed cameras save lives. But the UCL research – for all its significance (and we’ll ignore that it was paid for by the advocates of speed cameras shall we?) focuses on point studies. And even at the most dangerous point in the country the numbers of injury accidents is too small for any trend not to be meaningless.

If we’re looking for causal factors in all this – for the thing that is causing the most accidents – then we must look at the numbers or men under 30 driving on our roads. For it is these young men who are most likely to cause and to be involved in serious accidents. If Johann Hari really cares so deeply about road safety that he thinks freedoms can be infringed – then he should be advocating banning young men from driving.


*See Mr Hari, it’s not hard to find the link to the research you reference and put it in your blog post. And save us folk half an hour or so trying to find it.

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Motorway services stations aren't there to serve you food - which is why it's so crap and expensive

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Why are motorway service stations so awful? Why do we use them when we know the experience will be unpleasant? And how do these places get away with charging us so much for the poor excuse for food and drink they serve us? I know these are matters of great importance to you all and have merited my thoughts and attention over the past couple of days (not least because I’ve been in one of two of them during a trip to and from the South West).

My initial thoughts were that there has to be an explanation – after all such service stations are universally awful. Even Italy with its slow food delights has dreadful service stations selling expensive and poor quality food. So there has to be some rational reason for the problem – why services stations are so poor and (perhaps related) why we are prepared to put up with this situation.

There are several possible reasons (and these are not necessarily exclusive) including a semi-monopoly (both at the site and in the overall ownership of the service stations), the impact of regulation and exploiting a captive audience.

To appreciate this lets look first at a similar situation – the sale of popcorn at the cinema. Here there has been some serious research at Stanford University:

The findings empirically answer the age-old question of whether it’s better to charge more for a primary product (in this case, the movie ticket) or a secondary product (the popcorn). Putting the premium on the “frill” items, it turns out, indeed opens up the possibility for price-sensitive people to see films. That means more customers coming to theaters in general, and a nice profit from those who are willing to fork it over for the Gummy Bears.

This takes us a little way towards understanding the problem except that we can’t obviously see a primary product at the motorway service station – surely selling us food and drink is their primary activity? Here’s a clue, however, from the Highways Agency regulations:

The Government specifies that all MSAs must offer:

Free short term parking for all types of vehicle
Free toilets and hand washing facilities (in sufficient quantity to cater reasonably for the traffic flow on the motorway) and baby changing facilities
Fuel
Access for up to two hours for those carrying out emergency repairs to broken down vehicles.
Access to all facilities for disabled people.
Facilities must be available for 24 hours a day every day of the year
Access to a cash operated telephone

It seems clear from this that that primary function of motorway service areas is not to sell us food and drink – that isn’t in the list above. What we are doing by paying over the odds is allowing the provision of these free facilities required by regulation. Just as with the cinemas in the Stanford study, the service station operator is using the excess profits from high-priced food and drink to cross-subsidise the regulatory requirements – the free stuff the Highways Agency requires of the operators. If users paid for parking, to use to toilets and there was no free access it is likely that food prices would be much lower. More significantly, such an environment would put a greater emphasis on maintaining facilities – cleaning tables, sweeping floors and reducing litter.

I suspect that this is only part of the explanation – we now understand the high prices. But that does not (any more than it does for the cinema) explain the poor quality of both food and food service. Part of this may lie in the actual cost of the free stuff – to maintain food prices at a ‘reasonable’ level ‘requires’ quality to suffer. However, I suspect that the captive audience problem explains much of this as does the lack of real on site competition (would a ‘shopping mall’ type approach work better or would the site owner collect the monopoly profit through higher rents).

I suspect that we will carry on putting up with the price-gouging in order to have 24 hour, 365 days a year access to service stations – for the fuel, the toilets and the chance to park and have a break. And we’ll pay over the odds for food and drink so as to have that service. We’ll also put up with poor food and crap service because that’s not why we stop!



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The Red Mist descends....

…but it will pass. Have put on lots of twingly prog rock to calm me down. But in the meantime:

Universal average speed cameras on motorways – to “save carbon”

The happy fools who signed up for ID Cards can now get one

Labour MPs – plus Spanish commies – want to tell me my hours of work

We’re to be fined £1000 if we don’t fill in the census form

MPs are calling for the word "regular" to be banned

…and that’s just today.

Dear fascist bureaucrats, pseudo-liberals, greeny fascists, interfering so-called progressives and anyone else who thinks they can run our lives – please just leave us alone. We’re big, ugly and grown-up. And we can get along just fine without your help or guidance. GO AWAY.

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A little rant: I'm in favour of cycling but....

Why...

1. Ride in the road when there's cycle lane
2. Go the wrong way up a one way street
3. Bob on and off the pavement regardless of pedestrians
4. Jump red lights
5. Turn across the road without signalling
6. Weave in and out of semi-stationery traffic
7. Ride on the pavement and in pedestrian areas
8. Allow huge queues of traffic to build up behind you and not pull over.

...and when some poor driver has nearly killed you because of your stupidity (bloke who crossed in front of me on red today) why do you think it's OK to shout and swear, make rude gestures and generally act like an idiot? Have you never considered that you'd get a little more respect and consideration if you didn't behave as if the rules of the road were invented for others.

Keep on cycling but for god sake stop trying to pretend you're better than those of us in cars. You're not.