Thread: Another senseless tragedy

Interesting thought , one concern though . Is there enough jail space , can the economy handle that many people taken out of work ? Add this to all the other crimes we want people locked up for , were is the money going to come from to support it ?
More has to be put into the training of drivers to do the right thing. Perhaps those that choose not to drive should be applauded not put down ?

Originally Posted by travelrover

Yes, during a recent police blitz in the Hawkesbury LAC the driver of 1 in 10 vehicles pulled over were drug effected. No idea what constitutes 'over the limit' in these cases but pretty scary numbers. This is a rural area with plenty of other hazards on our roads from tractors, slow moving trucks, wandering stock and no shortage of roos. The area includes the notorious Bells Line of Road and the Putty Rd Both favorites venues for motorbikes and cars pushing their skills againts these challenging roads with the resultant regular carnage. The rescue choppers regularly fly over our place on Sunday afternoon. According to the local paper a high proportion (dont recall the %) of these casualties are drug or alcohol affected, or both. Generally under 25 males.

Dont know how the problems will be solved.

You should see the obviously drugged/drunk people walking around Warrnambool at night. When travelling though I make a point of locking the doors when stopped at traffic lights.

This happened a little while ago. It's hard to know if it was drugs or attempted suicide. Emergency services responding to crash | The Standard

Originally Posted by manic

Plenty of people would believe this if it aired on the news. I would like to know how they used the data to spin that yarn. I dont buy it!

Seeing as new cars are no longer built in this country we could super tax all new cars manufactured outside Australia, something like 1000%. Then encourage electric and alternative fuel conversions and rebuilds on all the cars we already have. Less polution, more local jobs, Aussie car industry revived.

Safety is in the hands of the driver. Drive like a lunatic and you are banned from driving. Drive whilst banned and you go to prison for a year.

That's the real environmentally friendly way but I guess it's our throwaway society that is the problem as even phones go out of date in a year.

Originally Posted by Homestar

In Vic, the recorded speed is 3KPH higher than the speed they book you for so if he was fined for 101 he was pinged doing 104. Still a stupid system, yes. If you’re on the ball, you just slow down for the cameras then speed up again.

Ahah! The problem would just be the point to point cameras that calculates your time over the distance & the portable speed camera cars that side of the road.

Most people try to do the right thing, but some people are not deterred by any penalty and just think they won't be caught.
An example is the number of disqualified drivers who continue to drive. No penalty will deter them. I know a person who ran up $20,000 in unpaid fines and tolls, was disqualified, his vehicle was deregistered - and he continued to drive it! When he was caught he whinged he was being victimised. Seriously?
The other day a bloke roared around me on a corner, crossing to the wrong side of the road over unbroken white lines just before a crest, which could have caused a head-on with an on-coming vehicle. Up the road he was stopped by a motorcycle cop, who discovered he was unlicensed. His response was to get out of the vehicle and assault the cop, who ended up in hospital with facial injuries, and drive off. He has since been arrested. Hopefully he will be put away, since he obviously is not fit to be at large.
Harsher penalties don't deter people who will just ignore the rules anyway.

Originally Posted by trog

Interesting thought , one concern though . Is there enough jail space , can the economy handle that many people taken out of work ? Add this to all the other crimes we want people locked up for , were is the money going to come from to support it ?
More has to be put into the training of drivers to do the right thing. Perhaps those that choose not to drive should be applauded not put down ?

Maybe if we get rid of the lifers living with free movies etc. we could make room....

Originally Posted by DiscoMick

Most people try to do the right thing, but some people are not deterred by any penalty and just think they won't be caught.
An example is the number of disqualified drivers who continue to drive. No penalty will deter them. I know a person who ran up $20,000 in unpaid fines and tolls, was disqualified, his vehicle was deregistered - and he continued to drive it! When he was caught he whinged he was being victimised. Seriously?
The other day a bloke roared around me on a corner, crossing to the wrong side of the road just before a crest, which have caused a head-on with an on-coming vehicle. Up the road he was stopped by a motorcycle cop, who discovered he was unlicensed. His response was to get out of the vehicle and assault the cop, who ended up in hospital with facial injuries, and drive off. He has since been arrested. Hopefully he will be put away, since he obviously is not fit to be at large.
Harsher penalties don't deter people who will just ignore the rules anyway.

No it doesn't sadly. Years ago we had a bikie gang turn up on our farm & when the police came they confiscated their guns and told them to leave. Then the bikies took the police to court for theft of firearms! Even if you do a citizens arrest you could become the accused. Guilty until proven innocent nowadays. This is probably where dash cams come in for truckies that have their braking room taken by a car & then run into them when the car suddenly stops. I've seen it happen and it beats me why you want to squeeze your little VW Golf in front of a Kenworth truck...

Originally Posted by JDNSW

Actually, if you think about the number of drivers on the road, and the distance driven, compared to the number of accidents, the figure is probably way higher than 95%, probably closer to 99.9%. If drivers making the right decision only 95% of the time, the accident and death rates would be much higher.

With it now confirmed that the car in the Point Cook crash was more than 100k over the speed limit, and the offending driver in the South Coast head-on being a serial driving offender who had served time for driving while disqualified and was on methadone treatment, one has to be a bit sceptical about the effectiveness of strict speed limits enforcement by speed cameras as a road safety tool.

Victorian police are alarmed by the nearly twofold increase in drivers with BAC above the limit. But with this still less than 1.5% of drivers tested and with over 20% of drivers involved in fatal accidents in that category, the major cause of accidents should be fairly clear. Even more concerning is that they also report slightly more drivers tested were on drugs than alcohol for the first time.

JDNSW I typed 99.9% but changed it assuming you gents might assume I was my usual (over?) optimistic self.


Drug driving including prescription drugs is in my view one of the big issues along with the total contempt or complete ingnornace for or of other people lives shown by the 1% or so. Running long distance puts me on the slow path a lot. The amount of whoopee weed is obvious from both houses and even CARS at many evening runs I take! Add the numbers of people fouced on phones while driving saddly makes the percenage of selfih ingnorant ****** back to above 5%