Thread: Hide your rego no?

My grandfather handed his in about 5 yr ago or more. He was shattered but he was honest with himself that he was no longer safe. I bought him a motorised scooter recently and you just can't wipe the smile off his dial - some indepedence once again and the costs of taxis & buses were killing him.

My objection to posted speed limits is that they are arbitrary. Set by politicians, police, and bureaucrats without reference to the actual road conditions. I can accept restrictions in built-up areas, even (reluctantly) the 50kph limit in residential streets, but 100kph on major highways, no way.

I first got a learner's permit in 1957. The speed limits in Qld. then were 30mph in a built-up area and 50mph outside. The cars of the time had poor drum brakes, indirect steering, bad handling, poor lighting, few had turn signals which were not legal anyway. Many cars of the twenties through early 50's were still on the road, with mechanical brakes, indeed, cars were still being made into the fifties with mechanical brakes, steering systems with commonly three or more inches of play, repeatedly retreaded cross ply tyres which many owners ran until they were totally bald or "down to the canvas". Roads were rough, with broken shoulders, many Brisbane streets and much of the major highway network were still unsealed.The Qld. speed limits were raised about 1960 to 40mph in built-up areas and 60mph outside. The 40mph limit was reduced after a short time to 35mph. The only changes since have been with metrification to 60kph and100kph, no increase at all except that some highways are now 110kph. With the exponential improvement in both vehicles and roads, one could expect that the speed limits on highways could be increased to 130 or 140kph. But no, "every k over is a killer" say the elected servants, their tame bureaucrats, and compliant police forces, yet in reality few accidents are caused by speed inappropriate in the prevailing circumstances. Until the early 70's, much of NSW highway network was "unrestricted'. The onus being on the police to prove that a motorist charged with excessive speed in an unrestricted zone was travelling at a dangerous speed ,and the motorist could defend the charge on the basis of no danger. The speed camers are purely revenue raisers like poker machines and have no affect on road safety whatsoever.

Originally Posted by Brian Hjelm

My objection to posted speed limits is that they are arbitrary. Set by politicians, police, and bureaucrats without reference to the actual road conditions. I can accept restrictions in built-up areas, even (reluctantly) the 50kph limit in residential streets, but 100kph on major highways, no way.

I first got a learner's permit in 1957. The speed limits in Qld. then were 30mph in a built-up area and 50mph outside. The cars of the time had poor drum brakes, indirect steering, bad handling, poor lighting, few had turn signals which were not legal anyway. Many cars of the twenties through early 50's were still on the road, with mechanical brakes, indeed, cars were still being made into the fifties with mechanical brakes, steering systems with commonly three or more inches of play, repeatedly retreaded cross ply tyres which many owners ran until they were totally bald or "down to the canvas". Roads were rough, with broken shoulders, many Brisbane streets and much of the major highway network were still unsealed.The Qld. speed limits were raised about 1960 to 40mph in built-up areas and 60mph outside. The 40mph limit was reduced after a short time to 35mph. The only changes since have been with metrification to 60kph and100kph, no increase at all except that some highways are now 110kph. With the exponential improvement in both vehicles and roads, one could expect that the speed limits on highways could be increased to 130 or 140kph. But no, "every k over is a killer" say the elected servants, their tame bureaucrats, and compliant police forces, yet in reality few accidents are caused by speed inappropriate in the prevailing circumstances. Until the early 70's, much of NSW highway network was "unrestricted'. The onus being on the police to prove that a motorist charged with excessive speed in an unrestricted zone was travelling at a dangerous speed ,and the motorist could defend the charge on the basis of no danger. The speed camers are purely revenue raisers like poker machines and have no affect on road safety whatsoever.

No, don't even get me started on speed limits. The NT looses its derestriction and gets a 130kph speed limit as of 1st January 2007.

Apparently there are many people souveniring the old derestriction signs before they disappear on New Year's eve.

Australia is larger in area than Europe, yet has only has the population of Greater London. Europeans have major highways without speed limits, or with much higher limits than our quite uncongested highways. We should be able to run the Newell, Warrego, and similar outback highways at 140 or more.

this happened to guy in sydney, read it in a letter in one of the 4wd mags a while back.
the guy had a tricked up cruiser he used in his work doing stunts and providing special vehicles for films/ads. Harold Scruby saw the vehicle on the website and dobbed him into the RTA. he badgered them until they inspected his vehicle. after a few visits to his work to inspect it when he wasn't available, they issued an order to comply or his vehicle rego would be cancelled and he would be fined.
they found very little wrong with it because he took his job seriously enough to make sure the vehicle had every mod engineered properly.
as a reaction to that, all of the vehicles featured on the lroc website or in the magazine have their rego numbers altered. my suggestion was to make them all read "SCRUBY" after the man himself, but they thought that might just open the doors to the pr1ck.
hence my ute on the front of the november LROC news, has the YOOT blanked out.

Guys, have a read through this:

the impact is 40 times greater

There are some good points there. Given that Australia's car population is probably the oldest in a developed country speed limit increases may not be a welcome change from the physics point of view.

A small speed increase will not get you where you're going all that much faster but will increase the fuel consumption.

I am not even going to go into the road conditions here...

... and the philosophical arguments regarding personal freedom etc is something I am not going to go into either.

Anyway, do your sums, see how much quicker you can realy drive between Sydney and Brisbane given the speed increase on the Freeway sections.

Originally Posted by Turtle61

Anyway, do your sums, see how much quicker you can realy drive between Sydney and Brisbane given the speed increase on the Freeway sections.

In the mid 1960's I was in the used car trade for a while. I used to buy cars in Sydney and organise drivers to take them to Brisbane and follow up myself as Tail End Charlie to assist any who were in need. Our bench mark was twelve hours, Burwood to Fortitude Valley, using the Putty Road and New England Highway. Regular drivers were expected to perform that time. This in cars of the fifties and early sixties. We never had an accident even cruising at up to eighty mph in the few capable cars. Today with the speed limits and speed cameras you can barely make it in twelve hours in modern cars. I once brought up a Chev. Camaro with 327 and 4 speed, drum brakes, in 8 3/4 hours and on another occasion, an AP6 Valiant in 10 1/2 hours. Both occasions I had a brilliant run with traffic both ends. I bought a number of ex highway Patrol Falcons at different times which were 351GT's in the base Falcon 500 body. these were regularly driven up in 10 to 11 hours. At no time di I ever think these average speeds were dangerous. Cars and highways areso much better now that the limits should be increased.

Originally Posted by Turtle61

Guys, have a read through this:

the impact is 40 times greater

There are some good points there. Given that Australia's car population is probably the oldest in a developed country speed limit increases may not be a welcome change from the physics point of view.

I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news but you've been had by spin intended to justify their revenue generation policies.

The research this stuff uses as it's base was a Victorian study that was done by the Monash Uni (Melb) and paid for by the Victorian Government. It was done by a guy (can't remember his name) but he was pro "flash for cash".

Also, the study actually said that a speed of 5k different to the surrounding traffic was likely to multiply your chance of a collision. So, if you were on a 60k limited road, and everyone was driving at 65, and you drove at 60 you increase your chance by x. Of course all the states wishing to push their spin conveniently ignore this little semantic.

Of course the Scruby clones will throw volumes of doctored research and I could throw volumes back including from states in the US that abolished speed limits on highways and had their road tolls slashed.

I'm really not anti speed limit per se. I'm just in favour of realistic and appropriate limits, and more importantly in favour of policing speed as a part of a balanced strategy. Ie one that includes improving roads and driver training. At the moment policing speed is the strategy (and a couple of booze buses which is a very positive thing).

Really, if all this draconian speed enforcement was working, why is the toll on the up? You can argue population increase, but you can also argue that cars are MUCH safer than they were. Bottom line is it's going up government tunnel vision speed enforcement makes little or no difference.

The shame of it is that it's a win win for the government too. This chrissie they will get the spin doctors in full swing. If we have a good toll it's working and we need more enforcement. If it's bad we need more enforcement. All the while it's one of the few revenue streams state governments have where they can make extra money. And isn't it a beauty. Show me the money.