Entitled People

Yesterday, I posted about an entitled person.

Here's two more:

The first one is a Conservative police and crime commissioner married to a Conservative MP.

The second drives a Range Rover.

Or did until she got banned today.

They have both committed motoring offences.  I have marginally more sympathy for the first one of these - Caroline Henry who has been charged with five (YES FIVE!) speeding offences between March and June last year - the story, as reported by the BBC, is here.

However, those five offences were all between 5 and 10mph over the limit in a 30-Zone.

I speak as someone caught doing 37mph in a 30-Zone.  I got a speed awareness course which did educate me quite a bit and I now have to accept that 37mph is dodgy in a 30-Zone.

Normally, you can spot the fixed cameras and the mobile vans miles off - I was caught out by a van parked on the opposite side of the road in the dark.  So I don't understand how anyone could be caught 5 times including twice by the same camera.

The fact she drives a "silver Lexus with a personalised number plate" doesn't make her any more palatable and the fact she is a Conservative explains why she isn't looking to resign despite her promise to "reduce crime with action, not words".  Another example of her arrogance is that she ignored the advice of her solicitor and wrote to the Court stating that she was sorry, ashamed and embarrassed which may sound like contrition but made his job a lot harder.  Mind you, he's a solicitor so who cares?

The second woman is Sherrilyn Speid who,despite her name, didn't commit a speeding offence. No, she nudged climate change protesters with her car because they were blocking her route to take her child to school.  Her solicitor "challenged the driving ban as it would mean Speid could no longer shop for her mother, who has multiple sclerosis, drive to work, or drop off her son at school or football."

I suspect that she is rich enough to order an Uber but if not, then how about doing what unentitled people do and get on a bus?

Doggy Style

I found this satisfying story and video on the Car+Driver site today.  It's about a couple of thickos attempting and failing to break in to a Tesla in Las Vegas and then trying and failing to vandalise the charging unit.  Meanwhile, the car is filming it all in high quality and it ends up on YouTube where they are quite rightly ridiculed.

At the end of that story, I was pointed at another Car+Driver Tesla story which I thought was new but turned out to be from last October.  This is about how Teslas now have a mode whereby you can leave your dog safely in a car with the windows shut because it will keep the temperature within a sensible limit - until the battery goes flat at which point it will alert the driver by text.

That would never work with a cat.

 

A cat would steal the car.

 

But my favourite recent Car+Driver Tesla story comes from the festive period.  They have one as a long-term test vehicle.  The driver received a message to say that his car, which was parked outside the house on Christmas Day, had developed a fault which made it undriveable.

 

Rather impressively, a tow truck came and collected the car within half an hour.

Less impressively, there was no information about what the fault was and how long it would take to repair.  And, unlike in their previous experience, there was no offer of a loan car, or a rental car or the Uber credits that have been offered to other customers in similar situations.

 

However,

 

UPDATE 12/31/19, 10:00 a.m.: Although it’s possible the timing is purely coincidental, the service department at Tesla’s Toledo, Ohio, facility contacted C/D within three hours of this story's initial publication, offering a loaner car, a rental, or $100 per day in Uber credit while our Model 3 is in the shop. They also said parts are on the way and the car will be ready for us on Thursday (January 2).

 

Funny that.

Not über Intelligent

Or even über artificial intelligent.

This BBC story tells of how Uber has pulled its self-driving cars from the roads after an accident which left one of the vehicles on its side on Arizona.

Looks nasty:

The car itself looks nice though - it must really pay to be an Uber Driver if they can afford new Volvo SUVs - especially with self-driving technology.

Uber have stated that the car was in self-driving mode at the time.

The allegation in this case is that another driver "failed to yield".

Which is why I don't like the idea of self-driving cars.  Most drivers rate themselves as having above-average driving skills.  This is actually impossible but even the best driver in the world cannot do anything if someone else acts unexpectedly and hits them.  The way things stand at the moment - self-driving cars still need someone behind the wheel to take over in the case of an emergency.  In which case that person has to be fully alert at all times to what is going on around them - I know I would want to be!  But that completely negates the point of a self-driving vehicle.

I'm quite concerned in this case as to how the car ended up on its side - was it travelling too fast?  - did it clip the kerb? - did the driver panic when the other car was suddenly in its path?

We know SUVs tend to topple a lot easier than normal cars but even so.

Is this what is known as doing a bit of taxi driving on the side?

Droning On Even More

I had trouble believing the story I reported two weeks ago.

I have more trouble believing this Autocar one.

Maybe it's just a Halloween story designed to put the wind up us.

Literally.

It is another Uber drones story.  Except these ones are big enough to carry people around. Full marks to their marketing department for all this coverage.

But it couldn't actually happen could it?

Then again - Uber does mean "above".

Droning On

I'm not sure I believe this story from Car+Driver.

It comes with this picture:

And it is reported by several sites so I'm going with it's true.

Apparently Uber (the taxi people) are using Drones in Mexico to display messages to drivers stuck in traffic jams.  The one in this picture translates to, "The city is for you, not for 5.5 million cars."

They seem to be nagging messages - I'd have gone with one of the following:

• money generating advertising messages like "Cheap power tools at Home Depot - this week only"
• pro-Uber messages like "Share an Uber to cut down on the number of cars here"
• useful messages like "This tailback lasts for 2km and is due to an idiot driving into a lamp-post"

It doesn't say who creates the messages or where the drones take off from.  Do Uber drivers carry a drone, a piece of card and a marker pen with them?

Local take-aways could use them to get food orders, deliver the food and take the money - if you're stuck in a jam, you don't want to go hungry now, do you?

Or, if you're just bored in the jam, you could always do some shopping: