Trussed Up

I'm getting fed up of Autocar's car news.

It seems to just now be "business insights" that you have to register for or repeats of slideshows.

So I decided to go back to my old favourite - Auto Express car news.

There they had a couple of stories from earlier in the week about how our new feeble-minded, Thatcher-Wannabe Prime Minister was trying to woo the 180000 old white men who got to choose the replacement for the bumbling lecherous Churchill-Wannabe liar.

I'm talking, of course, about Liz Truss:

Hang on, that might be the wrong picture.

Yes, this one is Liz Truss:

You can tell by the spurious union flags.

Anyway, there is one story I actually find myself agreeing with the woman on - she is not a fan of Smart Motorways and suggests the evidence she's seen indicates the concept has failed.

Too bloody right it has - people have died!

The story is here.  Every time I drive to Manchester on the M56 I get slowed down by the roadworks behind the conversion of a stretch of it into Smart Motorway - I dread the day it is opened so that doubles the torture.

Just because you call something "smart" it doesn't mean it actually is - look at Liz Truss for example.

In the other story, she suggests that she is “prepared” to look into scrapping mandatory speed limits on motorways as prime minister.  Now using words like "suggest" and "prepared to look into" means that this is as likely to happen as the 40 new hospitals Boris promised us.

And is she saying she wants to make us more like Germany!?

We could have stayed in the EU for that.

This story wouldn't have chimed with the old men voting for the PM so maybe that is why the final voting went a lot closer than most people - me included - thought it would.

Never mind.

At least Priti Patel is gone.

Bad Driving Caught on Video

The BBC today have a story about an impatient van driver killing another driver by causing a head-on collision.  The incident was caught on a dash-cam (is it called a dash-cam if it is rear-facing?)  and the dead man's family wanted the footage releasing - presumably as a warning to other impatient tossers.

This particular impatient tosser was jailed for three years and four months.

Good.

I've not included a link as I would be uncomfortable doing so.  So instead, here is a link to another BBC story about a miscreant caught on dash-cam (is it called a dash-cam if it attached to a cyclist?)

In this case, an Audi Q8 driver has been ordered to pay more than £1,800 after passing a cyclist too closely.  Now to be fair, the Q8 driver's seat was probably so far away from the cyclist that he didn't realise that the other side of the car was within 1.5m of him.

I don't like Audi Q8s - I don't see the point of them.

I also don't like this particular Audi Q8 driver - he was initially offered a driver awareness course or a fixed penalty notice so he only has himself to blame.

He said, "The fine is absolutely appalling. I am 77 years of age and the last fine I had was 35 to 40 years ago."

All that proves is that he hasn't be caught very often.  And what has his age got to do with it?  I'd be keeping quiet about that if I was him or people may be questioning whether or not he should be retaking his test.

Now, if you've got five minutes to spare, you can watch MY dash-cam footage (from a real dash-cam).  The car to watch is the car in front of the car in front of me.  It is a black Mercedes A-Class being driven by, I'm guessing here, someone very much of the age of the Audi Q8 driver.

He insists on driving in the outside overtaking lane at approximately 10mph under the speed limit UNTIL he comes out of the 50mph roadworks section.

I have had to split that into two to get it uploaded to Blogger and it is during the second half in which you get the high-pitched expletives from me.

I think he only stopped messing about at the end because he saw the two Traffic Womble cars and thought that they were Police.

Meanwhile, to finish off on a lighter note, here is yet another BBC story with footage of an example (like this one from February) of a fork-lift driver getting the better of a low-life.

Red Light District

I believe that when temporary traffic lights at roadworks fail, they are set to default to red rather than green.

It makes sense - it is better for people to get fed up waiting and cautiously proceed rather than to confidently hurtle towards somebody doing the same in the opposite direction.

I must admit, I felt reasonably safe going past this one today: 

It can't be often that you have to chase and catch up with a traffic light.

And it can't be often that Junction 5 of the M53 is a Red Light District.

Badgering

Revenge of the badgers in Gloucestershire?

Gloucestershire is one of the areas where badger culling has been extended - a stupid effort to prevent bovine TB with no scientific backing.

 

So the badgers are fighting back by undermining the roads there.  We are talking a three-month road closure.

 

And the law seems to be on their side.

 

Apart from the wanting them dead bit.

Working Up Your Speed

The BBC report today that the Motorway roadworks speed limit could be increased.  It is currently 50mph.

There's been a study.

The tests took place at 60mph on the M5 between junction 4A and junction 6, and at 55mph on the M3 in Surrey between junction 3 and 4A.

The study found 60% of those who drove in the 60mph trial zone had a decreased average heart rate, while it was lower for only 56% of those on the 55mph journey.

Therefore, if they raised it to 100mph, there would be a decreased heart rate for 100% of those taking part.  (I have a Degree in Statistics)

But the heart-rates of the road-workers would be much higher.

That is the main issue here I think - the safety of the workers on these sites.  A union spokesman said: "Sadly, in recent years there have been several deaths of motorway workers and these changes will make their work even more dangerous. Already motorists frequently drive into coned-off areas. At increased speeds, it will make such potentially lethal accidents even more common."

However, many stretches of motorway roadworks look like this:

...without a worker in sight.  These are the places they can up the speeds - the workers can then bring with them signs reducing the speed limit when they set up in the morning.

Or would that be too sensible?

Slippery Road Ahead

There's something fishy in the state of Oregon.

 

And it's all over the road.

 

A number of hagfish - aka slime eels - because they have a habit of producing lots of the stuff when stressed - have been involved in a road accident.  According to the Police, the driver, Salvatore Tragale, who is not a hagfish, approached roadworks and tried to stop.  One container flew off the truck bed and into the southbound lane, while the other containers spilled onto the highway.  The flying container hit one vehicle which then caused it and four other vehicles to be pushed into each other. There were no serious injuries to the humans involved.  Not too sure of the fate of the fish but their prospects were not good anyway as they were en route to becoming South Korean meals. 

The story is here - I found it on the Australian ABC News site although plenty of other news outlets closer to Oregon also had it.

 

As for Salvatore - e'll have to be more careful next time.