newmercman:
So one way to prevent rear end shunts of this nature is, when it’s congested, to adopt the 40mph (or lower) speed limit that the M25 has in places
It may not prevent the collisions, but it would, in some way, protect the idiots from themselves
I sort of agree with you. Although the differing speed limits where put in place to keep a continuous traffic flow, albeit at a reduced rate, rather than a stop start scenario when traffic volume is clearly to heavy. The upshot of this is that of course accidents at a lower speed are generally less severe than accidents at full speed. “accidents will happen” is a fact. What anyone is going to do to reduce the severity of them is anyones guess, especially that some people are all for upping the motorway speed limit, and HGV drivers want to be able to do 50 mph on single carriageways? Can’t have it all ways, go faster, be safer, make accidents less severe? Of course you could halve the speed limit, increase employment, cut accident deaths by more than 60% but no ones really gonna go that far as it costs money !!
Being easily killed is a by product of using a motorway.
In general most shunts and pile ups are caused by the seperation issue not the speed one.
Or they’re caused by people travelling too fast for the space they can see or anticipate to be clear ahead.
As we’ve seen fitting limiters and running at 56 mph max is doing nothing to solve those problems or reduce the severity of impacts if/when they happen.While reducing speeds and fitting limiters is just just adding to the issues by creating more traffic congestion and overtaking problems/bunching caused by low speed differentials.The fact is the choice is either drivers start to drive properly,with changes in the enforcement regime which prioritise that aspect not the speed one,or the motorways just become pointless expensive slow running liabilities.
Especially in the case of using the idea of ever lower speeds in a vain attempt to deal with the symptoms not the cause of the problem in which case the logical conclusion would require a much lower running speeds than 40 mph to guarantee safety in an environment of drivers who simply just don’t have the natural ability or pride in the job to drive safely at reasonable motorway speeds.IE the idea of dumbing down the speed environment just produces dumber drivers while at the same time the logical conclusion of that defeats the object of motorways anyway.
Sorry Geoffrey, but I never read the whole post as I knew there was no point after reading that speed limiters cause bunching
They do not
Drivers that do not drive appropriately are the cause of bunching
I’ve said this many times now, but I’ll say it again, a large percentage of today’s lorry drivers have never driven an unrestricted lorry, those of us that have will have had more than twenty years to get used to them
The one and only reason that you hit something from behind is because you failed to leave an adequate distance to allow you to stop in time
newmercman:
Sorry Geoffrey, but I never read the whole post as I knew there was no point after reading that speed limiters cause bunching
They do not
Drivers that do not drive appropriately are the cause of bunching
I’ve said this many times now, but I’ll say it again, a large percentage of today’s lorry drivers have never driven an unrestricted lorry, those of us that have will have had more than twenty years to get used to them
The one and only reason that you hit something from behind is because you failed to leave an adequate distance to allow you to stop in time
By bunching I’m referring to the fact that low speed differentials cause the unarguable issues of overtaking moves taking longer than they should do.Which then causes a ripple effect back along the motorway when drivers have to back off to maintain seperation distances in lane 2 or in lane 1 while being overtaken to compensate for those low differentials.That’s in addition to the issue of drivers returning to lane 1 short for the same reason with the forseeable results of that if/when traffic slows up ahead at the point where that takes place.Which would actually result in a nose to tail shunt which wasn’t the fault of the driver behind running into the one ahead that’s just taken away all his seperation distance and vision by returning short.Which certainly wasn’t a problem before speed limiters when we were able to overtake with much higher speed differentials on the basis that maintaining seperation distances and not creating ripples behind in lanes 1 or 2 were more important than running speeds.
switchlogic:
I see some have questioned what will happen in future as our roads get ever more congested, I’ll tell you what will happen, technology. Just like gear changing has been taken out of most of our hands so will some of the braking. Trucks already have this technology, it will become standard in time. Like it or not it’ll react faster than any human can and save a lot of accidents of this sort happening.
the problem is technology will cause accidents until everyone’s got one, it’s all well and good having the latest technology in your vehicle but the driver of the vehicle following to close behind will have even less time to react than they have now!
you will need a total re think on stopping distances,(I know a lot of folk don’t bother) but once some vehicles don’t need thinking time the driver of the truck behind will need to allow an even bigger gap, how will the truck or vehicle following know that your operating on separate set of stopping distances ?
Technology is all well and good and I’m all for it but keeping a safe distance from the vechile in front is not hard i beleave its part of the test to gain your licence apart from mech failure which is v uncommon nowadays there’s no excuse for running into the back of Somone
What annoys me is on one hand you have people on here banging in about how they shud be paid x amount an hour n how they wouldn’t get out of bed for this wage or Tht wage yet they drive with a complete disrigared for stopping distances it’s been said time and time before a speed limiter or speed limit is a max speed not a target
Yes I remember but the problem with that is they do not go on to say all that needs saying.
The 2 second rule is a minimum distance for an alert driver in good conditions and is aimed at cars.
Regarding trucks the minimum distance should be 4 seconds again with an alert driver in good conditions
These days it does not seem to matter what the conditions are…wet,icy, or fog and the morons are nose to tail.
CRAZY.
I am glad all concerned got out alive, and thanks to whoever took the pictures, as it happens i like to see pictures of wrecks, not though necessarily the injured or dead inside, but doesnt bother me, sometimes its good to know what caused the hold up, i must admit that i dont normally have time or the inclination myself to take pictures, although i often wished i did.
I must agree that there are far too many vehicles who tailgate ( hence the new legislation to fine drivers who do ) but like other laws, they need policing, and the resources are not available, ( bit like criminals not being jailed, its all about the cost ) There are many reasons why vehicles crash into the rear of other vehicles, fatigue, fell asleep, not leaving sufficient braking distances ( following too close/tailgating ) or mechanical failure, and that could happen with an automatic braking device fitted, whatever happens we all get held up on a daily basis, we are pushed to the limits with our work loads, all trying to reach our favourite haunts for an overnight stop, and all this adds to the risks involved, and thats what causes most accidents RISKS, maybe all believing we are invincible, it will not happen to us, but on a lasting note, i might add that the majority of accidents can be avoided by being a better driver and being more vigilant with whats happening around us, and the way drivers react to a situation.
That brake system on the Volvo…is it/was that a fully automatic system that does exactly as it showed in the vid…it misses the car in front (just) and then stops dead? Great idea…unless you happen to be in a following truck and find yourself presented with a 44tonner parked right in front of you! There is also a very similar video (Volvo again, I think) of the same system failing and the test pilot having to take evasive action…try that on a crowded m/way. I would rather have to stay in an alert state of mind, pay attention, hang back and do most of the things that ‘technology’ is taking from us (and leaving us with a false sence of security) myself. Back to the main…did the reefer detach prior to the accident and was the cause of the crash or would it have been caused by the force of the container lorry colliding with it, lifting it off the pin?
auto brakings fine as well as auto distance, but what about when some bell end in a car chops your big safe gap up so he can make the exit, auto slam on = major crashes, the poster above who is right in saying technology wont work unless everyone has it
Technological solutions for human problems rarely work well anyway, or at least if they do work, they throw up a whole host of new problems which nobody foresees. My signature says it all …
It’s a shame these threads always seem to end up with a few people arguing between themselves. No one truly knows what caused this terrible accident but thankfully no one lost their life in it & thank god for the emergency sevices they certainly had some work to do that day to sort things out.
IF speed was what caused this I hope any traffic office bod who reads this thread takes a minute to think what can happen next time he’s pushing his drivers beyond the limit of safety just to meet targets. As far as I’m concerned if I’m late for a delivery it’s either because I’ve dropped a clanger, which can happen to all of us, or something’s gone wrong on the road but, I’d rather get their late than not at all.
Basilbrush:
It’s a shame these threads always seem to end up with a few people arguing between themselves. No one truly knows what caused this terrible accident but thankfully no one lost their life in it & thank god for the emergency sevices they certainly had some work to do that day to sort things out.
IF speed was what caused this I hope any traffic office bod who reads this thread takes a minute to think what can happen next time he’s pushing his drivers beyond the limit of safety just to meet targets. As far as I’m concerned if I’m late for a delivery it’s either because I’ve dropped a clanger, which can happen to all of us, or something’s gone wrong on the road but, I’d rather get their late than not at all.
BB
basil I am sure most drivers have a mind of their own.Who would be stupid enough to put their own life and others at risk just because of a nob in an office.
In reality though more likely not keeping a safe distance as we see in abundance everyday…
Rhythm Thief:
Technological solutions for human problems rarely work well anyway,
The airline industry might disagree with that statement. Air safety wouldn’t be where it is today without the highly automated systems in place on modern aircraft.
It’s coming anyway. I read last year that from 2015, if a car manufacturer wants to achieve a 5 star safety rating it must have an automatic emergency braking system fitted. Volvo already has it on the new FH. Adaptive Cruise to maintain set driving distances will probably become compulsory at some point too.
No system with a human element will ever be flawless but it’s safe to say that leaving humans to their own devices doesn’t work. This is drilled home many times a day on various roads and motorways often with fatal results.
Read most of this and agree alot of accidents could be avoided with real driver training and proper enforcement. The no overtaking was mentioned earlier on the a1 and a14. drove along the a14 last week, came up behind a tipper doing 52mph and matched his speed and maintained a safe distance. needless to say no less than 20 trucks overtook us and only 1 abided by the no overtaking… British drivers mentality, both car, truck,bus and van, is horrendous. I do alot of driving on the continent lately and they must do something extremely different in the lessons/tests… its a sight to behold driving along the E34 and seeing 30+ wagons in convoy at whatever the front wagon is doing. This totally frees the 2nd lane for cars and you rarely see massive congestion other than around the city ring roads. Even on the 3/4 lane motorways if the matrix starts flashing then the trucks pull into convoy no matter what the speed is. A good example been i came off the a44 at Kassle Germany onthe the a7 north last week. Huge ass hill fully loaded and went down to 36 MPH. not one truck overtook me…outer 2 lanes flowed and traffic didn`t stop one and it was as busy as the m25 on a busy monday morning. Go figure…
Another thing I find over there they dont use roundabouts. You go from one major road onto another without stopping and this IMO keeps the traffic flowing instead of stop starting constantly. UK everywhere has a roundabout , I`m sure some place here have roundabouts for the roundbaout lol. Its simple if the traffic doesnt stop at a junction traffic keeps flowing.
Yeah those no HGV in lane 2 signs on the A14/M42 etc are a waste of time.
It’s all down to impatience. Next time you roll up to the back of a traffic jam observe the drivers around you, doesn’t matter what they’re driving. When I come to a jam my priority is to come to a safe and controlled stop so I get the engine brake on at full power and alert those behind by putting my hazards on. Look around and the priority for most others is to quickly swerve into the lane with the shortest queue.
I came up to a queue into the roadworks on the M5 yesterday and I always look in my mirror to see if anyone is about to rear end me. A foreign lorry was about to pull up behind me but swerved into the middle lane at the last minute as there was a shorter queue. When I say shorter, a few car lengths coz he didn’t even get level with me. We came to a stop but my lane moved off first and I went off in to the distance. he eventually took me and swapped lanes several times. This went on for a good 10 miles and he eventually exited the roadworks about 50 yards in front of me. A lot of effort for not a lot of gain.
Car drivers go mad for it. I always keep a long distance to vehicles in front in jams and cars seem to think they’ve found some secret exit from the jam and jump straight in it not realising that my lane isn’t going any faster than the others I’m just not tailgating like everyone else. No wonder jams are full of shunts.
Terry is spot on, I do the same, watch all the fools changing lane constantly, and truck drivers are as bad as anyone. My view is I just plod along in lane one, we’ll all get out at roughly same time with seconds to spare so I take the most relaxing route.
Thats exactly it Terry. Driver impatience, added to a lack of foresight, common sense and general driving ability.
Those guys who jump lanes make me laugh. I always pick a lane and stay in that lane and watch whats around me. the best ones are lane jumpers who end up behind me after 20 lane changes. What must go through their minds?
I propose that future road upgrades include 3 inch spikes that pop up in the white lines. When traffic is stationary the highways can activate a “STAY IN LANE” message on matrix and pop up these spikes. The lack of domino from lane jumpers will soon get traffic moving again hahaha
