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20 mph limits

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swill453
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Re: 20 mph limits

#376363

Postby swill453 » January 12th, 2021, 8:09 pm

Lootman wrote:It is not the exact same action but it does display the self selfish indifference to other road users, as had been explained to you.

Go on, have the last word.

Scott.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376371

Postby Arborbridge » January 12th, 2021, 8:40 pm

Lootman wrote:
richlist wrote:So there are people on this forum who think that whilst driving within the 20mph speed limit one should actually pull over and stop to allow other drivers to pass. Absolute madness.

WHY ?

Ultimately it has nothing to so with the speed limit. It has to do with being a considerate road user.

So if you have a tail of twenty vehicles behind you, are you saying that you would stubbornly continue to obstruct their progress out of spite? Rather than pulling over at a safe opportune moment to let them pass? Do you also hog the "fast lane" on motorways rather than pull over to allow others to pass?

On rural lanes it is quite common for tractors and other slow moving vehicles to pull over from time to time to allow this. I suspect the UK does not yet have a law enforcing that because historically UK drivers have not been selfish, but that may change if too many drivers think they have a right to dawdle and obstruct.

That said, having an artificially slow speed limit compounds this problem.



The tractor is a man of straw argument, and you know it. If the tractor cannot travel at 20 mph, fine - they will often move over. But why would they move over if they can travel at or slightly above the limit. I see not reason whatsoever.

Here we have a guy seriously suggesting that we should pull over and allow people to break the law, adding in a vain attempt at moral blackmail, that not to do so is somehow immoral or selfish!
I can hardly believe what I'm reading here: it's tantamount to urging people to break the law by condoning people who drive over the limit.

This is pure rationalisation of taking the law into one's own hands - a parallel with Trump's America perhaps? (OK, I stretch the point, but isn't it the same instinct: I'll break the law if I want to and tell everyone else they can keep out of my way)

Arb.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376377

Postby Lootman » January 12th, 2021, 8:54 pm

Arborbridge wrote:Here we have a guy seriously suggesting that we should pull over and allow people to break the law, adding in a vain attempt at moral blackmail, that not to do so is somehow immoral or selfish!

I can hardly believe what I'm reading here: it's tantamount to urging people to break the law by condoning people who drive over the limit.

There is an interesting philosophical point there. Is it your duty to personally prevent others from breaking the law?

I can see how it is possible to take that position, although personally I would regard it as too self-righteous for me to adopt. I believe in giving people the freedom to do what they want, in general. Everyone breaks the law to some extent, and presumably have their reasons, so that is not my call.

I might intervene if I saw an assault, rape or murder, if it was reasonable for me to do so. But a technical breach of a speed limit? Not my job. Similarly I also would not snitch on anyone but accept that is not a principle for everyone; it is just how I was raised.

As I said before I do not think anyone should feel intimidated into driving faster, limit or not. But refusing to let others overtake seems like taking puritanism a bit far. And if I had an angry, frustrated driver behind me, I'd rather he passed me and disappear into the distance.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376378

Postby swill453 » January 12th, 2021, 8:59 pm

Lootman wrote:As I said before I do not think anyone should feel intimidated into driving faster, limit or not. But refusing to let others overtake seems like taking puritanism a bit far. And if I had an angry, frustrated driver behind me, I'd rather he passed me and disappear into the distance.

Nobody here has advocated "refusing to let others overtake". If someone can safely overtake me I don't have a problem with it, whatever speed I'm doing.

Scott.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376397

Postby Mike4 » January 12th, 2021, 10:29 pm

Arborbridge wrote:The tractor is a man of straw argument, and you know it. If the tractor cannot travel at 20 mph, fine - they will often move over. But why would they move over if they can travel at or slightly above the limit. I see not reason whatsoever.


It's a straw man argument on another front too. The mahoosive £150k tractors farmers around here drive appear to be perfectly capable of 50mph on the public highway.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376399

Postby Lootman » January 12th, 2021, 10:32 pm

Mike4 wrote:
Arborbridge wrote:The tractor is a man of straw argument, and you know it. If the tractor cannot travel at 20 mph, fine - they will often move over. But why would they move over if they can travel at or slightly above the limit. I see not reason whatsoever.

It's a straw man argument on another front too. The mahoosive £150k tractors farmers around here drive appear to be perfectly capable of 50mph on the public highway.

The absolute speed is less important than the relative speed.

So for example a tractor doing 10 mph in a natural 30 mph zone is the same problem as someone driving 20 mph in a natural 35 mph or 40 mph zone.

If you are blocking traffic then move the freak over and stop being an obstacle!

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376400

Postby didds » January 12th, 2021, 10:33 pm

richlist wrote:So there are people on this forum who think that whilst driving within the 20mph speed limit one should actually pull over and stop to allow other drivers to pass. Absolute madness.

WHY ?



yeah... i know.

how do you as the lead driver doing 20mph in a 20 zmne, with a queue of vehicles behind you, know that they want to more than 20 mph ?

I can see you pulling over, the stream of traffic passing you, you jumping on the end - to find everyone is still doing 20 mph becasue they were all in fact following the speed limit.

not that there is an issue with that particularly of course.

It just made me laugh to think of it.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376402

Postby swill453 » January 12th, 2021, 10:35 pm

Lootman wrote:So for example a tractor doing 10 mph in a natural 30 mph zone is the same problem as someone driving 20 mph in a natural 35 mph or 40 mph zone.

If you are blocking traffic then move the freak over and stop being an obstacle!

There's no such thing as a "natural 35 mph or 40 mph zone". The subject under discussion is a road where the legal maximum speed is 20 mph, at pain of prosecution.

Someone driving at 20 mph there is not an obstacle.

Scott.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376403

Postby Lootman » January 12th, 2021, 10:42 pm

swill453 wrote:
Lootman wrote:So for example a tractor doing 10 mph in a natural 30 mph zone is the same problem as someone driving 20 mph in a natural 35 mph or 40 mph zone.

If you are blocking traffic then move the freak over and stop being an obstacle!

There's no such thing as a "natural 35 mph or 40 mph zone". The subject under discussion is a road where the legal maximum speed is 20 mph, at pain of prosecution.

Someone driving at 20 mph there is not an obstacle.

And that is where we disagree, as you well know. It is not like I am going to agree with you just because you keep repeating the same thing over and over no matter how dumb I have explained that is.

You seem obsessed with the law above all else. Whereas I consider the law as just one input into real-life decision making.

Unless of course you are going to claim that your Scottish puritanism means that you have never, ever technically transgressed the law ever? You are Gordon Brown and I claim my five pounds. :D

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376408

Postby swill453 » January 12th, 2021, 11:03 pm

Lootman wrote:You seem obsessed with the law above all else. Whereas I consider the law as just one input into real-life decision making.

Unless of course you are going to claim that your Scottish puritanism means that you have never, ever technically transgressed the law ever? You are Gordon Brown and I claim my five pounds. :D

No, I haven't even stated I would be strictly sticking to the speed limit. However if I wanted to go faster, but found myself behind someone dead on the limit without a safe overtaking opportunity, I'd accept that and certainly wouldn't consider them an obstacle. My real-life decision making would cause me to shrug and accept it with grace. Anything else might cloud one's thinking, leading to increased risk.

Scott.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376411

Postby airbus330 » January 12th, 2021, 11:15 pm

didds wrote:
richlist wrote:So there are people on this forum who think that whilst driving within the 20mph speed limit one should actually pull over and stop to allow other drivers to pass. Absolute madness.

WHY ?



yeah... i know.

how do you as the lead driver doing 20mph in a 20 zmne, with a queue of vehicles behind you, know that they want to more than 20 mph ?

I can see you pulling over, the stream of traffic passing you, you jumping on the end - to find everyone is still doing 20 mph because they were all in fact following the speed limit.

not that there is an issue with that particularly of course.

It just made me laugh to think of it.


If you don't notice the BMW 6" off your rear bumper, you're not using your mirrors enough :lol:

I'll freely admit that the dawdling driver running 23 in a 30 does my head in and I will try and pass before someone equally irritated tries to pass from 3 cars back. The vast majority of speed limits, particularly outside residential areas are very conservative and the limit is really the minimum sensible speed. I'm happy to obey 20's in residential areas, but the increasing roll out of them will simply lead to more people to ignore them. Speed limit case in point. A482 Llanwrda to Lampeter, about 30 miles of glorious twisty open road. Got taken from National limit to blanket 50 a couple of years back. Virtually no-one obeys it generally and those that do become moving road blocks for streams of commercial traffic trying to get somewhere. It encourages risky overtaking, so a safety feature has actually made the road less safe. Thankfully, the tractors tend to pull in and let the faster traffic pass.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376445

Postby Arborbridge » January 13th, 2021, 7:56 am

Lootman wrote:
Mike4 wrote:
Arborbridge wrote:The tractor is a man of straw argument, and you know it. If the tractor cannot travel at 20 mph, fine - they will often move over. But why would they move over if they can travel at or slightly above the limit. I see not reason whatsoever.

It's a straw man argument on another front too. The mahoosive £150k tractors farmers around here drive appear to be perfectly capable of 50mph on the public highway.

The absolute speed is less important than the relative speed.

So for example a tractor doing 10 mph in a natural 30 mph zone is the same problem as someone driving 20 mph in a natural 35 mph or 40 mph zone.

If you are blocking traffic then move the freak over and stop being an obstacle!



You are making the same mistake again: there is no such thing as a "natural" speed. Apart from anything else, this idea must vary according to what type of road user you are.
It's entirely your own concept, and it tends to suggest the you believe that one's own concept of what this speed should be should override the legal limit - judging from your illustrations in the previous posts. This is nothing but a semantic trick to rationalise one's law breaking.

Arb.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376450

Postby Arborbridge » January 13th, 2021, 8:11 am

Lootman wrote:
swill453 wrote:
Lootman wrote:So for example a tractor doing 10 mph in a natural 30 mph zone is the same problem as someone driving 20 mph in a natural 35 mph or 40 mph zone.

If you are blocking traffic then move the freak over and stop being an obstacle!

There's no such thing as a "natural 35 mph or 40 mph zone". The subject under discussion is a road where the legal maximum speed is 20 mph, at pain of prosecution.

Someone driving at 20 mph there is not an obstacle.

And that is where we disagree, as you well know. It is not like I am going to agree with you just because you keep repeating the same thing over and over no matter how dumb I have explained that is.

You seem obsessed with the law above all else. Whereas I consider the law as just one input into real-life decision making.

Unless of course you are going to claim that your Scottish puritanism means that you have never, ever technically transgressed the law ever? You are Gordon Brown and I claim my five pounds. :D


Try that with a shopping lifting charge or worse :roll:

Of course there are times when one might accidentally transgress the speed laws, but since I left my youth behind, never deliberately as far as I remember. Indeed I have been punished for doing so, and one of those punishments resulted in a fine and points which made me more careful ever after.

But here you are advocating not only deliberately breaking the law, but claiming those who are driving within the law (unless they waste their own time pulling over) to be "enemies of the people". This is pretty extraordinary stuff, and surely cannot be supported. Your philosphy possibly accounts for those people who come up too close behind me in an attempt to intimidate me into going too fast and break the law.
Fine if they want to overtake, let them do so, but why would their bullying manner in life make me use my own time pulling over to a halt to let them pass? You say that's selfish, while giving freedom to demand that the overtaking car can indulge in selfishness.

And this is all based on a concept of the "natural speed" which exists only in your own mind.

Arb.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376462

Postby didds » January 13th, 2021, 9:19 am

airbus330 wrote:If you don't notice the BMW 6" off your rear bumper, you're not using your mirrors enough :lol:


that's where all bmws drive anyway I thought, whatever the speed! ;-)

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376473

Postby Arborbridge » January 13th, 2021, 9:40 am

airbus330 wrote:I'll freely admit that the dawdling driver running 23 in a 30 does my head in and I will try and pass before someone equally irritated tries to pass from 3 cars back. The vast majority of speed limits, particularly outside residential areas are very conservative and the limit is really the minimum sensible speed.


As regards your first sentence: I agree. But we were discussing drivers driving at the speed limit, not way below it, and the context of overtaking and whether one should pull over.

and the limit is really the minimum sensible speed.

The speed limit is a maximum not a minimum. You may feel they are an indication of the a minmum sensible speed, but that's a concept in your mind which could be the result of your wanting to drive too fast. In the real world, those limits have been set to keep all roads users safe - it is independent of one's own desires or feelings which should not come into it.

I've seen people overtaking where it's hazardous, I expect they thought it was safe to do so: it's a construct in their own minds only. Those people drive very much on the principle that there is unlikely to be anything untoward round the next bend - a stationery car, for example. That is not a safe way to drive - but people rationalise that it is.

Arb.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376478

Postby swill453 » January 13th, 2021, 9:50 am

Arborbridge wrote:The speed limit is a maximum not a minimum. You may feel they are an indication of the a minmum sensible speed, but that's a concept in your mind which could be the result of your wanting to drive too fast. In the real world, those limits have been set to keep all roads users safe - it is independent of one's own desires or feelings which should not come into it.

I remember the introduction to the police driving manual has a comment that people who think speed limits should be higher than they are, are statistically in more accidents than the average driver.

Scott.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376492

Postby Arborbridge » January 13th, 2021, 10:10 am

swill453 wrote:
Arborbridge wrote:The speed limit is a maximum not a minimum. You may feel they are an indication of the a minmum sensible speed, but that's a concept in your mind which could be the result of your wanting to drive too fast. In the real world, those limits have been set to keep all roads users safe - it is independent of one's own desires or feelings which should not come into it.

I remember the introduction to the police driving manual has a comment that people who think speed limits should be higher than they are, are statistically in more accidents than the average driver.

Scott.


I can quite believe it!

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376494

Postby Arborbridge » January 13th, 2021, 10:16 am

I'd just like to comment, that I've pretty much said all I want to say on this subject, and have made my position and opinions clear. The discussion shows signs of becoming repetitive and circular, so unless some new perspective or aspect on this is raised, I'm done for the moment - until it begins in new form in a different thread, perhaps.

If someone else wants to have the last word, that's fine by me, it won't invalidate what I've already said before: let them repeat what has already been repeated - but let us not bore the audience any further :)

Arb.

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376508

Postby vrdiver » January 13th, 2021, 10:36 am

Arborbridge wrote:I'd just like to comment, that I've pretty much said all I want to say on this subject, and have made my position and opinions clear.

What! You've pulled over to let others pass? :twisted:

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Re: 20 mph limits

#376591

Postby Lootman » January 13th, 2021, 2:03 pm

Arborbridge wrote:
Lootman wrote: I consider the law as just one input into real-life decision making.

Unless of course you are going to claim that your Scottish puritanism means that you have never, ever technically transgressed the law ever?

Try that with a shopping lifting charge or worse :roll:

Of course there are times when one might accidentally transgress the speed laws, but since I left my youth behind, never deliberately as far as I remember. Indeed I have been punished for doing so, and one of those punishments resulted in a fine and points which made me more careful ever after.

But here you are advocating not only deliberately breaking the law . .

I start with the premise that everyone breaks the law. Some do it more than others. And some have better reasons than others. But we all do it whether by "accident" as you suggest (which of course is no excuse) or for cause. And drivers probably break more laws than non-drivers - who here has never parked illegally "just for 5 minutes"? According to the original post, people routinely drive at 35 or 40 in the 20 zone near him.

So I do not see this as being a matter of "good" people versus "bad" people. Rather we all have criteria for making the decisions that we do. The law is certainly a factor to be taken into account, but is not the only one. For instance you might speed because you are taking your very pregnant wife to the hospital, or to escape a dangerous situation. Every law has valid exceptions.

So Swill is wrong to assert that I have a "breathtaking" disregard for the law. It is true that I do not mindlessly and slavishly follow every technical regulation just because it is a regulation. Rather I use my judgement to try and always make the best decision in any circumstance. I am no goody-two-shoes but nor I am a serial criminal. Decisions are carefully considered.

And in the 50 years I have been driving I have received just 2 non-parking tickets. Neither was for speeding. One minor "fender bender" accident. Some might call that a good driving record. :D


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